School lunch has always gotten a bad rap. The food is knocked on constantly, and of course, you have to pay for it, or at least you used to. School lunch is now free for all NYC public school students. Now, if you’re starving and forgot your wallet at home, you don’t need to ask a friend for a couple dollars or spend your day hungry and miserable. You can walk up to the serving area, swipe your ID, or enter the number manually, and eat til your heart contents.

Over the years school lunch has often been equated with being less than appealing to the palate. The majority of opinions from the ten interviewed students were negative. Countless complaints were made about the food being burnt, dry, and runny. Out of the three people who actually eat the lunch, two said that they are starving by the time their lunch period comes around,  and would eat anything. It isn’t the best, but it gets them by.  One male Senior Performing Arts Student, however, loves the lunch and doesn’t understand what’s so bad about it. “It’s really good. I don’t understand why people hate it so much.” Shockingly enough, 6/10 students had no idea that lunch is even free; but this didn’t change their mind on the quality of the food.

With all the controversy surrounding a simple school meal, I had to try it for myself. I prefered the chocolate milk over the regular, but both tasted like cardboard due to the carton. The first thing I tried was a bran muffin, but it wasn’t enjoyable because of how dry and stale it tasted. The mashed potatoes served were burnt and unseasoned, and the turkey was cold. Despite the hot food being a flop, I thoroughly enjoyed the sliced apples and salad.

Eugene, the head cook, is in charge of preparing the meals for each lunch period of students. “Last year we fed about 400 students per day, but now that lunch is free, the number has increased to 600. I feel like if more students knew that lunch was free, more people would be eating it.” Curtis has around 2,000 students, so this number is extremely underwhelming. Eugene says that he wishes the quality of food was better, but he can only work with what the school gives him.