{"id":74269,"date":"2025-09-15T13:00:54","date_gmt":"2025-09-15T04:00:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/global-development\/2025\/sep\/15\/state-school-meals-india-meghalaya-foraged-wild-indigenous-foods-menus"},"modified":"2025-09-15T13:00:54","modified_gmt":"2025-09-15T04:00:54","slug":"fish-mint-himalayan-chives-and-berry-pickle-how-wild-ingredients-are-transforming-school-dinners-in-india","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/?p=74269","title":{"rendered":"Fish mint, Himalayan chives and berry pickle: how wild ingredients are transforming school dinners in India"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>In the remote state of Meghalaya, foraged foods are helping to diversify state-provided menus \u2013 and tackle chronic malnutrition<\/p>\n<p>Excited chatter and the clattering of steel plates drown out the din of the monsoon rains: it is lunchtime in Laitsohpliah government school in the north-east Indian state of Meghalaya. The food has been cooked on-site and is free for everyone, part of India\u2019s ambitious \u201cmidday meal\u201d \u2013 <a href=\"https:\/\/pmposhan.education.gov.in\/\">PM Poshan<\/a> \u2013 programme to incentivise school enrolment.<\/p>\n<p>The scheme covers more than 1m state-run schools across the country, but the menu at Laitsohpliah is hyperlocal, thanks to a recent charity initiative in the state.<\/p>\n<p>A lunch of rice, dal, potatoes with east Himalayan chives, cured dry fish and <em>sohryngkham<\/em>, a wild berry pickle<\/p>\n<p> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/global-development\/2025\/sep\/15\/state-school-meals-india-meghalaya-foraged-wild-indigenous-foods-menus\">Continue reading&#8230;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In the remote state of Meghalaya, foraged foods are helping to diversify state-provided menus \u2013 and tackle chronic malnutritionExcited chatter and the clattering of steel plates drown out the din of the monsoon rains: it is lunchtime in Laitsohpliah go&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4978,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"sns_share_botton_hide":"","vkExUnit_sns_title":"","_vk_print_noindex":"","sitemap_hide":"","_veu_custom_css":"","veu_display_promotion_alert":"","vkexunit_cta_each_option":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[615,65,311,2616,59,566,408,62,503,78,344,3394,1082,61,3393,42],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-74269","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-education","category-environment","category-food","category-foraging","category-global-development","category-global-health","category-health-wellbeing","category-india","category-indigenous-peoples","category-life-and-style","category-nutrition","category-school-meals","category-schools","category-south-and-central-asia","category-stunting","category-world-news"],"aioseo_notices":[],"veu_head_title_object":{"title":"","add_site_title":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74269","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4978"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=74269"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74269\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":74279,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74269\/revisions\/74279"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=74269"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=74269"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=74269"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}