Preschools that provide lunch?
We are seeking recommendations on preschools in Berkeley, Oakland, Piedmont, and Emeryville area that provide lunch. We hope to find a preschool where all the children eat the same home-cooked dishes together, and talk about the tastes and textures as a part of their food education.
I grew up in a different country where preschools are free and all kids have to eat the same meals. No microwave food, no snacking allowed outside of designated meal times, and no substitute if a kid decides to be a picky eater that day. So it's hard for me to comprehend why so many preschools here can cost north of 25k a year and still do not heat up lunches for students.
When you recommend a certain preschool, could you also about the style, pros and cons, and your experience about the preschool? Thank you so much!
[Moderator note: here are some previous recommendations: https://www.berkeleyparentsnetwork.org/recommend/preschool/lunch#archive ]
Parent Replies
Au Beau Séjour in N. Oakland is a lovely new preschool (French immersion) that provides lunches. It's amazing and great -- even if the menu isn't exactly how we would feed our child, we are grateful to have only one (older child) meal to pack every day -- and we like the homogeneity of everyone eating together without comparison or envy. The food is nutritious, and our only real complaint (to ourselves, not to the school) is that there is more sugar on the menu than we give our child.
The kids also have a little garden that they get to work in sometimes, and there are chickens. The school is new but the director has a lot of experience. We've only been there since September but are very happy with most aspects of the school. We switched our child from a more expensive school, and although it had some things we preferred, we've learned with two kids that no school is going to have ALL the attributes....or unlikely anyway!
Our daughter is at Au Beau Sejour in Oakland near Emeryville and she loves it. Lunch is provided and looks very tasty — it is French-run and French immersion so no surprise they take food seriously. They just finished a “semaine du goût” (taste week) where they talked in great detail about food :) Happy to provide more details on our experience if helpful and can also refer you if you decide it’s a good fit.
We have been at Claremont Day Nursery at Claremont and Wolsey for several years (two kids), which serves lunch every day, and we love it. In addition to serving lunch, the teachers are wonderful, the price is relatively affordable, the hours are excellent, and the school is open year round with only a one week break around Christmas. The style is not particularly defined - the kids play a lot especially in the large outdoor space, and they get a lot of age appropriate guidance on social interaction and manners (please and thank you). I couldn’t be more happy with it.
My nieces attend Claremont Day Pre-School in Kensington Circle. They have a hot lunch every day, and their rules around eating are excellent (clean up after yourselves, this is what's for lunch, healthy foods, etc). I am planning to send my 15 month old daughter when she is 2. My sister and brother in law are VERY happy with the school, so happy that I didn't pause when it came time to reserving our spot.
I think fewer schools do it nowadays because of all the dietary restrictions: documented, life-threatening food allergies (these are rising), intolerances real and imagined (lactose, sugar, gluten, soy, red dye, etc.), religious restrictions, secular belief-driven restrictions (e.g., vegan, vegetarian, local, all-organic, etc.), and nutritional injunctions (e.g., protein must be consumed at every meal). It’s hard to manage them all while feeding everyone the same thing. And in a culture where most parents allow snacking and food substitution to some extent at home, it’s harder to implement this approach successfully at school. It may not make sense but it’s the culture we’re in.
Claremont Day Nursery! The dishes are not always home made (I think sometimes they get some Costco food), but it is more than balanced out by the pasta with sauce made using tomatoes grown by the owner! We sent our older kid there and plan to send the younger one, too. It is play-based and designed for working families. Many of the teachers have been there for years and years and they do lots of fun family events.
Claremont Day Nursery provided lunch for my son when he attended many years ago. All the kids ate the same meal together, which I thought was a great way to go. This also made it much easier to get out the door in the morning for work because I did not have to pack a lunch!
Grand Lake Montessori in Oakland serves warm lunch. The food is varied, organic and the kids seem to love it. In the toddler program (18 mos. - 30 mo.) the kids also prepare lunch together twice a week. They call it the little chefs program and it's really fun to see the kids involved in preparing a meal. In the primary classroom (2.5 yrs +), in addition to warm lunch, the kids have regularly scheduled baking activities.
Grand Lake Montessori is great school. We feel really fortunate to be a part of the community. The teachers are thoughtful and patient and our kid is happy and absolutely loves school.
Other places you may consider are PRINTS (Pacific Rim International School) in Emeryville and Bright Futures in Oakland.
Wawasi (in Albany, but just over the Berkeley border) provides a home cooked hot breakfast and lunch and two snacks. (I do not know if they discuss the tastes/textures as part of their food education.) Our son seems to eat more veggies there than he does at home.
We've been really happy with the school - the teachers are great and provide a warm environment that helped our son's transition from his nanny. The school is play based and mixed ages, but they do some basic letter recognition, etc, and also bring in outside music and yoga teachers every week. They also speak Spanish, but not exclusively. He gets tons of outdoor time and generally seems happy to arrive and reluctant to leave. (He's under two, so he doesn't tell us much.)
The UC Berkeley Early Childhood Education program works with university dining services to provide mostly organic, nutritious lunches and snacks. It's such a relief for working parents. The program has three preschool sites. Enrollment is generally August through July, but it's worth checking to see if there's an unexpected vacancy. It's not a perfect program and the university bureaucracy is a lot to deal with, but I've liked all the teachers we've had since my daughter was 3 months old.