Director leads meal service for thousands of students

Serving thousands of hungry kindergarten through 12th-grade students is no easy feat, yet it’s done on a daily basis in Kalispell Public Schools, overseen by new Food Service Director, Christine Thelen. 

Outside the Central Kitchen on a fall November morning, the cold air gives way to the warm aromas from all the cooking and baking inside. Standing next to a wire rack stacked with dry ingredients, Thelen got an update when dozens of turkeys were set to arrive to prepare for a Thanksgiving-themed meal. 

“I love cooking,” Thelen said. “And the best part of my job is seeing all the kids and interacting with all the kids. I absolutely love it. I just think it’s important to have happy meals and good interactions with kids” 

The Kalispell native, who started the director position this school year, made the transition into food service after 22 years driving school buses for the district.  

“I was a single mom, so I needed to have the same schedule as my kids,” she said. “It was a great schedule.” 

She started working at Linderman Education Center and then Flathead High School, where she became the lead food service worker, further expanding her food service skillset. 

“I was able to do my bus route before I’d go into the kitchen, work all day and do my bus route in the afternoon and call it a day,” Thelen said. 

She said it was fun introducing high school students to new flavors such as homemade chicken curry soup that received her own children’s seal of approval.  

The Central Kitchen, which was previously housed at Flathead, moved into the current building on Northwest Lane, which opened in 2014. After learning that former food services director Jana Graham was going to retire, Thelen said she was approached about filling the position. 

“I spoke with my husband and my family and I thought, you know what? I think I could do this. I think that I would like a challenge,” she said. 

Prior to working at the district, Thelen hadn’t worked in food service.  

“I mean, I watched my mom [cook] on the other side of the counter growing up and making homemade meals and I would cook from scratch for my kids,” she said.  

“I loved watching my mom. She would make us a hot breakfast every day before she drove — she also drove a school bus — and she would pack out lunches and have a hot, homemade-from-scratch meal every day coming home. I’m the middle child of five. Yeah, so I grew up with that and that’s what I know,” Thelen said. 

ALTHOUGH SHE has an office now, Thelen still rolls up her sleeves to help staff whether it's prepping, cooking, serving or cashiering. She often travels to school kitchens that are short-staffed to help out, where she gets to continue interacting with students and teachers. 

“[For] a lot of kids this is their hot meal ... this is their interaction, positive interaction, and that’s important to me,” she said. 

Thelen said the food service department prepares an average of roughly 4,200 meals daily to 16 schools, which includes ones that contract the district to provide meals including Trinity Lutheran, Smith Valley, Cayuse Prairie, Helena Flats and Fair-Mont-Egan schools. 

The number of breakfasts and lunches served has gone up tremendously since Kalispell Public Schools began offering free meals to all students under the U.S. Department of Agriculture Community Eligibility Provision, which is an option for schools and districts in low-income areas to increase student participation and access to nutritious meals. 

“Does it make us busy? Uh-huh, but I like being busy. I would much rather be crazy busy than sitting around,” she said with a smile, noting that she was headed to Flathead after the interview.  

The logistics of menu planning on this scale requires attention to detail. What factors into the menu rotation primarily depends on what ingredients and government commodities are available.  

“When we're serving that much food, I try and go back into our freezer and see what we're heavy on,” she said. "Currently we've got a ton of pulled pork. So yesterday, we made pulled pork chili as just kind of a variety, versus your chicken chili or your beef chili.” 

Participating elementary schools also do taste tests to get exposure to new vegetables and fruits that may be hard to come by or expensive in Montana. On a dry-erase board in her office, vegetables are listed for the week’s taste tests including the root vegetable jicama. 

“We’re going to send out some mango pieces today. I mean mango is generally a pretty expensive fruit for families to purchase, so I want to be able to kind of spread their wings a little bit,” she said. 

The USDA also has revised nutrition standards limiting added sugars, reducing sodium levels and increasing whole grains in school meals. Schools have until 2027 to put them in place. 

“It’s not really that big of a difference for us,” Thelen said, earlier noting, “These don’t have to be in place until 2027, but I figure with everyone being new at Central Kitchen, why not start it now? Let’s just get the ball rolling.” 

Thelen said she’s focused on reducing the number of pre-packaged foods used and increasing scratch cooking, which is challenging with the staff turnover.  

"The less pre-packaged foods, in my opinion, the better. We have a brand-new head cook [Chela Pease] and she’s fantastic. She loves scratch cooking,” Thelen said. “We’re on the same page with scratch cooking and stuff.” 

She said the district already has a low sodium content in meals. 

“Especially with all the scratch cooking that we’re doing right now. You can season your food and make it taste great without using salt. Chela has been great with using all kinds of seasonings and we’re getting a lot of good feedback,” Thelen said. 

Added sugar may be more difficult due to its prevalence in food, especially packaged foods like cereal, or yogurt, which is why food service will opt to deliver cereals such as Rice Krispies or Cheerios. The Central Kitchen also has a baker on the staff who can tinker with recipes. 

“It’s just going to be a lot of label reading and we can contact our vendors and say these are the new guidelines. What are the child-nutrition-appropriate items that you have,” she said. 

While not meal planning, Thelen said she’s a “lake girl” whether it’s kayaking, paddle boarding or boating with her husband James. She also enjoys traveling to visit her daughter Mikaila (who loves cooking) in Boston and Emmy (who bakes) in Bozeman. 

Reporter Hilary Matheson may be reached at 758-4431 or hmatheson@dailyinterlake.com.