FRESH INGREDIENTS • FRESH FOOD

INDEPENDENT CATERING • SERVING QUALITY SCHOOL MEALS IN SOUTH EAST ENGLAND SINCE 1996

About

‘The lack of quality in school food has been highlighted in recent years but we have always served fresh food since we started the business 28 years ago’

ANDREW SAUNDERS

For 28 years Independent Catering has been at the forefront of providing fresh and fabulous food to schools.

In 1996 Andrew Saunders founded the company with a vision of creating a service based on great food using locally sourced ingredients and suppliers. The company still led by Andrew, with a team of passionate skilled chefs, now provides a service to over 100 schools in Kent, Surrey and Sussex cooking tens of thousands of meals a day!

We are proud of our environmental and sustainable approach to our menus and food standards which underpins our commitment to fresh, seasonal and locally grown produce. Our commitment to using the best food that Kent, Sussex and the UK can offer lies at the heart of our approach and always has done!

Our core values ensure pupils and school staff receive healthy and innovative menus, served with a smile by our wonderful dedicated team of catering staff.

Our approach is simple! Great food prepared on site delivering fantastic value for money for parents.

The long term partnerships we have with our schools are testimony to our food and service ethos.

We’re delighted to announce that Independent Catering has partnered with Olio to cut out food waste across our operations!
Olio’s volunteers have already helped us rescue hundreds of meals since we started working together.
We couldn’t be more excited about the extra impact Olio will allow us to deliver – both for local people and for the planet.

#fightingfoodwaste #feedingcommunities #zerowaste

‘As part of my role, I see EVERY type of school across the whole country and am exposed to every school catering organisation that you can imagine and it is very rare that when I visit a school I am genuinely gob-smacked with the quality of the food offering, which I was at Dulverton primary. The food selection that was being served to pupils at Dulverton was some of the best I have seen, the salad bar was bursting with nutrition, with a wide variety rivalling a five-star hotel and the dessert station was so attractive and colourful that it was impossible for pupils not to want to divulge in everything on it!’

Paul Evans MSc, RNutr – Operations Director, School Health UK

‘What a difference Independent Catering have made to our meal provision since joining us in April 2022. We have seen a dramatic increase in pupil meal uptake and this is down to the fantastic fresh food on offer and the professional and friendly staff.

Thank you Independent for being a part of improving our children’s lives.’

Natalie Coles – Turner Schools

‘I wanted to take the opportunity at the end of term to say a massive thank you to the staff at the Abbey. Paul and his team have been fabulous at meeting my vegan needs (demands!) all year. They have never moaned, always gone out of their way to make me feel included in what ever the main meal is and even researched different products to find the vegan ones!

What is even more amazing is that, contrary to my memories of school dinners 40 years ago, these actually taste delicious! I now eat my main meal of the day at school as I can be confident that I will have a tasty and nutritious vegan meal

I honestly can’t praise all the team enough for their friendliness, inclusivity and skill at cooking hundreds of meals without compromising on quality.

They are all a credit to your organisation.’

Charlotte – The Abbey School

VIEW MOVIE

OUR MENUS

Made in your school kitchen! We prepare and cook all our menu items, so if you need to know the ingredients – please ask.
LOCAL and FRESH – Our daily main meals, soups, salads and cold food are made FRESH every day with local (Kent) seasonal produce.

PLEASE NOTE: OUR DAILY MENUS CAN BE SUBJECT TO CHANGE

ALLERGEN KEY
1 Cereals Containing Gluten, 2 Crustaceans, 3 Molluscs, 4 Fish, 5 Peanuts, 6 Nuts, 7 Eggs, 8 Soybeans, 9 Milk, 10 Celery, 11 Mustard, 12 Lupin, 13 Sesame, 14 Sulphur Dioxide

No Nuts or Nut Oils are used in Independent Catering Primary and Secondary School Meals.
Click Here to download our Food Provenance document.

INGREDIENTS CONTAINING GLUTEN (INDICATED BY THE NUMBER 1 ON THE MENU) WILL CONTAIN WHEAT, OATS, BARLEY, SPELT, RYE OR KAMUT, OR A COMBINATION THEREOF. IF YOU HAVE ANY ALLERGEN CONCERNS PLEASE SPEAK TO THE CATERING MANAGER

WE ONLY USE

DOWNLOAD OUR CURRENT MENUS

Pay Online

Welcome to the Independent Catering’s school meals online payment website. You can make payments for your child’s school meals using your debit card for free or credit card for a small charge.

Please register with SQuid by clicking on your son/daughters School, having received your 16 DIGIT REGISTRATION and 3 DIGIT CVV CODE.

If you do not have your son/daughters REGISTRATION number please email us at info@independentcatering.co.uk stating your son/daughters School Name/Class/Year.

Once you have registered with Squid you can continue to make further payments throughout the school term, also view credit balance and see items purchased.

Top Tip: When you register, use your child’s name as the user name.
This makes it much easier if you have two children at school.

USING SQUID – FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

HOW DO I SET UP MY SQUID ACCOUNT?admin2022-03-13T04:31:21+00:00

HOW DO I SET UP MY SQUID ACCOUNT?

If you only have one child at a squid school you can use your (parents) details for both setting up the account information such as name, user name and passwords and your preferred user name. However if you have more than one child and are setting up multiple squid accounts you can use your name, address, email and passwords as above but the user name must be different for each account. As a suggestion you could chose your child’s name as the user name as a method to help you identify which account you are signing into but repeat all the other information in an attempt to have less to remember.

IF MY CHILD MOVED FROM ONE SQUID SCHOOL TO A DIFFERENT SQUID SCHOOL DOES THEIR SQUID ACCOUNT TRAVEL WITH THEM?admin2022-03-13T04:30:44+00:00

IF MY CHILD MOVED FROM ONE SQUID SCHOOL TO A DIFFERENT SQUID SCHOOL DOES THEIR SQUID ACCOUNT TRAVEL WITH THEM?

No. Currently you will have to register your child at the new school with a new squid 16 digit registration number and 3 digit CVV code which we can provide to you. You will need to contact us at Head office on 01732 746123 or info@independentcatering.co.uk and we will transfer any balance for you.

HOW LONG DOES IT TAKE TO APPLY THE TOP UP TO THE ACCOUNT AT MY CHILD’S SCHOOL?admin2022-03-13T04:29:13+00:00

HOW LONG DOES IT TAKE TO APPLY THE TOP UP TO THE ACCOUNT AT MY CHILD’S SCHOOL?

Credit Card and Debit Card Top Up’s are applied in approximately 15 minutes. Bank Transfers take up to three banking days to show on the account.

DO I GET EMAIL CONFIRMATION OF EACH TOP UP?admin2022-03-13T04:29:45+00:00

DO I GET EMAIL CONFIRMATION OF EACH TOP UP?

Yes, if you pay by credit card.

IS THERE A CHARGE FOR ME TO USE SQUID?admin2022-03-13T04:29:50+00:00

IS THERE A CHARGE FOR ME TO USE SQUID?

No if you use a Debit Card or Bank Transfer (bank transfers can take up to three days to show on the account).

IF I HAVE SET UP A SQUID ACCOUNT FOR EACH OF MY CHILDREN DO I HAVE TO SIGN INTO EACH ACCOUNT TO TOP UP THE BALANCE FOR EACH CHILD?admin2022-03-13T04:24:42+00:00

IF I HAVE SET UP A SQUID ACCOUNT FOR EACH OF MY CHILDREN DO I HAVE TO SIGN INTO EACH ACCOUNT TO TOP UP THE BALANCE FOR EACH CHILD?

No. You can log in to one of the squid accounts (remember which one you are in) and top up the balance. Then select the friends & family option and type in the purse number for your other child (this is not the 16 digit registration number – it is a longer purse number allocated to each registered account) and top up the balance for that account and repeat this for each account you want to add funds to.

IF I HAVE MORE THAN ONE CHILD AT A SCHOOL USING SQUID DO I NEED TO REGISTER ALL CHILDREN OR JUST ONE?admin2022-03-13T04:23:57+00:00

IF I HAVE MORE THAN ONE CHILD AT A SCHOOL USING SQUID DO I NEED TO REGISTER ALL CHILDREN OR JUST ONE?

Yes. Currently you will need to register each child even if they are in the same school. i.e. if you have three children all at schools who have squid as the online payment option you will have three letters informing you of three different registration numbers and you must set up all three squid accounts. (SEE ALSO QUESTION BELOW ABOUT PAYING WITH SQUID). Squid are currently working on a program to change this but it is not available yet.

HOW DO I GET A REFUND IF MY CHILD LEAVES OR MOVES SCHOOL?admin2022-03-11T17:23:53+00:00

HOW DO I GET A REFUND IF MY CHILD LEAVES OR MOVES SCHOOL?

Refunds are administered by Squid directly and not Independent Catering. For a full refund please log into your squid account in the usual way by clicking on your school from the list opposite (please remember to be logged into the squid account that you want a refund for just in case you have more than one account). Click on the Contact Us link in the squid website to reveal an email message box and request a full refund and closure of the account.

GALLERY

To REGISTER FOR PAYMENTS, CHECK BALANCES or TOP UP at the following schools, please click on your child’s school below