What’s Cooking? Breakfast for School Kids

CHENNAI: At the quiet hour of 3.30 am, Uma and her team of eight women arrived by vehicle at the ‘Perunthalaivar Kamarajar’ breakfast preparation kitchen, located within the Chennai middle school in the Oragadam area of Ambattur.

First the women thoroughly cleaned the kitchen, and then supervisor Uma briefed her team before commencing work.

“The Chief Minister has entrusted us with the responsibility of preparing breakfast for schoolchildren. As we undertake this task for the first time, we must prepare the meal with a sense of responsibility, ensuring it is hygienic, delicious and made with a cheerful spirit,” she said.

Everyone was made to wear gloves, headgear and aprons. She also directed that the breakfast menu for the day — comprising ven pongal, sambar made vegetables with brinjal, onion, tomato and drumstick, as well as sakkarai pongal (sweet pongal), to mark the launch of the expanded breakfast scheme, — be prepared.

After collecting the ingredients, each person offered a prayer and began their work.

Supervisor Uma instructed her team to thoroughly wash the rice and lentils thrice in clean water, and to wash and then chop the vegetables. As the women launched into the work, Uma’s voice could be heard intermittently — specifically checking if the rice was cooked, instructing them to boil the lentils in the pressure cooker and advising them to cook the food over moderate flame.

Only the sounds of cooking were audible in the quiet morning.

Kitchens have been set up at three locations within the Ambattur zone — the Chennai school in Oragadam, Padi Kuppam and Ambattur Ram Nagar.

Breakfast is supplied from these three locations to 5,493 students across 51 schools. This benefits 2,802 students in classes 1-5, along with 2,691 students in the newly-included classes 6-8.

Around 5.30 am, as breakfast preparations were nearing completion, the tempering process filled the air with a delightful aroma.

Once the breakfast was ready around 6 am, municipal officials tasted it and approved the quality. Subsequently, the required quantities for each school were weighed, the school names marked on the containers, and the food loaded onto vehicles for despatch to the schools at exactly 6.30 am.

Corporation officials further stated that they would supply breakfast items — specifically ven pongal, rava kichadi, wheat rava kichadi and millet kichadi — along with the necessary vegetables and sambar, five days a week.

Uma said, “We have been newly selected for this scheme, and we are happy about it. On behalf of our team, we first express our gratitude to the Chief Minister.”

She said the Corporation has provided them with training on how to prepare food that is clean, hygienic and tasty.

It fills us with a sense of awe and happiness to realise that thousands of schoolchildren are consuming the breakfast we have prepared with such care, added the supervisor.

Her team then left with joy and a sense of fulfilment, noting that they needed to go home to cook for their family.

Speaking about the expanded scheme, Radhakrishnan, a father from Pudur, said he works for a private company and has two children — a son (class 7) and a daughter (class 4) in the same school. While his daughter used to receive breakfast in school, his son would often go without a proper meal because the parents left for work early in the morning. Now, thanks to the Chief Minister’s expanded breakfast scheme, his son also receives breakfast in school.

Amutha, a third-grade student of the Oragadam school, made a telling comment, “At home, they make sakkarai pongal only occasionally, but today I am happy to have eaten it right here in the school.”