School nutrition programs are moving away from highly processed foods and toward more scratch and speed scratch cooking. Students and families are asking for tasty, less processed meals, and school nutrition programs are finding ways to make that happen.
Scratch cooking uses raw, whole, and fresh ingredients to prepare meals. Speed scratch cooking combines some prepared ingredients with fresh foods to cut down on prep time while improving flavor and quality compared to heat-and-serve meals.
According to the School Nutrition Association’s School Nutrition Trends Report SY 2025-26, approximately 71.1% of responding school nutrition programs offer scratch-prepared entrees on a daily or weekly basis, showing that the shift is already happening.
The Benefits of Moving Toward Scratch (and Speed Scratch)
Scratch and speed scratch cooking help you serve meals that taste better and contain fewer processed ingredients. Not every item has to be made from scratch to make a difference. Even a few small swaps can add flavor and variety, and make it easier to increase student participation.
- Incorporating fresh and local ingredients
- Lowering food costs compared to fully processed items
- Improving quality and student appeal
- Meeting nutrition targets for saturated fat, added sugars, and sodium
- Increasing student access to fresh, healthy meals
- Expanding students’ palates and including cultural flavors
- Providing more control over what is served each day
The Real Cost Comparison: Labor vs. Food
Scratch cooking usually means lower food costs because you’re buying more raw, whole foods. It also takes more labor and more time because of the extra prep and training. There’s a lot to do before the food ever hits the tray: washing, chopping, cooking, portioning, and cleaning up.
Speed scratch cooking is different. Some ingredients come in already prepped or cooked, which cuts down on prep time and labor. The downside is that those items usually cost more than raw ingredients.
With staffing shortages and limited time in the kitchen, many school nutrition programs choose speed scratch because it helps keep meals consistent without stretching staff too thin.
What’s Ideal for Speed Scratch Cooking?
While scratch and speed scratch cooking come with many benefits, they also come with real challenges. What’s possible can look different across districts and even between schools in the same district. It comes down to resources, like staffing, time, equipment, and kitchen setup.
- Labor and time: Scratch prep takes time, and many kitchens don’t have extra hands.
- Skills and training: Scratch recipes have more steps, and teams may need time and training to make them the same way every day.
- Equipment and space: Limited ovens, prep space, and storage can limit how much scratch is realistic.
- Food safety: More scratch prep means more food safety steps to track, like temperatures, cooling, holding, and other critical control points.
- Compliance and documentation: Scratch menus still need standardized recipes, crediting, and documentation that meets USDA requirements.
- Budget and products: Some ingredients cost more, and product quality can vary by vendor.
For programs trying to expand scratch cooking and rely less on processed foods, extra resources can make a big difference. This may include funding, time for recipe testing and menu planning, culinary training, staffing support, and equipment or facility upgrades.
How Health-e Pro Can Help With the Shift
Moving toward scratch and speed scratch cooking can feel overwhelming. Health-e Pro can help you stay organized and compliant as you make the shift.
Health-e Pro’s Global Recipe Database includes 5,000+ USDA-compliant recipes, including scratch and speed scratch options, with crediting information and documentation. You can start with one that fits your program, copy it, make adjustments, and add it to your menu in just a few clicks.
Meal pattern and compliance checks catch issues early, like a missing component or a menu that’s high in sodium, so you can make adjustments before service.
Health-e Pro’s Business Insights Dashboard gives you the data you need to make scratch and speed scratch work for your program. You can track meal cost and average food cost for budget planning, meals per labor hour for staffing, and menu popularity to understand what students actually like.
And with online menu publishing, you can add recipe images to menus and sidebars to highlight scratch and speed scratch items and show families what’s being served.
Making the Shift Sustainable
As more programs shift to scratch cooking, sustainable practices help support long-term success. While scratch may be the goal, speed scratch is the strategy that makes it achievable. Speed scratch is how schools make real improvements without stretching staff, time, or budgets too thin.
For more support, check out our blog post, Writing Standardized Recipes for School Nutrition Programs or head over to our YouTube channel and check out our Standardized Recipes Expert Series video to learn how to write scratch and speed scratch recipes.