Are you a salad bar skeptic? If you are, you’re not alone. Many a committed K-12 food service director is hesitant to try, out of concern over participation, waste, expense, mess, and food safety. And now salad bars in schools are seemingly even trickier to pull off. How do you insure that kids are meeting their daily fruit and vegetable quotas–and the required weekly balance of green and orange veggies, and beans and peas–if you let them serve themselves? For answers, we will first turn to school salad bar evangelist Rodney Taylor, from Riverside Unified, and two of his talented staff. This program was sponsored by Tabard Inn

“Every kid goes through the salad bar first. At that point they are engaged by an adult on each side who encourage children to eat the colors. We want the plate to be colorful.” [09:00]

Rodney Taylor on Inside School Food

“I have served over 6 million salad bar meals in Riverside. For those who tell you it places children at risk – I’ll tell you I haven’t lost one child yet.” [15:00]

“There’s a level of service we want to be able to provide. Once they [the children] see that you care – it will immediately turn [things] around.” [31:00]

— Ryan Douglas on Inside School Food