Returning to school for a new academic year, students around the country were met by a federally mandated cafeteria policy that gave them more whole-grain bread products and required them to take helpings of fruit and vegetables in the lunch line.

Many students reacted to being told “It's good for you” the same way kids have reacted to that admonition since peas and carrots first poked their way through Mother Earth's fertile soil.

Good-for-you food is ending up in the rubbish.

“You have to take a vegetable and a fruit,” said Paige St. George, a Manchester Memorial High School junior. “(Students) walk out the door and everyone throws (the healthy food) in the trash.”

New federal rules set minimum requirements for everything from the nutritional value of bread to the amount of fruit and vegetables that students must take in the cafeteria line.

Schools are struggling to adapt.

“We've seen a lot more food thrown away,” said Nancy Faucon, food service director for the Londonderry Schools.

Smaller serving sizes

The new menus are a product of the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act, a bill passed in 2011 during a lame-duck session of the 111th Congress. Championed by First Lady Michelle Obama, the law essentially told the U.S. Department of Agriculture to make sure food served in school cafeterias is healthy.

New USDA rules took effect at the start of the school year. They govern what has to be served at lunchtime and what cannot appear on the menu at schools that accept federal reimbursement money for school lunches.

The rules often don't go over well with hungry students.

“In order (for schools) to be reimbursed for a full meal, the students now need to take a full meal, and sometimes that means the students are filling their plates with the required food components and not eating them,” said Jane Simard, food services director for the Derry public schools. “For example, in the past a student could take a milk and a sandwich, and that would be considered a reimbursable meal, whereas now, the student must also take a fruit or vegetable in order for us to get reimbursed.”

The federal dietary domain begins and ends in the lunchroom.

As the New Hampshire Commission on Childhood Obesity noted in its 2009 report, “The USDA does not have the authority to regulate foods sold outside the cafeteria or outside of meal times.”

The USDA can and has told schools that lunch must include at least three of five food groups. Students must take a half-cup of fruit and be offered a second half-cup.

“Fruit, grains, meat or a meat alternative, vegetable and milk make up a reimbursable meal,” said Jim Connors, who heads the food service program in Manchester. “We are using the same menus as last year; the changes are the whole grains and things that are done pursuant to the wellness policy.”

Manchester Board of School Committee member John Avard said he has visited high school and middle school cafeteria and heard from students who don't think they're being served enough. Those students, he said, wind up turning to vending machines for snacks to quell rumbling stomachs.

“I don't believe the portions are truly the size that they used to be,” Avard said of the school lunches.

Adjustments to serving sizes have indeed been made. In Manchester, rules for bread formerly counted a sub roll as five servings, which required an adjustment.

“We went to a smaller sub roll,” Connors said. “In terms of other components of the meal, they are the same — the same amount of meat and cheese, lettuce, tomato, hot sauce, pickles. They still get all that; we haven't cut back.”

Manchester also confronted an issue when its supplier of wraps ran low on lunch-sized tortillas and had to substitute a smaller breakfast size at the start of the school year.

Hardest hit among cafeteria offerings appears to be that traditional school cafeteria favorite: the pizza slice.

“The pizza got smaller,” observed Manchester Memorial student Ramon Taveres.

To keep servings of bread in line, pizza slices have in fact been reduced. Food service directors say the smaller size has been supplemented with other foods from the prescribed healthy-choice menu.

Student Jasmine Dobe said students sometimes reach for pizza only because they don't like other choices.

“You shouldn't have pizza every day,” Dobe said.

Cupcake bans

In some districts, the dietary watchdogs have extended their authority beyond the cafeteria.

The Bedford Bulletin, a sister publication of the New Hampshire Sunday News, recently reported that Bedford's school district had banned cupcakes and the like from children's classroom birthday parties. School officials blamed federal regulations.

Similar restrictions also have been adopted in Nashua.

But contrary to public statements made by some officials, the restrictions on what can be served, eaten or shared outside of the cafeteria don't come from the federal government.

New Hampshire adopted rules last December in light of recommendations in the 2009 report from the state Commission on Childhood Obesity, according to Judy Fillion, a registered dietician and director of program support at the state Department of Education.

The 2011 rules require districts to have a policy that regulates distribution of healthy foods, and the policy must include “nutritional targets for foods and beverages made available outside the federally regulated school meals program.”

A DOE technical advisory distributed to districts along with the new rules states, “The Department recognizes that classroom parties and celebrations may be difficult to address. It is also recognized that there are many benefits to holding healthy celebrations.”

The advisory suggests limiting classroom celebrations to a “birthdays of the month” event, asking families to suggest healthy items or “celebrate without using food.”

Trial and error

For the people planning the menus and fixing the meals, finding foods students will eat rather than dump is a challenge.

“Really, it's a matter of trial and error, of finding things the kids are going to eat,” said Londonderry's Faucon.

“At this point, we're cautiously optimistic,” said Megan Bizarro, food service director for the Goffstown School District.

Her strategy is to make the new healthier food options look more appealing than the stewed prunes their grandparents turned aside when they were kids — and to serve the healthy foods with a smile.

“If we're not positive, our customers pick up on that,” Bizarro said. “And who wants to come in and see a grumpy lunch lady?”

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Bill Smith may be reached at wsmith@unionleader.com. Union Leader correspondents Adam Swift (aswift@newstote.com), April Guilmet (aguilmet@newstote.com) and Kathy Remillard (kremillard@newstote.com) contributed to this story.