Which dishes do teenagers prefer in the school meal? Are these preferences socially structured, as well as domestic food preferences, which depend on family ‘s cultural and social habits (Tichit, 2012, 2014)? Do gender, geographical origin and social background play a marginal role in canteen food preferences ? Does food taste for schoolmeal tend to crystallise around a shared, narrow repertoire of teen agers’ favourite foods, summed up, for example, in the pasta-chips-burger triptych? To answer these questions, we use a sub-sample of the INRAE's CORALIM survey, drawn from a middle school located in a low-income neighborhood, which provides an insight into the social and migratory diversity of a working-class urban environment (n=760 students). To collect dish preferences, the questionnaire asks respondents to name their favourite canteen starter, main course and dessert, in the form of an open question, and conversely their worst canteen starter, main course and dessert. Based on a textual analysis and a hierarchical ascending classification of the answers about the best and worst canteen dishes, we arrive at a typology of ideal menus. This typology turns out to depend on the age, gender and social background of the students. The 6th grade children (11 ys old) involved in the participatory part of the research in 2021-22 and 2023-24, took part in the result analysis and in focus group based on the actual dishes eaten in the canteen during the week of the survey. Field observations carried out in the canteen in 2023-24, during their meals, also made it possible to compare the students’ discourse with their practices. The observations and testimonies collected corroborate the quantitative results, while highlighting the unspoken aspects of the canteen meal, which provide a better understanding of how teen agers’ culinary choices are constructed and how they change with age.