Lunch bunch give pupils fine fare with big smiles
The dinner ladies at a Newport school dish up care along with their cottage pie. Sian Burkitt went to first sitting...
IT IS a cold, miserable day and rain runs down the windows of Alway Primary School in Newport.
But in the canteen the atmosphere is warm and inviting, and the smell of cooking drifts through the air.
The bell rings and children begin pouring into the hall, all dressed up as their favourite characters for World Book Day.
Overseeing the crowd of Hermione Grangers and Batmans, answering questions, sorting out squabbles and wiping away tears are the unsung heroines of the school, and so many others like it – its dinner ladies.
“I love the kids. I know what they want and what they don’t want,” says Claire Green, 44, who works in the canteen.
Claire greets the children with a big smile as they excitedly approach the counter, picking out their lunch. She has worked in the school for 19 years now, 11 of those as a cook. She switches effortlessly between preparing food, serving the children, and having a laugh with the other ladies in the canteen.
Claire and the other cooks, Clare Cuthbert and Ceri Price, are responsible for everything inside the kitchen – preparing fresh, nutritious meals every day.
“Everything we do today is from scratch,” says Claire. “We make cakes fresh every day. We’ve got everything from sticky toffee pudding to pineapple upside down cake and coconut and jam.”
On the other side of the counter are Toni Gibbons, 53, and Deborah Vaughan, 54, the duo responsible for business outside the kitchen.
“There’s a brilliant community, we all get on really well,” says Toni, chatting about the group of dinner ladies.
Toni and Deborah patrol the dinner hall, smiling and laughing away. They are jokingly trying to convince the cooks to part with a piece of leftover cake.
“I bribe the canteen ladies with sweets,” says Toni, grinning. “I put three sweets down on the side, I pinch a piece of cake, and I put it in my pocket.”
Toni is always found with sweets in her overall, a handy trick to win over children and adults alike. At this point she also insists that I help myself to a bit of freshly baked cake.
“On Fridays, if the kids are good, they have a sweet off me, don’t they, Deb?” says Toni, asking her colleague.
The team obviously have a great bond, not just with one another, but with the children too.
Living on the Alway estate, where the majority of their pupils come from, the dinner ladies are part of their lives both inside and outside school.
Deb chats about how comfortable the children are around them, and starts to laugh when she thinks of one specific memory. “I had a couple of boys a few years back who knocked on my door, saying, ‘Deb, can you phone my mum and tell her I’ll be late home?’” she says.
The dinner ladies also organise the school’s breakfast club, with Claire and her team starting their days at 8am to make sure that every child who needs a breakfast is provided with one.
“It’s good for them. Now we know they’re getting fed,” says Toni.
It’s clear to hear the concern in Toni’s voice as she explains that, if she is ever worried that a youngster may be hungry, she and Claire will make a sandwich for them.
“We’re not supposed to, but we do,” she says.
When they originally began working at the school years ago, if they were concerned that children weren’t eating enough, they could stay with them until they had eaten. But all of that has changed now, and the dinner ladies explain that they cannot make children eat anything they don’t want to.
“We still try and convince them to come and try the food, though. I bribe them with sweets!” says Toni.
Both Toni and Deb have spent most of their lives within walking distance of Alway Primary School, with Toni having attended the school herself when she was younger.
“We’re part of the furniture!” laughs Toni.
Between them, the pair have 25 years’ worth of experience as dinner ladies, and Deb even balances this role with her shifts as a school crossing patrol warden.
“I’ve seen a couple of kids who I knew when they were younger, and now they’re bringing their own kids to school,” says Deb. One thing that every dinner lady agrees has undergone a revolution over the past 10 years is the food at the canteen.
“Times have changed,” says Claire, serving up plates of lasagne.
“There’s no Turkey Twizzlers... it’s all proper home-cooked food.”
Alway Primary School has gone a step further in the campaign for healthy eating by installing a salad bar in the canteen, which children help themselves to.
“The kids love it, when they get their dinner they always put salad on it,” says Deb.
However, despite the children fully embracing their new healthy diet, the dinner ladies still find the odd case of individuals smuggling in sweets and chocolate for lunch.
“Somebody came in the other day, and he had like five bars of chocolate!” says Toni.
She adds, laughing: “I says to him, ‘where’s your sandwiches?’ and he says, ‘I don’t want any!’”
In the canteen, I finish off the cake that Toni insisted I try. It is lovely. She also takes some sweets and puts them into my hand.
“Go on, take some with you!” she insists.
I ask them about their future, and where they see themselves in five or ten years’ time. “We’ll stay here till the end, won’t we, Deb?” says Toni. “We’re not going anywhere.”