LUNCH BREAK

DINNERS, TUCKSHOP/BUNS,

ICE CREAMS & LOLLIES, DINNER BREAK

You certainly did get sticky buns from the dining hall at break it was one of the highly responsible duties of a prefect to supervise distribution of said items { 1d each i think, and that was when a penny WAS a penny!!} to the oiks who pushed and shoved at the door i seem to remember that the buns had a particularly dark and malty taste perhaps that explains why certain members of this list have retained a craving for a good malt? i must admit that buns have never smelt or tasted as good since perhaps not as stirring a memory as the front of hc's blouse but nevertheless it comforts me on cold, dark winter evenings {that reminds me....i must tell you a story about john madell at some point} i don't remember bottles of milk though only when we were at rush green { and yes, i WAS a milk monitor!} (Graham Lee)

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Sticky buns which cost 1d on Mondays, Tuesdays, Thursdays & Fridays... but on Wednesdays they were CREAM buns with a dash of jam! These were twice as expensive and you had to get there mighty quick or the "gannets" had scoffed them all.I believe that, in the class-ridden society in which we lived, prefects were allowed to ORDER theirs in advance and had them trayed up to their little "pit" beside room 2. (Confirm this over-indulged privilege please, Graham? David B? John?) ...and, of course, the staff were allowed to jump the queue!!! It didn't 'arf p*** you off when you'd queued for half of breaktime only to witness Boozer or Ron Smith snap up the last cream buns when you were next in the queue with your tanner clutched in your sweaty hand! Worse still, of course if it was B-C (thoughts might have turned murderous!) or Scrooge! (David Maltby)

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I can remember doing my duty and dispensing both liquid and solid refreshment in exchange for cash, from the dining room during morning break. That would have been 1974-5.
I think I recall both prefects and masters jumping the queue, but I don't recall making up special orders. However, my memory of this is rather vague.(John Phillips)

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I rarely ate school dinners - I took sandwiches and 'a Thermos' into Room 21 each lunchtime, where a - yes, a pr*f*ct - would maintain a watchful eye over us. (Andy Lee)

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I was one of those rare (and peculiar) pupils who actually liked school dinners!! yes, yes... I know it wasn't fashionable and schoolmates looked askance and tended to leave road maps, with the route to Warley Hospital heavily
outlined, where you were most likely to stumble across them... but I reckon that most of the food was eminently eatable if you could put up with the troughing habits of the seven other oiks at your table.
The school custard - as I believe I have mentioned - was out of this world, especially if you could persuade the serving lady to heave a great dollop of the "skin" from the top onto your plate.
To liven up mealtimes on our table, we would pass the time with a pocket ready-reckoner giving impossibly difficult
long-multiplication-of-pounds-shillings-and-pence sums to a guy called Mayo to do in his head! (We were assigned alphabetically to our tables so Maltby, Marshall P, Marshall S, Mayo, Painter +3 others...) Peter Mayo was a ginger-headed, freckled, mathematical genius and NEVER got any of these sums wrong. We'd have been devastated if he ever had!
He was another VERY faddy eater and left most of his food every meal. He had a particular dislike for peas and, one day left a huge pile of peas on his plate with, for some reason, his spoon stuck into them. This was just too much for the guy sitting next to him who suddenly smacked his hand down on the handle and launched a myriad peas into the air to rain down on all and sundry! Typically first year, we were helpless with laughter for the rest of the meal! (David Maltby)

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I recall that during wet breaks we were permitted to remain in our class rooms, and were supplied with ancient National Geographic magazines to keep us quiet. These had acquired graffiti modifications over the years. A popular amendment involved the name Kruger, a boy in the year above mine. Does anyone know why he was such a popular butt of jests? (John Hawkins)

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The shop at the corner of Station and Brentwood Roads referred to by some HMs as a confectioners, and others as a tobacconist!, was called "THE CANDY SHOP". They used to sell bags of broken ice-cream wafers for a halfpenny a bag: an adequate replacement for school 'meat and 2 veg' (Eric Barker)

JH asked "Most boys paid for a hot meal of meat & two veg. every day. (Question for the 'older' members - how did we pay for meals before the dinner tickets started in the early 60s?) A few brought sandwiches, or went home nearby."

In the early '50's school dinners cost 2/6d a week. The money was collected on a Monday morning. That's sixpence a day for a hot meal and desert, not bad value even although the quality and taste of much of the food left something to be desired. If you didn't want school dinners you bought sandwiches or for those who lived close, went home.

Personally I ate the dinners the first year but then found that 2/6d bought cigarettes and sweets on a Monday morning at a small shop close to Gidea Park Station and also left a little over for other goodies later in the week. I always bought a sandwich from home and ate that instead of the dinners, which my parents thought I was registered for.  If one did not eat the dinners, there was far more time for play during the dinner break. (Mike Merry)

In my day, school dinners were (or could be) paid for by the term! After much soul-searching, I decided in my last term (summer 1953) to withhold the entire payment on the first day and hoard it. I invested some of this amazing capital in a chromatic harmonica from the big music shop in Romford. The problem was where to keep it at home, and where to play it. In the end I swapped it for some useless stuff from another boy, it had become a liability! But I was also a regular visitor to the confectioners/newsagents across the crossroad from Gidea Park Station. Coconut ice, and sometimes licorice sherbets! The shop is now some kind of ethnic takeaway, I think I noticed before the 2002 Reunion. (Robert Priddy)

Robert P. referred to a sweet shop where he spent his money. The one I used was in Station Road. Instead of taking the alleyway along the embankment through to the Upper Brentwood Road (emerging just south of the bridge), one would take Station Road to Upper Brentwood. Just before Upper Brentwood, on the right hand side was the shop. (MJM)

The caretaker staff had quite a daily routine for the school hall. After morning assembly in the cleared hall, trestle tables lined the hall for morning break. All those crates of standard issue 1/3 pint of milk - as many as you wanted. In winter they could be frozen, needing thawing on the radiators. In summer they would be at body temperature! Then the tables & benches were organised for school dinners - were there two sittings? A prefect to keep order with the use of a ladle! They would nominate tables to join the queues at the serving area. To keep the noise down they would thump tables with their ladle, sometimes bending the handle to our amusement. The day ended with the hall cleared for morning assembly again. Where were all the tables and benches stored?
For a year or two I somehow became one of the dinner trolley boys. We would sit by the main hall doors organising the used plates, & ferry them back to the canteen on double-deck trolleys. This entitled us to first place in the dinner queue, & special treatment. Most boys complained that the food was terrible, and that they didn't get enough of it. We would have as much as we wanted. There was a small tax-free payment at the end of the week. There must be many memories of good and bad meals. Treacle tart was a popular dessert. Also steamed pudding with hot chocolate sauce. I remember complaining of quite a large stone in salad, which had almost broken a tooth, but the dinner lady assured me that it would have been well washed. I kept that as a souvenir (evidence) for many years. (John Hawkins)

Lunch and tables. Teachers sat at the front of the main hall on the window side while pr*f*cts tried to control the student body. The fifth form students used the small dining room near the kitchen. We were served bowls of food and we were trusted to share the food between eight students at the table. The tables in the main hall were stored under the stage via doors at the end of the stage. (Brian Coan)

I have just recalled that in my time school dinners were all served from aluminium trays. Older trays were badly pitted with corrosion, and I wonder if we all suffered brain damage from minor aluminium poisoning over those years. Perhaps that explains some of the postings to this list! (John Hawkins)

My recollections of the dinner break were of long, carefree games in High Trees as a young 'un, and more interesting pastimes as a 15+. There wasn't the option to cut dinners though.  Jake made sure that nobody could opt out without a signed note from the parents.  Every day, dinner tickets were taken by p*****ts at the doors to the hall - everybody ate there - and woe betide anybody who was on the dinner roll and didn't hand one in.  Jake had detainees check tickets every afternoon, and any missing ones resulted in a summons to his study the next morning. Looking back, it was an enormous amount of effort to put in.  I suppose he must have cross-checked with the registers and put an hour or so in every day.

The main reason for skipping dinners was, of course, RCH girls.  A bike would be borrowed (!) from the sheds and a group of us would hurtle down to the park next to the RCH where GIRLS would be hanging around nonchalantly waiting.  I had my first snog ever with Suzanne Gilbert against the fence there.  I know it's not gentlemanly to kiss and tell, good gents, but I am amongst friends I hope. (Steve Snelgrove)

School dinners.....The meringues were still an occasional feature during my time.  Custard, pink or off-white, on coconut pudding was it?  Sponge puddings with desiccated coconut atop.  Chips that should have been a joy but weren't quite, with a cardboardy taste.  My very favourite were the little individual steak and kidney puddings, definitely worth a try for seconds.  The crumble (thanks for the reminder) was delicious, but I usually cut the sweet course in order to avoid JPC as far as possible.  And remember scraping leftovers into the swill bin and occasionally dropping cutlery in and having (ugh) to retrieve it? There's no mention from you older boys of the tuck shop, from which I have to assume that it was a later addition.  It was in a little brick building by the kitchens.  It sold nothing of nutritional value at all - wagon wheels, when they were still "Weston's Wagon Wheels", not "Burton's" as they are now (made not far from here, between Cwmbran and Pontypool) and huge - or perhaps I was smaller! (Steve Snelgrove)

In the 1950's, the Royal Liberty in keeping with the times, offered school dinners to boys who were willing to pay two shillings and sixpence for a dinner during the five days they were at school. Although the pupils appeared to be mostly from middle class families, many of the parents worked and were glad to pay this sum so that their children could eat a hot meal at noon on weekdays. There were two sittings for "dinner" (really a hot lunch), one was at 12noon and the other at 1245pm. The lunch hour was from twelve until one forty five. Dinner sittings were held in the assembly hall (for older students) and in the smaller dining room adjacent to the kitchens, for the younger boys. Meals were delivered partially prepared and were heated up and served by a corps of ladies. I recall the food as being tasteless and usually consisting of some kind of stew, lots of mashed potatoes and a vegetable, often cabbage. There was also a desert served and this often turned out to be a soggy piece of plain cake or pudding with treacle.

During my first year at the school I paid my half a crown and had dinner. It was better to be on the first shift as you could be out of the hall and into the playground, full of greasy food, and with an hour to do as you pleased. By the second year I had learned about cigarettes and other interesting things and I did not eat school dinners again. Each morning I would prepare two large sandwiches of cucumber, ham etc. covered with Heinz Salad Cream. These went into a brown paper bag and thence into my satchel. I was free of the system and, on a Monday morning, my two and six in my pocket, I would walk grandly into the sweet shop on the corner of Station Road and Upper Brentwood and proceed to spend my money on ten Players Weights and a variety of sweets. This pattern continued through my five years at the school although I must admit that I grew out of Weights and went on to Capstan and then Guards. (Mike Merry)

We have heard a few references to school dinners but I remember that until we moved close enough to go home at lunch time my brother (OEM) and I took sandwiches. Did this option continue into later years? (GAL)

TUCK SHOP – BUNS

 

The 1960's tuck shop operated out of the small red-brick building at the top of the playground next to the kitchen.  Sold sweets and ice-cream. Was that building originally Bob's stable?   The shape and the split door suggested it, but it looked a bit small to keep a full-grown horse in. (John Bailey)

Derek Humphrey wrote: "Now, more importantly, who remembers those penny buns? They'd cost you about six bob each now. But that's inflation for you." Remembered most fondly, along with the Tuppenny ones with cream & jam if you could afford it, and also along with standing in the queue at break time and grinding a circular indentation into the school wall with aforesaid penny to pass the minutes until stuffing face with buns. (see 1954 School Film). (David Gregory)

...the bun sale in the small dining hall: Regular 1d and cream 2d. This was the way it was in 52/56 and I wonder who got the money for this? I seem to recall it was sixth formers that sold the buns.  The pr*f*cts sold ice lolly's outside of the side door to the kitchen during lunch hours. There was free milk in the Assembly Hall mid-morning and if I remember correctly, any left-overs were available at lunch time? (Mike Merry)

The buns were still on sale during my early years but must have been discontinued later.  The price was 3d for the iced ones, the only ones I can remember.  There was always a queue (ignored by the older boys) so they must have been popular.  I wonder where they came from.  Were they made on the premises or bought in?  There was also advantage to choosing carefully (if the p*****ts allowed) to obtain the maximum quantity of icing. (Steve Snelgrove)

...the bun issue. I think they were delivered to the school, I don't think everything was cooked on premises but heated up

or only partially cooked (the second half).Who kept the money, that was my question? I'm glad someone remembered the meringues, they were incredible. I suppose for those of us bought up during the war, sweet things were a great delicacy. Rationing made sugar very hard to come by. I remember to this day the first Ice Cream cone I ate. It was in 1947 at a store called Beestons in Chadwell Heath Lane right opposite Hall road where I lived. We lined up for hours to get a home made ice cream and it was like nothing I had ever tasted in my life. Seven years old and never had an ice cream! Seems incredible doesn't it! (Mike Merry)

When I think back I suppose the school could have made an attempt to organize something instructive during the dinner break for those who wanted to do something intelligent. However, apart from the Life Saving courses, I recall nothing whatsoever was done except to attempt to make sure the pupils did not leave the school grounds and kept out of the school itself unless it was raining.

We all looked forward to those dinner hours. Whatever it was you had planned would be talked over during the milk break in the morning and at noon you would meet in the appropriate location and the fun would start. I wonder if they still smoke in High Trees and if any unexpected "rain" showers fall in the pupils of that little church school on the western boundary behind the goal posts of the forth IX football pitch? (Mike Merry)

During the years 1963/4 (or thereabouts) I ran the Tuck Shop with Richard Beattie and Richard Rogers.  In fact I think we were the first to run it from the location described.  Alan Woodhurst was the master in charge. Mostly in charge of the special offers and free gifts that accompanied the various supplies!

Profits went to the school Central Fund which entailed a weekly trip to the Midland Bank at the bottom of Upper Brentwood Road on a Wednesday afternoon (conveniently clashing with organised games in which I had neither interest nor ability).  Others on the list have been involved from later years. (Michael P. Large)

The 'Tuck Shop Trio' - Messrs. Pettit, Woolaston: These three amigos used to run the stable-like tuck shop at the upper end of the playground and were also responsible for selling doughnuts from a window in the quad at break times. These activities were carried out with admirable derision towards us younger pupils and one always had the sense that they were 'coining it in'. (Ray Liddard)

A tuckshop was operated from the lockup at one time, although earlier it was operated out of the canteen door nearby, by a glamorous young secretary from the office. (John Hawkins)

How about the morning break penny buns sold in the senior lunch room, and creamy ones for tuppence on Wednesdays. (Brian Coan)

I think Trevor Bolton used to operate the bun and ice cream shop at lunch time. (Tom Little)

Reference currant buns: I was part of the staff(?) who sold buns during the 50s. They were indeed 1 penny (old) each with a maximum of 6 buns, On Wednesday we sold cream and iced buns at tuppence each. The benefit to the servers was that we stored the small bottles of milk in the kitchen fridge so we could enjoy several bottles of ice cold milk while serving the riff-raff. Occasionally we had to take trays of unsold buns to the main hall to encourage pupils to buy more. And sometimes we sold out early to the disappointment of those at the end of the line. I cannot remember the name of the teacher in charge but he was a really friendly person. I wonder if the bun selling gave him additional income to the paltry school teacher’s salary. I remember a certain Peter Fell still owes me tuppence I lent him for buns one day. (Brian Coan)

 I used to cycle home to Harold Wood every day for lunch but stayed at school when the weather was really bad.  All I remember was Apple and Rhubarb crumble.  I liked it so much I asked the cook how it was done and recommended it to my Mum. I also remembered the smell of the small dining room, very characteristic, and unchanged for the 1996 reunion.  This brought out nostalgia in a big way.  But why should a non-diner remember the room?  Well, the penny buns at morning break every day were sold there and iced buns on a Wednesday which cost tuppence.  Which reminds me, Derek Roast (another story) still owes me a penny from the first Wednesday of the first term. Neither of us knew of the Wednesday luxury bun cost at the time and I had threepence, one penny of which I 'lent' him.  And he owes me to this very day.  He does, the beggar. And, of course, it was the room where GHRN used to visit the tardy crew who were too late for morning assembly and foregathered there for their punishment, usually a detention. Then I realised that to be really late and go straight to class was preferable.  Nobody noticed except the school police who had to be in class like us all.  And all without quartz watches. (by whom?)

...I went and bought six penny buns at break time and got on with my life. Now, more importantly, who remembers those penny buns? They'd cost you about six bob each now. But that's inflation for you. (Derek Humphrey)

John H wrote:- 'How much are the penny buns?  If they are 6 x 12 = 72 times dearer now, after forty years, I calculate that at 11.5% inflation year after year."

Actually, John, I think 11.5% compound gives you about five shillings and sixpence (although I may be wrong).

But on referring to Croner’s Penny Bun Index, I find that, taking Penny Buns = 100 in December 1957, the latest figure published (October 2001) is 7,248 and that’s allowing for re-indexing in 1969, 1981,and 1993.

n.b. there is a footnote against 1976 when the ratio of currants to bun was reduced by 9.5%, so in real terms the bun would be even more expensive than I originally suggested.

I am afraid that I cannot comment on the inflationary effect on  'the Tuppenny ones with cream & jam' as mentioned by David G, as someone has removed that page from my Croners handbook. (Derek Humphrey)

With interest and inflation it is now 6d. Think this will buy 1/8th of a sticky bun. Where shall I put it? (Peter Moulds)

Derek Roast?  Throughout my first five years at school, Masters used to call the register.  I always followed Peter Rich then Derek Roast to the sniggers of many. (David Silverside)

SCHOOL DINNERS

 

I always liked school dinners but eventually, the draws of RCH girls, the need to avoid seeing Jake as he doled out the pink custard and the overall desirability of maintaining flexibility of an afternoon on days when I had free periods, or games, and could skip the whole afternoon. On the subject of skipping games, can anybody else match my claim to have NEVER done one of those ghastly road runs to which we were subjected on wet Wednesday afternoons.  The favourite ploy was to be among the first in the queue outside the pavilion and bundle through the window at the back, lying low until all the masters had gone.  Then - freedom! (Steve Snelgrove)

I am very amused by the fact that the only item that can be remembered is pink custard! My own (and that of many others I suspect) favourite "afters" were meringues (If the spelling is not correct I apologise) These fragile, sweet, circular temptations were on the menu about once per term I understand and resulted in riots to get seconds. I believe the best food at the school was that of the House Parties when everyone contributed sandwiches, sponges, cakes etc. and we made pigs of ourselves in the small dining hall before being entertained by skits and songs in the Assembly Hall. 

We are told of the strict checks made by Mr. Coles. I cannot recall every seeing Scruff make an appearance in the dinner hall, he would usually go across to his house at lunch time. Also, I do believe you required a note to say you would not be taking dinners. I never did get one of these but by the end of the first year it seemed to be assumed I did not partake and I was never bothered again. I did eventually confess to my parents about this deviation, however by that time I was about 46 years old and it's amazing how 35 years can soften the blow! (Mike Merry)

ICE-CREAMS, ICE-LOLLIES

 

Fred used to own the ice cream van which parked outside the school gates on Upper Brentwood Road every lunchtime. Younger boys (1st & 2nd years I think) we not allowed out the school grounds at lunchtime, but Fred's Van was an exception. Many kids gave up their school dinner and spent the money at Fred's instead. Couple of Fred's specialities were straws filled with sherbert and High Balls (Ice Cream in plastic cones with bubble gum at the bottom). Fred was there throughout my tenure at the school (1979 to 1984). Anyone else remember him? (Gary)

I remember Fred and his van. His dodgy hotdogs, burgers and ice-creams were a cool alternative to packed lunches or eating in the hall for first years. This was mainly because everybody else used to push and shove so younger kids couldn't get served! He was on the side street by the woodwork block and then got moved to Upper Brentwood road after the residents complained, then he got moved to outside the biology block and next to the pool after more residents complained...

I remember there was a small gang who caused him to flee and I think one of them was called Warren but I cannot remember his surname? He started to wear plastic lab gloves claiming the food was too unsanitary for people to handle. This process of intimidation carried on for a few days until the rooftop incident. Fred was replaced by a young nervous guy from Harold Hill called Paul. (Col Chapman)

…the lollies were sold out of the kitchens at the Tuck shop over a huge potato peeler at a stable-type door, if I remember.  I shall look on 8 July.  A good place to loiter. The Waggon Wheels were wonderful and the Mars bars as big as mobile (cellular) phones.(David Silverside)

Wafers & Lollies good old ice cream wafers.... (was it just the actual wafer Ian lent you, Ged?... or did it have ice cream as well?.... if so, it smacks of atypical extravagance!)... the thing about wafer ices was that you squeezed the two biscuits together... forming a convex linear ice cream protrusion  .. good this, innit!..... and then you ran your tongue around the whole circumference... reforming the surface to a concave one... applied gentle finger pressure.. reforming the convex...and so on.. until one was left with a slightly soggy pair of adjacent biscuits.. ahhhhh....... i am beginning to deduce that it was half of this soggy remainder that he lent you, Ged!!... sounds about right....and now its payback time... the trick of wafer-squeezing was to get even pressure so that the biscuits remained parallel during their short life. once this state was lost, one got a large blob of vanilla down one's school tie... to join the smears of RLS tapioca and semolina... which had a special starching property when decaying on the old cross and crown. Expanding  the subject slightly... I remember tasting my first choc ice on an 86A bus as it passed Wards Sports shop near Romford station.... which indicates what a seminal moment it was. (Colin Calvert)

I went for ice-lollies too, the poor boys' alternative to ice cream - and that icy stuff never was anywhere near to cream, it was some weird post-war mixture of milk products and undeclared vegetable fats. I did not taste real cream ice-cream until I came to Norway. (Genuine Italian style soft-ice is the best creamed ice)!

Since the wafer 'thread' has now digressed into ice-lollies, I will really STRETCH it out further to include bubble gum. Its very first appearance (from the USA y'know) was around 1951-2, a ghastly synthetic yellow, followed some time later by an ever trendier ghastly red. At first, I had to cycle to Upminster to get any. It tasted for about 10 seconds, then became a malleable gob-clobbering gobbing mass... but only experts could blow decent-sized bubbles with that inferior prototype brand. Any further documentation of these vital issues is clearly welcome.... phewwwwwwwwww.... PHhutt!  (Robert Priddy)

Talk of Ice Cream brought back memories of the eating arrangements in the school.

Morning breaks - see how many 1/3 pint bottles of milk you could get away with (2 normally, sometimes 3) in the school hall, buns etc. from the entrance to the cloakroom near the hall, or was it the entrance to the 'senior/staff' dining room.

Lunch times back to the main hall (after getting my free dinner tickets), Jake hanging over every boy as they ate to teach them how to hold a spoon etc. Sandwich boys in the Spanish classroom. Outside the little brick shed that contained the tuck shop (anybody on the list used to run it?) – choc. bars and ice creams? Promotion to the senior/staff dining room (was it during the 5th or 6th years - as a school governor at a Primary and Secondary school now, it is still difficult getting used to Year 10 and 11 etc.) (Chris Fribbins)

LUNCH HOUR TIMES