North Providence High School offers grab and go lunch options

There's a new addition to the traditional lunchroom serving line at North Providence High School. And it's helping students who are on the go get their food faster.

This year, the North Providence, RI-based school began offering grab and go lunch options in addition to the standard hot lunches. The grab and go items follow the National School Lunch Program guidelines and are kept in a dedicated cold case.

"We're always trying to keep a pulse on what our students are looking for. We kept hearing how busy they are, so we saw an opportunity to add some really quick, accessible items that would sustain them through the afternoon," says Donna Humphries, NPHS Director of Dining Services.

With lunch periods lasting just 25 minutes, many students were finding it difficult to get through the serving line, eat, and still find time to tackle tasks that might need to be done before their next class, like stopping at their locker or finishing up homework. The school's traditional offerings include things like a grill station, deli station, salad bar, and macaroni and cheese bar. "They're popular, but sometimes custom can take a few minutes," Humphries says. "Grab and go can be appealing when a student is short on time."

The grab and go case is stocked with fast and easy fare. When designing the menu, Humphries talked with students to find out what they wanted and considered popular trends, like bento-style boxes. "I've seen students after-hours purchasing them at convenience stores, so it made sense that this quick, convenient, carryable item is something that might be appealing to them," Humphries says.

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Bento boxes, which hail from Japan and are popular throughout Asia, feature individual compartments typically filled with a variety of foods like rice or noodles, fish, meat, vegetables, and eggs. The boxes at NPHS stray from tradition. A hummus box includes fresh vegetables, pita bread, hummus, and reduced-fat cheddar cheese, for instance. Another box features soft pretzel bites with ha, grapes, and cheese. "We have limitations on what we can use, but there's no reason why we can't put sliced apples, yogurt, and cheese together," in a bento-style box, Humphries says.

The options go beyond bento boxes though. There are also wraps, including a buffalo chicken wrap, deconstructed parfaits with yogurt and fruit, and overnight oatmeal cups. Salads are also a hit, and typically feature seasonal ingredients. "We want to make sure to use things that are available to us and use local whenever we can," Humphries says. Over the fall, the grab and go case featured a harvest salad with apples and butternut squash, for instance.

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All of the grab and go items require disposable packaging. The type of box or container that's needed depends on what's being served. "We need different types of containers all with different lids," Humphries says. Salads, for instance, have been packed in cups that students can shake to distribute the dressing.

While packaging required some thought, the main hurdle was training staff to make individual portions for the grab and go case. "Often we cook our recipes in bulk. If you're going to do fried rice it's for 125. When you're building a Caesar salad with grilled chicken, it's all individual. So we needed to break down the recipes into individual serving sizes instead of doing them in bulk," Humphries explained. Figuring out how many of each item to make for the day also came with a learning curve. "We didn't want to over- or under-produce," says Humphries.

Monitoring grab and go case sales helps Humphries determine the appropriate quantity, as well as track what's a hit and what isn't. "Production records determine what we want to continue with. If something doesn't continually sell, we remove it," Humphries says, adding that the bento-style boxes seem to be particularly popular.

The grab and go case has grown in popularity throughout the fall. Of the roughly 550 lunches served daily at NPHS, Humphries estimates that between 70 and 85 are grab and go. "We know our students' time is important to them," she says. "So far we've been having a great response to it."