Fish sticks - clearly, not the best of foods, from a health perspective, I suspect, but I loved them when I was in elementary school, and still like them, although I don't eat them as often anymore. In the school district that I grew up in, school lunches were paid for through school taxes, for everyone. No one had to sign up their kid, as a poor person, to receive a free lunch. From K-12th grade, school lunch was a part of the package. In retrospect, I am thinking that the school made out like bandits that way, particularly in high school. Although lunch in the school cafeteria was free, I ate lunch there on the first and second day of my Freshman year, and I was by no means the only kid who stood in line for hamburgers and French fries from the restaurant downtown instead of eating in the cafeteria. So, while the school collected for our lunch in taxes, we paid for the lunch that we actually ate downtown, and they'd have been fools to have prepared lunch for those of us who never ate in the cafeteria. But that's not what this thread is about. In elementary school, apparently fish sticks were more expensive than whatever else they might have prepared because, strangely enough, the fish sticks were only for Catholics, who - at that time- were not supposed to eat meat on Friday. Unless you told the lunch lady you were Catholic, she wouldn't give you fish sticks. So every Friday, all of us Catholics got fish sticks, while the poor Protestants were stuck with whatever other garbage they might have prepared. There were a lot of Catholics on Fridays. We never had fish sticks at home, and I loved the fish sticks that they served every Friday at school. In fact, my memory of them is far better than the ones we sometimes buy now.
We call them fish fingers, and although the ready frozen ones have always been popular with kids... Fish fingers have seen a resurgence with adults in the last few years in pubs and restaurants.. cooked either in breadcrumbs or in batter using fresh cod or haddock , and make big chunky fish fingers out of them and serve them in a huge bun Like this....
We still have them, but my wife can no longer eat anything breaded, so we eat our salmon and halibut strips just fried without breading unless we roll them in coconut.
I still have them occasionally, but like Mrs Don, I can't eat anything breaded, so I dip them in a tempura batter...
I do like the occasional fish stick dinner. At school, they were called Deep Sea Doodles, for some reason......mostly breading, not much fish, which brings to mind "long time no sea."
I ate some fish sticks my daughter bought at Cosco or Sam's not to long ago and they were much better than the ones they used to feed us in school or that I ate at home growing up. I could actually taste more fish than breading. Here's my favorite kind of "fish stick".
Our store carries a few different kinds of fish sticks, none of which are as good as I remember of the ones I had in elementary school. One of them, Gortons, I think, comes pretty close, and is pretty good.
I usually enjoyed the food they served us at school...including the fish sticks... but my children and grandchildren always want to bring their lunch instead of eating what the school serves. I still don't understand why.
I didn't mind most of the stuff we had in elementary school, and the high school lunch was probably okay too, but nothing could beat the hamburger and french fries that they served at the restaurant downtown. They did a huge business serving high schoolers. Since there wasn't time to sit down and order, our choices were restricted to hamburgers or cheeseburgers, and a large pile of french fries, but they were good. Plus, eating in the cafeteria wasn't cool.
In jr high at our gym we could buy hamburgers french fries and hot dogs... They tasted good. Most of the time I took my lunch, was cheaper even then All thru school in cafateria we could buy a big, light roll that was so good. We would buy rolls then a ice cream that came like a square between two pieces of paper like material. Put the ice cream inside that hit roll...outta this world flavor ...um was tasty. As for fish sticks...um not so much as mostly breading. But you can buy some tasty frozen fishes in store freezer that is pretty good.
Bringing your lunch was the "kiss of death" on the Cool-O-Meter at my high school. You'd be consigned to the cafeteria equivalent of Outer Mongolia.
In the first grade, we had rolls that were round and not very thick, but really good. I liked the fish sandwiches in what's now middle school . They were served in hot dog buns. My favorite lunch was a chicken patty sandwich in high school. Best dessert - huge cinnamon rolls
I totally do not remember ever having fish sticks for school lunch, but that doesn’t mean that we didn’t have them, just that they were not memorable, at least to me. The main thing that i remember from school lunches was from grade school, and on Thursday, we had chili and cinnamon rolls for dessert. I love chili, and those cinnamon rolls were the biggest and the best ones that I have ever eaten in my whole life, as I remember. I think that everyone had school lunch in grade schools, or at least I do not remember ever taking a lunch with me; but in high school, then I often packed my own lunch, and usually made tuna sandwiches for lunch the night before. I think that it was “un-cool” to pack a lunch at my school also; but I just did what i wanted and never even thought about what anyone else thought about me bringing my own lunch. As far as liking fish sticks, I DO like them, and we often buy a package of them at Sams or Walmart; because they stay in the freezer and are quick and easy to make a lunch or a fish sandwich out of. We like the fish filets even better, but they are more expensive, and we get less of those for the same amount of money; so sometimes we get one, and sometimes the other. I make fresh tartar sauce, and usually put either lemon or malt vinegar on my fish sticks, and eat them along with my green salad, and Bobby often makes a sandwich out of his.