Norfolk schools use hummus to get kids eating healthy food

Historically in Norfolk schools, beans and children haven’t mixed.

“Beans have always been a hard sell for us,” lamented Helen E. Phillips, senior director of child nutrition services for Norfolk Public Schools.

This aversion to beans among the school-age set could soon pose a problem in lunchrooms across the city – and across the land. This summer, Congress is expected to reauthorize the Child Nutrition Act , a big plate of federal food rules that cover food stamps; the Women, Infants and Children nutrition program; and school lunches.

School food and cafeteria workers are anticipating big changes. While veggies have long been a lunchroom requirement, proposed requirements will make the lunch lines even more colorful – and diverse.

Each week, schools will have to offer a half cup of dark green vegetables, a half cup of orange vegetables, one cup of starchy vegetables and at least a half cup of legumes.

Last week at Sewells Point Elementary School, Norfolk’s food services staff tackled the legume imperative. Their secret weapon: hummus.

Hummus is a smooth, Middle Eastern dip made from ground chickpeas – a legume also known as garbanzo beans – mixed with lemon juice, garlic and olive oil. It’s usually served with pita, a flatbread. The hummus that the kids were trying came from Azar’s Natural Foods, a local food service purveyor with two Mediterranean restaurants.

As students filed into the cafeteria, cooks in the kitchen arranged a regiment of plastic cups on oversized baking trays. They placed a dab of hummus in the bottom of each cup and a quartet of carrots on top.

The food services staff suspected that few Sewells Point students had ever eaten hummus, but Christina Kepa, the school division dietician who conjured the idea, figured the dish might appeal to them.

“All of the kids love dip,” she explained, “and they are already used to and like carrots.”

An elementary school cafeteria is a controlled pandemonium of motion, sound and smell. At Sewells Point, laughter and chatter and squeals mixed with the scent of pizza and spaghetti and yeasty bread as the experiment began.

A gaggle of young students were well into their meals when the grown-ups filed into the lunchroom proffering the new food.

“This is hummus; it’s made with chickpeas,” Kepa cheerfully told a group of kindergartners, carefully avoiding the “B” word.

Connor Curry cast a wary glance toward the concoction. Then he stretched out his pointer finger and slowly and deliberately pushed the new, strange food out of his space.

Others were more open.

Second-grader D’Aundrae Griffin downed his hummus and carrots quickly. His verdict: “It tastes like potatoes!”

In the mysterious world of children’s taste buds, students compared hummus to chocolate (three children), cheese (two kids), ham and grapes.

“I don’t really know what it tastes like; it just tastes so good!” was the verdict of Madilyn Reid, a second- grader.

Overall, food services staffers concluded that the hummus had ample “kid appeal.” That made Phillips happy because hummus contains fiber, B vitamins and olive oil, a healthy fat. It’s far better than the low-fat ranch dressing the kids now dip their baby carrots into.

The next day, the middle school set wasn’t as open.

“A whole different crowd,” Phillips said.

Only about half the kids liked it. She expects high school will be harder still.

“The thing is,” she said, “you’ve got to get them while they’re young.”

Lorraine Eaton, (757) 446-2697, lorraine.eaton@pilotonline.com