Starchy food cooked in fat or oil should not be provided on more than three days in a week across the school day.
What is specified in this standard?
Starchy food cooked in fat or oil must not be provided on more than three days in a single week across the school day.
Why this standard needs to be in place
To reduce the amount of fat children eat. Eating non-fatty starchy food is a key part of a healthy diet and will help to control calorie intake, as fat is a very concentrated source of calories.
What counts as a starchy food cooked in fat or oil?
Starchy foods cooked in fat or oil are those where fat or oil has been added before or during the cooking process
Examples of starchy foods cooked in fat or oil are:
- potatoes cooked in oil in the school kitchen e.g. roast potatoes, sauté potatoes, potato wedges, chips
- potato products that have been flash-fried (and are therefore cooked in oil) during manufacture e.g. oven chips, potato wedges, roast potatoes, hash browns, diced potato
- fried bread
- garlic bread where garlic butter is added before heating
- Yorkshire pudding
- fried rice
- fried noodles
- pancakes and waffles cooked in oil
It is important to read the product label and/or product specification information of bought in products to check which items have been flash-fried and would be restricted under this standard.
Examples of foods that are not restricted under this standard are:
- garlic bread made with garlic and herbs in the dough, but no added fat e.g. butter/margarine or oil e.g. olive oil
- toast with butter/spread – the butter/spread is added after the cooking process is complete
- jacket potatoes with butter – the butter is added after the cooking process is complete
- mashed potato made with butter/spread – the butter/spread added after the cooking process is complete.
Good practice
- Prepare as much foods as possible from scratch and use cooking methods that do not use fat or oil e.g. boiling or steaming
- Serve garlic bread as a menu item, not as an extra
- When cooking starchy food in fat or oil, use the minimum amount of oil and drain well
- Use clean oil that is high in unsaturated fats such as sunflower, rape, soya or a mixed vegetable oil.
Is starchy food cooked in fat or oil the same as deep-fried food?
Not necessarily, this depends on how the food is cooked. For example, roast potatoes cooked from scratch in the school kitchen would count as a starchy food cooked in fat or oil, but not as a deep-fried food. Frozen roast potatoes, which are oven-baked in the school kitchen but were flash-fried during the manufacturing process, would count as both deep-fried food and starchy food cooked in fat or oil.
Does the restriction on the provision of starchy foods cooked in fat or oil apply to the number of days on which items are provided, or to the number of items?
The Regulations state that starchy food cooked in fat or oil must not be provided on more than three days in a week. Therefore this standard applies to the number of days on which starchy foods cooked in fat or oil are provided, and not to the number of foods in this category that are provided during the week
For example, if roast potatoes and Yorkshire pudding are both provided as part of a roast dinner, this would be classed as starchy foods cooked in fat or oil being provided on that day of the week, rather than as two separate items being provided.
This standard is different to the restriction on deep-fried items, which applies to the number of deep-fried items provided (rather than the number of days)
Does this standard apply across the school day?
Yes. the restrictions on starchy food cooked in fat or oil apply across the school day.
