My Food Program is a tool used by CACFP sponsors and providers to manage meal counts and attendance for food program reporting. The integration with Playground allows providers to sync menus, attendance, and meal data automatically between both systems, eliminating duplicate data entry and ensuring accurate CACFP claims.
What the Integration Does
The My Food Program integration is designed to make CACFP meal tracking and reporting simple and accurate by connecting two systems you already use. It automatically syncs your daily attendance and meal data from Playground with your My Food Program account, ensuring your reports always match what’s actually recorded in the classroom.
🚨 Menus must be created in My Food Program first. Playground can only import menus. To use the integration the menus cannot be created in Playground.
How It Works
Build your menus in My Food Program, then import them into Playground.
Record all attendance and meal counts in Playground using Eating Posts.
Send meal counts and attendance data back to My Food Program for monthly CACFP reporting.
This two-way connection works both ways:
My Food Program → Playground: Menus are created in My Food Program and can then be imported into Playground.
Playground → My Food Program: Attendance and meals must be recorded in Playground so they can be sent back to My Food Program for CACFP claims.
By keeping both systems in sync, you eliminate duplicate data entry, reduce human error, and save time during month-end reporting. Providers no longer have to manually reconcile meal counts or attendance records, Playground handles it all behind the scenes so that everything lines up for faster, more accurate submissions.
Connect to My Food Program
Turn on the integration in Playground:
Open Settings on the Playground dashboard
Stay on the General tab.
Scroll to the General Settings section.
Turn on the toggle to enable the integration.
Go back to the Integrations tab to confirm it now appears.
If it still doesn’t show up, reach out to Playground Support for help.
To connect Playground with My Food Program:
Go the My food program settings page to get your API Key and Site ID. To learn more click here.
In Playground, go to the Integrations tab and click on My Food Program.
Enter your API Key and click save.
Enter your Site ID and click save.
Once connected, the integration will automatically sync menus, attendance, and meal data.
Find Your My Food Program Credentials
Get Your API Key in My Food Program
From the main My Food Program dashboard, click Staff or Users
Click on the name of the user you want to generate the API key for.
Scroll down to the section labeled API Key.
Click the blue Generate API Key button.
The field will automatically fill with that user’s unique API Key.
Only one API Key can be generated per user.
If an API Key already exists, the button to generate a new one will not appear.
Make sure you click Save.
Find Your Site ID in My Food Program
For sponser users:
Log in to My Food Program
Click on Site Details from the main site dashboard
Scroll down to the section labeled Additional Site Information
The SiteId will be listed there along with the option to "Copy to Clipboard" for easy pasting.
For provider or center users:
Log in to My Food Program
Click on Site Details from the main site dashboard
Click the button at the top of the page that says "Edit Allowed Fields"
The SiteId will be listed there along with the option to "Copy to Clipboard" for easy pasting.
Import Options Available Through the My Food Program Integration
Import Students from My Food Program
This option lets you pull your student roster from My Food Program straight into Playground.
How it works:
Go to the Integrations Tab and click on My Food Program.
Under Import students from My Food Program, click Import.
Playground will download your student list from My Food Program.
If any students already exist in Playground, their information will be updated based on the data in My Food Program.
Import Menus and Food Items from My Food Program
Once your API Key and Site ID are connected in Playground, you can export your daily attendance and meal count data directly to My Food Program. All attendance and meal counts must be recorded in Playground for this export to work.
How it works:
Go to the Integrations Tab and click on My Food Program.
Choose the date range you want to import using Starting From and Ending On.
Click Import.
Playground will pull all menus and food items within that date range from My Food Program.
Your current Playground menus will be replaced with the imported My Food Program menus.
How to Send Meal Counts & Attendance Data to My Food Program
Once your API Key and Site ID are connected in Playground, you can export your daily attendance and meal count data directly to My Food Program.
In Playground, go to Integrations tab and click on My Food Program.
Scroll to the section labeled Export from Playground to My Food Program.
Select the date you want to send data for.
Playground will export all attendance and all meal data recorded for that date.
Click Export.
Your data is sent to My Food Program. You can log into the My food program platform to review it.
Troubleshooting and Support
If you experience issues connecting your accounts or syncing data:
Confirm your API Key and Site ID are correct.
Confirm menus are fully created and finalized in My Food Program. Playground can only import menus.
Make sure attendance and meals are recorded in Playground. Only data entered in Playground can be exported to My Food Program for reporting.
Ensure your My Food Program account is active and linked to your Playground location.
If problems continue, contact Playground Support.