Cafeteria ladies took care of us back in the day

I never see a printed school menu without being reminded of my own years in the lunch line and cafeteria at the Dora schools.

As a species, we humans love to complain.

In those long-ago days before cell phones and the internet (also known as the 1960s and 1970s of my youth), one of the only things most of us had to grouse about was school cafeteria food.

Our lunch ladies at Dora made that exceedingly hard.

Most of our lunch ladies were also school bus drivers. It was a good combination job for industrious local women.

They rose at dawn, rounded us up one or two or three at a time on the miles-long rural bus routes, spent the morning fixing our lunches, survived the chaos of lunch hour each day, spent the afternoon cleaning up the kitchen and cafeteria, and then hauled us all back home again.

Obviously, the smaller population of a rural school meant that our cooks had more flexibility and maybe a little more time to devote than those cranking out thousands of meals a day in large urban schools.

As a result, we had some great meals in that cafeteria.

Pot roast and mashed potatoes were always a favorite. The enchiladas and tacos were perennial hits. Nobody wanted to miss steak fingers and gravy. Turkey and dressing even appeared a few times each year.

More days than not, we also had homemade hot rolls with our lunches — vast trays of golden-brown yeasty perfection. People don't always believe me when they hear that, but it was true. You could almost always count on “seconds” on those rolls, delivered in a napkin by a kind-hearted lunch lady.

At some point, those creative lunch ladies started making … what did they call them … maybe “ranch rolls” or “cowboy rolls?” They filled pockets of yeast dough with meat and cheese and baked them into a meal I still miss after all these years.

Now, in the interest of full disclosure, we also had “bean days.” As an adult, I can appreciate the cooks wanting an easier day now and again, and bean days would have done that.

On bean days (which were usually met with a collective groan when announced in our classrooms), we could count on a hefty serving of pinto beans, with sides of canned spinach and canned tomatoes.

They were redeemed, somewhat, by a square of cornbread and a serving of cobbler.

Ah, yes, homemade cobbler.

Even on bean days, our lunch ladies came through.

Pretty hard to whine about that.

Betty Williamson misses the clank of metal trays but mostly the hot rolls. Reach her at:

[email protected]