Head cook fired after serving Nebraska public school students kangaroo for lunch

Hope Schreiber
·Writer


Kangaroo meat is apparently lean and nutritious, with virtually no saturated fat, and may taste like a lighter version of venison — but that apparently didn’t impress the superintendent of Potter-Dix Public Schools in Nebraska or the students’ families.

According to local news station KHOU-11, students at a Nebraska public school were served a bowl of chili for lunch on Oct. 10, but along with beef, the secret ingredient was none other than kangaroo meat. The “exotic” meal resulted in Superintendent Mike Williams having to send an apology letter to the students’ families.

“If a family wants to eat exotic foods, they can do so on their own time — not at school,” Williams wrote, adding that the schools will not be serving food “of this nature again. Period.”

The school’s cook made chili for students with beef and kangaroo meat. (Photo: Getty Images)
The school’s cook made chili for students with beef and kangaroo meat. (Photo: Getty Images)

Kevin Frei, the head cook at the school who added the kangaroo meat, no longer works for the district, according to Nebraska’s Lincoln Journal Star. As mentioned in the letter, Frei added the meat because of its nutritional value for the students, but it’s a curious choice, given that kangaroo meat is probably not easy to come by in Nebraska. One online provider lists a pound of ground kangaroo meat for $15.

It is not certain how parents and other family members initially discovered that Frei’s famous chili’s secret ingredient was, in fact, kangaroo meat.

Superintendent Williams did not immediately respond to Yahoo Lifestyle’s requests for comment.

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