5 Ways to Add Veggies 🥕 to Your Back-to-School Menus

1. Feature What’s Growing Near You. 

Highlight local vegetables that are harvested in late summer and early fall. Depending on your state, seasonal vegetables may include cabbage, edamame, peppers, and summer squash. Offer taste-testing activities, creative signage, and food education to help students get to know the featured veggie. Be sure to follow local health department guidance for taste-testing events. Use the Food Buying Guide for Child Nutrition Programs to determine the amount of local vegetables to buy to meet meal pattern requirements.

2. Use Vegetables from USDA Foods. 

Frozen green beans and frozen diced carrots are among the most popular vegetables from the USDA Foods in Schools Program. Try the Green Beans with Potatoes and Smoked Turkey recipe on your back-to-school menu. The green beans and carrots now come in smaller 2-pound bags in addition to the 5-pound bags, depending on your needs. Check out the USDA Foods Available List for SY 2021-2022.

3. Offer Grab n’ Go Salads.

Looking for new salad ideas? The Child Nutrition Recipe Box has lots of grab n’ go salad ideas. Try these USDA container salad recipes for Salad Shakers, Marinated Black Bean Salad, Mediterranean Quinoa Salad, and Macaroni Salad.

4. Cater to Your Audience.

The Newton County School System in Georgia offers vegetables using Southern recipes that appeal to their students. Popular vegetable offerings include Black-Eyed Pea Hummus, Cabbage Rolls, Green Beans, Tomato Bisque, and Succotash. The Salt River Pima-Maricopa Indian Schools in Arizona offer a Soam Bav Bowl (Tepary Bean Bowl) made with local ingredients and USDA Foods. This dish reflects indigenous foods from O’odham and Piipaash traditions and is popular among students and school staff.

5. Dress Your Veggies.

Try making USDA’s Ranch Dressing recipe. Learn how to make other salad dressings by viewing the Institute of Child Nutrition’s Scratch-Made Salad Dressings and Condiments webinar. To access this webinar and other on-demand trainings register or sign in to the iLearn portal. If providing pre-packaged salads, remember to keep dressing in a small container and place it inside the larger container with the veggies. That way, if there are any leaks, it goes into the salad!

Share your activities with us on Twitter @TeamNutrition using the hashtag #TeamNutrition
or by emailing us at TeamNutrition@fns.usda.gov.

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