Taiwan School Lunches Make a Name in Japan: New Taipei's Xiufeng Elementary School Wins School Lunch Koshien Medal

[December 18, 2018, Daxiang Food Education Association Press Release]

Taiwan School Lunches Make a Name in Japan - New Taipei City's Xiufeng Elementary School Awarded Medal at Japan's National School Lunch Koshien

On December 8, at the awards ceremony for the 13th Japan National School Lunch Koshien held in Tokyo, dietitian Yang Ruei-ping and chef Chu Feng-mei of Xiufeng Elementary School in Xizhi District, New Taipei City, who took top honors in Taiwan's first school lunch competition, received medals recognizing their outstanding work in school lunches from Chairman Renjo Baba, the founder of the competition. This opened a new chapter in the history of exchanges between frontline school kitchen staff in Taiwan and Japan.

The Japan National School Lunch Koshien competition has been held for 13 years since it began in 2006. School dietitians and chefs from all over the country compete and innovate through the contest, constantly thinking about how to balance safety, nutrition and deliciousness while making good use of ingredients to showcase local culture and terroir. In October this year, Taiwan also held its first national school competition, where dietitian Yang Ruei-ping and chef Chu Feng-mei together presented multigrain rice, lotus leaf steamed pork, salted egg yolk bamboo shoots, sweet potato leaves in oyster sauce, tea-scented yam chicken soup and pomelo. Balancing nutritional completeness with deliciousness and showcasing the unique local terroir of Xizhi District, New Taipei City, the meal won unanimous praise from the judges.

Dietitian Yang Ruei-ping said that since August 1999, when she took the Taipei County recruitment exam and was assigned to Xiufeng Elementary School, it has been nearly twenty years, making it the longest job of her career. There have been hardships, tears and laughter. With the cooperation of school administrators, the parent association and kitchen colleagues, she has always worked diligently and done her utmost to provide students with the best dishes. Whenever she hears praise for the school lunches, she is truly delighted. She is honored that this time she has received recognition from professional workers in both Taiwan and Japan, which is a tremendous encouragement to her, proving that with determination, one can provide five-star delicious, nutritionally balanced meals even within limited conditions. In the future, she will work even harder to find diverse ingredients, vary cooking methods and guide the chefs to prepare fresh, healthy and delicious lunch dishes. Once again, thank you all for enjoying Xiufeng Elementary School's lunches.

Chairman Renjo Baba, who was invited to serve as an international judge for Taiwan's school lunch competition this year, spoke about his first encounter with Taiwan's school lunches and said he was deeply impressed by the dietitians' excellent food education teaching and the rich variety of lunch dishes. This exchange and observation between frontline lunch personnel from Taiwan and Japan is a very good opportunity, and he looks forward to generating more sparks in the future and further cross-national cooperation to jointly safeguard students' dietary health.

Huang Chia-lin, secretary-general of the preparatory office of the Daxiang Food Education Association, who organized Taiwan's first school lunch competition and also observed the Japan National School Lunch Koshien for the second time, believes that starting this year, competitions are being used to highlight difficulties such as insufficient school lunch staffing and large resource disparities between urban and rural areas, as well as to break the public's negative stereotypes. She hopes that with support from all sectors, parents and the public will pay more attention to and affirm the professionalism of frontline lunch workers, become their strong backing, and together accumulate bit by bit the power to change Taiwan.

[Press Contacts]

• Tseng Ni (Project Manager, Daxiang Food Education Association Preparatory Office) / [email protected]
• Huang Chia-lin (Secretary-General, Daxiang Food Education Association Preparatory Office) / [email protected]

[Reference Materials]

• Xiang Bao Inaugural Issue - Daxiang Food Education Season Special
• Five-Star Quality While Saving Money: New Taipei City's Xiufeng Elementary School Wins the 2018 Strongest School Lunch Crown in Taiwan
• Battle on the School Dining Table: The 2018 First Taiwan School Lunch Competition Opens with Fanfare