Turku puts rainbow trout soup back on school menus for €170,000

Turku will bring rainbow trout soup back to school and daycare menus in January, at an estimated annual cost of €170,000, Yle reports. The city says the move is intended to highlight its maritime food culture and encourage children to eat more fish.

The soup will be served every five weeks. Turku currently offers fish soup made with pollock; rainbow trout was removed from the recipe years ago because of its cost, according to Mirva Röning, a service manager at Kaarea, which provides meal services.

Turku service manager Maarit Ketola said the city prepares food for about 28,000 children and young people. By comparison, meatballs cost about €80,000 a year, while serving nuggets once a year costs €6,000.

Fishing is an important livelihood in the Varsinais-Suomi region, and fish has a central place in its food culture. “People here have eaten fish throughout history. We want to raise the appreciation of fish dishes,” Ketola said. The rainbow trout used in the soup will come from Finland or Denmark.

Local dishes appear on menus across Finland

Yle asked municipalities around Finland how local food features in school meals. In Savonlinna, examples include flatbreads, water rings and vendace, which is served once a year. Minna Lahti, the city’s food and cleaning services manager, said the fish is not especially popular with children but adds new flavours and interest to the menu.

Tampere serves black sausage, a local speciality, only on Tampere Day. Schools in Rovaniemi offer pike casserole and Rovaniemi soup, a meat soup made with traditional ingredients from the region. Reindeer and game are not on school menus because they are expensive and difficult to obtain in large quantities, said food and cleaning services director Hajnalka Kiss-Herttua.

In Rauma, children still enjoy lapskoussi, a stew made with slow-cooked meat, potatoes and root vegetables. The dish is not known to be served outside Satakunta. Rauma service director Rami Iltanen said the city once tried serving it every three weeks, but that proved too frequent even for local children.

Marjaana Manninen, an education counsellor at the Finnish National Agency for Education, said introducing children to local traditional foods is an important part of food education. Local food can also include ingredients from nearby areas and dishes that reflect the seasons, she said.