'Commodities First' menus equal savings

Date: March 16, 2019 Posted by Amy Mail Twitter Facebook

The USDA gives schools a gift every year in the form of commodity foods, officially known as USDA Foods. They provide nutritious foods to federal child nutrition programs while supporting American agriculture production. Using your commodities' entitlements to the fullest extent is just one of the ways NutriStudents K-12 helps ensure the integrity of your foodservice budget.

Our executive chef creates our school lunch menus with a "commodities first" mindset. Starting with available USDA Foods, she masterfully develops flavorful recipes that students will love. USDA offers more than 75 dry, canned, and frozen USDA Foods such as meat, cheese, produce, flour and pasta. Using commodities first, NutriStudents K-12 menus can help you reduce your overall food costs.

To help you allocate your USDA Foods entitlements for 2019-2020 accurately, access our Commodity Forecasting Calculator. Simply enter the number of times you plan to use specific NutriStudents K-12 menu weeks in your rotation next year, and the calculator will instantly give you the quantity of each commodity food to order on your survey. If you'd like a walk-through on how to use our Commodity Forecasting Calculator, contact customerservice@NutriStudentsK-12.com.

Clients who are not able to identify the specific NutriStudents K-12 menus weeks to offer in 2019-2020 yet can use these general recommendations for help with your USDA Foods' survey.