The Hartselle High School cafeteria has a new three-bar serving system in place that offers three choices of lunch for students and staff. | Joy Haynes

The Hartselle High School cafeteria has implemented a more streamlined three-bar serving system this year for lunch.

The three-bar system allows students three options of meals. They can choose from home cooking, Big Daddy’s pizza and an alternate, all of which meet nutrition standards.

The home cooking bar has daily choices such as spaghetti, meatloaf, taco salad or much more with a fruit and vegetable option. The pizza bar now features a round pizza, which is very similar to Domino’s Pizza, with a choice of corn or salad. The alternate choice is a fast-food type option such as a hamburger, hot dog or some sort of sandwich.

The new system has had nothing but positive results, according to cafeteria manager Terri Ward.

“We have had a lot of great feedback about the quicker serving time and the larger variety,” Ward said. “The pizza bar is definitely the biggest seller. We are serving about 75 more students a day than we were before. This new system has really made serving lunch simple even though there are more students coming through. We had a fabulous start to the year- the smoothest one I’ve seen, and I’ve been in a Hartselle cafeteria for over ten years now.”

Ward said the change did not require any new equipment. The school already had the three-bar system in the cafeteria, but only two bars were being utilized and both bars had the same food options.

Initially, the school expected to have to buy new ovens to accommodate a pizza bar, but a fieldtrip to Decatur High School’s cafeteria to see how their pizza bar was run proved otherwise. They realized Hartselle was already using the same type ovens Decatur had.

“The only new materials we bought for the system were some new pans to make the pizza crispier,” Ward said. “We will start using those once they come in. We also added signage and a few red tiles to the columns. The accents give the cafeteria more of a café atmosphere.”

The Hartselle Junior High School has also added Big Daddy’s pizza to their menu in an effort to tie in with the HHS cafeteria.

The new system lets students spend less time in line, and more time eating and socializing. Ward said the students now have about 15 minutes to eat their lunch and talk with friends before going back to class.

“The lunch line is a big issue, and we were hearing complaints about how long it was taking,” Ward said. “Since the change, we have seen the serving time decrease because the line gets separated and students can get what they want quicker.”

Four full-time and one part-time employee work in the HHS cafeteria. They feed about 350 of the nearly 1,000 HHS students.

“It’s always a challenge to get students in the cafeteria and interested in our options,” Ward said. “We started serving a la carte pizza at break, which has helped interest students. Since we are only feeding about a third of the student population, we still have room to grow, which we hope to do in the future.”