Do you have fond memories of your school dinners, or did they scar you for life so much that you’ve tried to erase them from your memory ever since?
We have to admit that they make us nostalgic whatever way though.
In the week that Bernard Matthews officially announced the #ComebackOfTheCentury in the return of cult-classic school dinner food – the Turkey Twizzler – we thought there is no better time to take a trip down memory lane and have a look back at what was put on our multi-coloured plastic divider trays at lunch time as kids.
Both the retro and the slightly more modern options – we’ll always remember our school dinners.
This list of course isn’t definitive of every school dinner at every primary and secondary school across Greater Manchester spanning multiple decades, so don’t get too enraged if we’ve missed off your favourite food from back in the day.
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These are some of the classics though.
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Turkey Twizzlers
Bernard Matthews
Could we really start this list with anything else?
Before they were ripped from the menu for being too unhealthy for kids by chef Jamie Oliver in 2005, and then manufacturing ceased all together a few years later, Turkey Twizzlers pretty much summed up school dinners.
Why is it that all school dinners, especially primary school dinners, came drenched in beans?
And when we say drenched, we don’t just mean on the side of your plate where you expect them to be, we mean drenched. Baked beans are a classic accompaniment to any meal here in the UK, but perhaps none more so than at school.
We’re not complaining though.
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Cheese Whirls
That soggy cheesy/potato pastry combination will forever be ingrained in our minds.
If it wasn’t a cheese whirl served up at your school, then it was a slice of cheese pie, or perhaps some sort of cheese flan instead.
Whatever way, it was definitely soggy.
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Pasta King
Pasta King
One for the 00s-10s secondary school/college students out there – Pasta King.
Despite the fact it was about 75% water at the bottom and it always left you questioning why it couldn’t have just been drained out first, Pasta King was still a top-tier edition to the lunch time menu.
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Turkey Dinosaurs
If it wasn’t Turkey Twizzlers, then it was Turkey Dinosaurs.
They’re still made by manufacturers Bernard Matthews to this day, but probably don’t make their way onto school dinner plates quite as often. They never got quite as bad of a rep as Turkey Twizzlers, but maybe that’s because Jamie Oliver just didn’t want to force the turkey kind of dinosaurs into extinction after the real ones already had.
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Shout out to the other classic school dinner foods of potato smiley faces, spaghetti hoops and chips in the picture too.
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Crinkle-Cut Carrots
The carrots were always cut like this.
Why? Was it to make them look a little more exciting and appealing to kids? We’ve no idea.
The only thing we can guess at is that they’re probably bought cut like that in the packet, because we’ve never seen a carrot grow in that shape.
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School Dinner Sponge
Need we say more?
There’s perhaps no other school dinner dessert that was so well-loved by all than the classic ‘School Dinner Sponge Cake’ with the icing and multi-coloured sprinkles, and even to this day, people all across the UK are trying their hands at recreating the recipe at home.
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Angel Delight
AKA pink custard
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It was commonly known by kids as the ‘pink custard’, but is that really what it was? According to the Angel Delight packaging, it’s just described as a “dessert”, which really doesn’t give much away at all.
Not that it matters though – Angel Delight was a welcomed addition to any school dinner menu.
There are also multiple other flavours in the Angel Delight range, including chocolate, banana and butterscotch, but strawberry seemed to be the winner with lunch staff in schools and for that reason, it will always be known as ‘pink custard’.
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Arctic Roll
Arctic Roll / Birds Eye
You knew it was a good day when Arctic Roll was on the menu.
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We’re not really sure why it was such a taste combination revelation because in theory, it really shouldn’t work should it? And yes, nine times out of ten the cake was really dry, but we loved it anyway.
If ice cream and cake is an acceptable choice, then why not just stick the ice cream in the cake?
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Choc Ices
Choc Ices – who can forget that paper-thin blue and white striped packet?
In contradiction to the excitement you felt when Arctic Roll was on the menu, Choc Ices always just seemed to be a bit of a let down, didn’t they? Like a cop-out dessert chosen at the last minute, but looking back now though, we probably gave them a bit of a hard time.
A Choc Ice would go down quite well right about now.
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Review | ‘This is a night to remember, Manchester’ – Jason Derulo’s Co-op Live debut
Amy Williams
Who’s ready for another throwback night? Because this was absolutely a night already full of nostalgia and one to remember.
American singer-songwriter Jason Derulo hit Co-op Live last night as part of his ‘The Last Dance World Tour’, famous for hit songs like ‘Whatcha Say’, ‘Talk Dirty’, and ‘Savage Love’ – we all remember the Covid TikTok dance, don’t we? – as well as many more.
With over 250 million singles sold and tens of billions of streams, you best believe his one night in Manchester was sold out.
Running through the big hits and everything in between, he and his dancers made it a proper party atmosphere on this fine Saturday evening.
He did his throwback songs and more; from the moment he said, “We’re throwing it back to the beginning, back to 2009″, we knew his first debut single, ‘Whatcha Say’, was about to grace our ears, and that it did.
He also brought back absolute classics like ‘Ridin’ Solo’ (I definitely lost my voice during this one) In My Head and It Girl.
The Last Dance run of shows has seen him visit places like Leeds, London, Glasgow and Birmingham, finishing his UK leg right here in Manchester, before he carries on to Europe, but we’re confident our date had the best crowd so far.
And just when you think this couldn’t get any better, he brought his little boy on stage to say hi to everyone, too – shattered everyone’s hearts.
He has that many hit songs, it wasn’t possible to get through them all, so his DJ halfway through did a mash-up of songs he’s also written and featured in, including ‘I Gotta Feeling’ by Black Eyed Peas, ‘Secret Love Song’ with Little Mix and ‘Replay’ by Iyaz.
We knew his voice was amazing – but can we have a moment for this man’s dance moves, keeping everyone on their feet at Co-op Live tonight, and his dancers made everyone want to start dance lessons tonight too, an absolutely incredible performance by all.
Jason Derulo told the audience, “This is a night to remember Manchester’, and that it absolutely was.
The story behind Sâlo: the rising Georgian-born Salford artist set be one of the region’s next stars
Danny Jones
We always love stories of people moving to Manchester to be more creatively engaged, but tales of entire families relocating here for a better life and art being born out of it is something truly special – and besides her obvious talent, that’s what has attracted us and plenty others to Sâlo.
This up-and-coming Salfordian artist may have been born around the border between Eastern Europe and Western Asia during a particular fraught time for her country, but she’s been raised and moulded like so many of us by this city’s rich music culture and wider artistic heritage.
She came to the UK with her family as a baby, with her parents fleeing poverty and lingering friction in Georgia following the collapse of the Soviet Union in the 90s, and their journey as asylum seekers eventually brought them here to the North West.
It was clear from a young age that Sâlo (short for Salome) had a gift for the piano, but it was when her family moved to the Greater Manchester area that her own interest in genres and styles began to develop. Here’s a little snippet of her recent performance at the stunning Stoller Hall.
This short video was taken from her feature in a recent episode of Manchester: Unplugged, the web series by StreamGM that launched just last year and spotlights local songwriters.
Honing in on one of her newest releases, ‘Set Me Free’, which taps into that pure love for the keys.
While this clip shows a stripped-back version of the fully-fledged electronic studio version, with production playing a key role in defining her sound, she blends everything from classical music and jazz to neo-soul as well as drum and bass.
You hear the phrase ‘genre-bending’ thrown around a lot these days, but if this mid-20s star in the making isn’t the epitome of that term, then we don’t know who is.
Speaking more about her background in the short documentary film, which aired on YouTube this week, she talks about her first memory of visiting Forsyth Music Shop in Manchester city centre, and the inspiration behind the track in question.
You watch the Sâlo episode of Manchester: Unplugged in full here.
Detailed in the description of the newest edition of the online show, “Classically trained from the age of four, Sâlo’s journey runs through some of Manchester’s most important music spaces”, including time spent at the RNCM and Chetham’s School of Music and more.
As for the tune itself, not only do the lyrics revolve around a difficult patch in a personal relationship – this being one of the first times she felt like she’s fully opened up and not held back on letting people know what she’s speaking about – but it’s also the first track she’s produced and mixed entirely on her own.
Painstakingly mastered from a small studio at home, she almost “fell out of love” with the song altogether, but getting back to that simple joy of playing piano helped revive her passion for it.
With a stunning voice, natural musical talent when it comes to her instrument, and a great blend of different analogue and digital influences, Sâlo is definitely one to watch moving forward.
Emily Sergeant -
18th August 2020 
