Sodexo - Our Catering Partner

Aside from creating delicious lunches for children and staff, much of the work done by Sodexo goes on behind the scenes.  Sustainability is a key focus and Sodexo's Social Impact Pledge is a set of strategic and ethical commitments they have made to their customers, employees and communities. 

First launched in 2015, Sodexo’s Pledge publicly commits the company to measure and provide evidence of where it is creating a positive impact across four social impact pathways:

• Our People: By providing support and help to those that need it most to secure suitable employment that could kickstart their career, help them retrain or take the first steps to long-term rehabilitation. 
• Our Planet: By committing to reducing our carbon footprint by 34% by 2025, in line with the Paris Agreement; moving to 100% reusable, recyclable or compostable packaging by 2025; and to cut food waste by 50% across all our sites by 2030. 
• Our Places: As a major employer across the UK & Ireland, we are committed to supporting the “levelling up” agenda by supporting those areas where we operate to overcome social and cultural challenges that drive economic disparity. 
• Our Partners: We have committed to providing tangible support to our partners, particularly Small and Medium Sized Enterprises (SMEs) and Voluntary, Community and Social Enterprises (VCSEs), with skills-based mentoring and coaching, pro bono technical and professional support and 30-day payment terms.

Ingredients and suppliers

Underpinning everything is our ethos of ‘fresh food from scratch’. Menus are seasonal, reflecting the best of fresh local produce and constructed to offer balance and variety, providing students with a range of healthy options but also allowing for treats. Typically, in dining halls we incorporate theatre cooking into the daily experience and create a warm and welcoming environment for students to enjoy their meals. We source our food responsibly and ethically and are proud to have long standing relationships with our suppliers.

All of our food is made fresh from scratch, every day. Meat and poultry can be traced back to British and Irish farms. We only use Red Tractor certified, fresh British and Irish beef, pork, lamb and poultry. Our fresh British and Irish bacon is made from pork reared on UK and Irish farms and smoked using beechwood chips for delicate but delicious taste. We take pride in sourcing the best ingredients to make the best food. It’s simple, we only use:

• 100% Red Tractor fresh milk and cream
• Fresh British fruit and vegetables wherever possible
• RSPCA Freedom Food accredited pork and British Lion marked eggs
• MSC certified fish and seafood
• Fairtrade, Rainforest Alliance and organic coffee
• Origin Green

Balanced nutrition

We recognise that for pupils to excel, in the classroom or out on the playing field, nutrition and a healthy diet is very important to that success. Our menu planning progressively and unobtrusively educates the customer towards a healthier, more nutritional option whilst maintaining an acceptable level of choice. All recipes promote and use ingredients based on principles that aim to reduce the levels of fat, salt and sugar. Some examples of this include using herbs and spices instead of salt to infuse food with flavour, replacing butter and vegetable oil with olive or rapeseed oil as a healthier alternative, and adding more fresh fruit to desserts to help achieve the government’s recommended ‘5 a day’.

Pupil Allergens

We are mindful that some pupils will have specific, diagnosed food allergens and it is essential that parents communicate this to us so that appropriate measures are put in place to ensure we meet your child’s dietary requirements.  We ask parents to complete a form to provide full information on pupils’ individual needs in respect of any confirmed diagnosis.

Please click here to access the form.  This should be completed, signed and returned to the Catering Manager via the School Office

Contact us

If you wish to discuss any aspect of our dining services or your child’s dietary requirements at Runnymede, please emails us at: admin@runnymede-school.org.uk

For more information about Independents by Sodexo, go to www.independentsbysodexo.com