S06E09 The School Meals Service with Heather Ellis: shownotes Neil’s guest today is Heather Ellis from Sheffield University. Helen is a historian of Education and she, along with academics from the University of Wolverhampton and UCL, have just embarked on an ambitious project looking at people’s experiences and memories of their school dinners in all four UK Home Nations. School dinners have been supplied by the School Meals Service – i.e. by the Government – since 1908. They talked about the project, the origins of the School Meals Service in the first decade of the 20th century, the foods served up over the next 100 years or so including pink sponge and custard, liver with the tubes attached and the now infamous turkey twizzlers, Maggie Thatcher – milk snatcher, the fall in the quality of school dinners, as well as Jamie Oliver’s campaign to get them sorted out, and many other things. The School Meals Project wants your food memories if you have had experience with school meals in the UK, however old you may be and whatever the interaction may be. School Meals Project website: https://www.theschoolmealsproject.co.uk/ Find Heather on Twitter @HeatherLWEllis Find The School Meals Project on Twitter: @ESRCSchoolMeals Jamie Oliver’s school meals campaign clip: https://youtu.be/DG66rKiNkw4 When published, Neil’s blog post with a recipe for sago pudding, will be found at www.britishfoodhistory.com Other past blog post recipes for school dinner-style foods: Rice pudding: https://britishfoodhistory.com/2015/01/14/rice-pudding/ How to make a steamed sponge pudding: https://britishfoodhistory.com/2023/01/13/how-to-make-a-steamed-sponge-pudding-a-step-by-step-guide/ Jam roly-poly: https://britishfoodhistory.com/2011/11/26/jam-roly-poly/ Proper custard: https://britishfoodhistory.com/2012/03/02/proper-custard/ Eton Mess: https://britishfoodhistory.com/2011/08/11/eton-mess/ Other bits: The Elizabeth Raffald Manchester Central Library event at 6pm on 13 September: https://librarylive.co.uk/event/elizabeth-raffald-englands-most-influential-housekeeper/ Neil will be speaking at the Ludlow Food Festival on Sunday 10 September at 2.30pm, talking all things Elizabeth Raffald: https://www.ludlowfoodfestival.co.uk/ He is also talking at Chelsea History Festival on Friday 29 September 2023, at 6pm about the history of sugar: https://chelseahistoryfestival.com/events/dark-history-sugar/ Neil’s blogs: ‘British Food: a History’ a href="http://britishfoodhistory.com/"...