Food Service Menu’s and Information

News & Updates

TCAPS Food Service will offer meatless meal options every day in all buildings. This could change on some days due to food supply challenges. TCAPS will also continue to offer all-you-can-eat salad bars in all buildings. At WSH and CHS, we will also continue to offer the all-you-can-eat hot veggie bars.  

We hope all students will join us each day for breakfast and lunch to enjoy delicious and nutritious meals that provide fuel for the day's activities. 

Food service will begin posting the menus online to try and give families more information on what we are planning to serve. Please be aware that due to supply chain disruptions and food shortages we may have to unexpectedly substitute food items that are posted on the menu. These substitutions could change the allergies listed on the online menu. We recommend that parents or the students with allergies check with the kitchen staff daily. Changes will occasionally occur and we want to ensure that all students with allergies are kept safe. Our staff will also continue to monitor all students known to have allergies.

Food Service Fact

TCAPS Food Service offers Michigan produce in our meals, somewhere in our district, nearly every school day of every school year. 

Clean Label Initiative

TCAPS Food Service is part of the Michigan Great Lakes Consortium (GLC) which is the third largest school food consortium in the United States. The GLC has recently added clean label requirements to all of our commodity food bids that are sent out to prospective manufacturers and processors that are interested in supplying commodities to the consortium. This is the first stage of this process to ensure our children are receiving healthy clean label food each day in their school meals. Many of the manufacturers have already begun this process on their own but we want to be sure that every manufacturer and processor are working towards the same goals of providing clean label products to our Michigan school children. TCAPS has been a leader in these efforts. Per TCAPS district wellness plan, TCAPS Food Service has not served any food with food dyes or high fructose corn syrup in any of our TCAPS meals for the last 15 years. 

Fresh Asparagus from Norconk Farm
Spring is officially here! TCAPS Food Service received its shipment of fresh asparagus from Norconk Farm in Empire, Michigan. All TCAPS buildings will be serving the local asparagus this week. Click here to view Groundwork Harvest of the Month: Jean-Yves the Asparagus.

Important Food Service Update

Traverse City Area Public Schools (TCAPS) proudly offers healthy and delicious breakfast and lunch meals to our students every school day in all of our buildings. Our children need these healthy meals to fuel their daily learning. This year, we are pleased to announce that all TCAPS students will receive free breakfast and lunch each school day, due to new State of Michigan legislation. 

Even though all students will receive free meals, we kindly request that all TCAPS families complete  the CEP Education Benefits form.

This request is critical as the information obtained from these applications allows TCAPS to apply for grants and state and federal funds for programs that support all students. These programs are essential to TCAPS ability to continue offering all students a world-class education. 

Completing this application is vital to district funding. Please complete the application online at traversecity.familyportal.cloud.  You can also print and deliver the application (found below) to your school or mail it to: 

TCAPS Food Service 
1180 Cass Road, 
Traverse City, Michigan 49685  

• CEP Education Benefits Form

If you have additional questions, contact TCAPS Food and Nutrition Services at 231-933-1910.

LEARN MORE

Help Your School Have Access to Grants and Funding by Completing the Application

It is critical that all households complete the CEP Education Benefits Application. This information determines the amount of money our schools receive from a variety of State and Federal supplemental programs like Title I A, At-Risk (31a), Title II A, E-Rate, etc. These supplemental programs have the potential to offer supports and services for our students including, but not limited to:

• Instructional supports (staff, supplies and materials, etc.)
• Non-instructional services (counseling, social work, health services, etc.)
• Professional learning for staff
• Parent and community engagement supplies and activities
• Technology
• Pandemic-EBT

Please complete and submit the application as soon as possible to ensure that additional funding for our school is available to meet the needs of our students. All information on the application submitted is confidential. Without your assistance in completing and returning the application, our schools cannot maximize the use of available State and Federal funds.

TCAPS Food Service is Now Hiring!

Would you like a well paying job where you can work while your children are in school and be off when they are out of school? 

Snow days, No Problem. Attending your child's sporting events and other after school activities, No Problem. Enjoying all of the holidays with your family and no job responsibilities. No problem. Summers with your family. No Problem. Please go to the TCAPS employment page and join our food service team.
 

Apply Now

Other News & Updates

Dietitian

Starting with the 2023-24 school year TCAPS Food and Nutrition Services would like to welcome our new registered dietitian team, Pisanick Partners. They will be happy to help our families with any nutrition and dietetic questions you may have. Families can contact them at (440)-922-6770 or Support@ppllc.info. 

Menu Information

Food service will begin posting the menus online to try and give families more information on what we are planning to serve. Please be aware that due to supply chain disruptions and food shortages we may have to unexpectedly substitute food items that are posted on the menu. These substitutions could change the allergies listed on the online menu. We recommend that parents or the students with allergies check with the kitchen staff daily. Changes will occasionally occur and we want to ensure that all students with allergies are kept safe. Our staff will also continue to monitor all students known to have allergies. 

View All School Menus

Meatless Options and Salad Bars

TCAPS Food Service will offer meatless meal options every day in all buildings. This could change on some days due to food supply challenges. TCAPS will also continue to offer all-you-can-eat salad bars in all buildings. At WSH and CHS, we will also continue to offer the all-you-can-eat hot veggie bars.  

We hope all students will join us each day for breakfast and lunch to enjoy delicious and nutritious meals that provide fuel for the day's activities. 

Food Service Fact

TCAPS Food Service offers Michigan produce in our meals, somewhere in our district, nearly every school day of every school year. 

Manage Your Child's Lunch Account

Although meals (including a  milk or juice) are now free for all students, milk, juice, and additional items are available to purchase for students who bring a lunch.

Add money to your student’s lunch account

TCAPS Food & Nutrition Services takes great pride in minimizing our environmental footprint in Traverse City. In our buildings using disposables, 95% of the plates and bowls are biodegradable. We will continue to strive for 100% biodegradable product usage. 

TCAPS elementary schools are moving to all online production sheets that will greatly reduce the amount of paper we use over the course of a year. 

TCAPS Food & Nutrition Services is proud to be working with local food vendors this year.  We would like to recognize these Michigan businesses and look forward to future partnerships with other Michigan businesses.

• Farm to Freezer Michigan
• Gordon Food Service 
• Louie's Meats, Inc.
• MI Farm Coop
• Norconk Farms
• Warren Orchards 
• Pepsi - Traverse City Distributorship
• Prairie Farms

Working with Local Farms

TCAPS Food & Nutrition Services works with local farms to provide fresh, tasty, and healthy foods to all students in the district.

Farm to School Newsletter

Michigan Farm to Freezer Initiative

View this Farm to Freezer video featuring Brandon Seng and Mark Coe, founders of Michigan Farm to Freezer, as they talk about their efforts to increase the year-round availability of farm-fresh, locally-harvested fruits and vegetables. The Michigan Farm to Freezer initiative began right here in Traverse City in 2013, and TCAPS is proud to have been an early supporter of the program. As Brandon Seng recently shared with TCAPS' Food & Nutrition Services Director Tom Freitas, "This all started with an asparagus contract with TCAPS! Crazy how it has grown since then. Thanks for all your continued support in our effort." 

The Michigan Farm to Freezer program has removed the limitation of only being able to offer produce while in season, allowing TCAPS to provide local food offerings throughout the year. 

Farm to School Projects

May 2025

Fresh Asparagus from Norconk Farm

On Tuesday May 20, we did a taste test with local asparagus from Norconk farms at Long Lake Elementary. We used three seperate recipes. First, we did a garlic parmesan on the asparagus. Our second one we used was an Italian herb with olive oil, and last we used butter. The students enjoyed all of them, but their favorite was the garlic parmesan followed by the Italian herb with olive oil. Overall it was a success, we had some great feedback from the students including how they were able to eat local foods. 

Spring is officially here! TCAPS Food Service received its shipment of fresh asparagus from Norconk Farm in Empire, Michigan. All TCAPS buildings will be serving the local asparagus this week. Click here to view Groundwork Harvest of the Month: Jean-Yves the Asparagus.

Staff Directory

• Tom Freitas, Food & Nutrition Services Director, 231.933.1911
• Steve Wilson, Food & Nutrition Services District Manager, 231.933.1910
• Pisanick Partners, Registered Dietitians, 440.922.6770
• John LaBarbera, Food Services Training Facilitator, 231.933.1912
• Sandy Low, Finance Director, 231.933.1797
• Kyra Brazell, Food & Nutrition Services Accounting Manager, 231.933.1732

School Kitchen Leaders

• Blair Elementary: Wendy Wiederhold, 231.933.5724
• Central Grade School: Linda Caswell, 231.933.5922
• Central High School: Nancy Frederick, 231.933.6518
• Cherry Knoll Elementary: Heather Dreves, 231.933.8963
• Courtade Elementary: Samantha Magee, 231.933.8963
• Eastern Elementary: Tracey Weatherholt, 231.933.5638
• East Middle School: Tyler Mons, 231.933.7474
• Long Lake Elementary: Christine Novak, 231.933.7818
• Silver Lake Elementary: Kaytelin Keefe, 231.933.3655
• TCAPS Montessori: Deb Eshleman, 231.933.6458
• Traverse Heights Elementary: Laurel Boger, 231.933.3538
• Traverse City High School: Marla Rivard, 231.933.5878
• Westwoods Elementary: Jaclyn Cosby, 231.933.7943
• West Middle School: Marieta Braun, 231.933.8368
• West Senior High School: Robert LaRoux, 231.933.7552
• Willow Hill Elementary: Stephanie Havens, 231.933.8569

Northwest Ed Kitchen Leaders

• Bridgeway School: Nancy Frederick, 231.933.6518
• Creekside School: Marieta Braun, 231.933.8368
• New Horizons School: Laurel Boger, 231.933.3538
• Transition Campus: Tyler Mons, 231.933.7474
• Head Start Discovery: Marla Rivard, 231.933.5878
• Head Start Chums Corner: Wendy Weiderhold, 231.933.5724
• Head Start Traverse Hts.: Laurel Boger, 231.933.3538