I used to have imagination when it came to food. Really I did. I used to be a pro! But I must have given my kid all my smarts, cause when I stare at that refrigerator every night, I canât come up with much in the way of inspiration for my kidâs school lunch. I wish I were as dedicated a lunchbox mama as Vegan Lunchbox. Ah, well. She rocks. I am merely trying to keep food in my kidâs football-shaped box that will make him a happy, healthy boy.
Unfortunately, anything I pack him from my âfridge will be a thousand times more healthy than the public school lunches⌠read The School Lunch Test from the New York Times and you might never let your kid eat at school again. There is something wrong with our eating habits when a company thinks its worth the money to produce and market an antacid for kids, designed specifically to ease discomfort brought on by âan overindulgence in food and drinkâ. ICK. So I perservere. What are your kidsâ favorite packed lunches, beyond PBnJâs or turkey sandwiches?
The King of Everything loves:
⢠The Middle Eastern lunch, with baba ganoush (what we called moutabel when we lived over there) and hummous and a variety of mini pitas and veggies to dip. A bottle of drinkable yogurt and some dates for dessert.
⢠Cheese and veggie filled tortellinis with a white or red sauce. They are tasty enough room temperature, though I do send it over in a thermos from time to time.
⢠Pancakes. Yes, breakfast for lunch is a special treat around our house. I make them from scratch, keep a batch of the dried ingredients mixed up and waiting just for the eggs, butter and milk. Pancakes are easily frozen, so I usually have some on hand for a quick fix. I add oatmeal or wheat germ to our pancakes, and make them with white, whole wheat flour, millet flour, and other high protein grains. When he has them for lunch, he gets pancake sandwiches, with blueberry preserves in between.
⢠mini hors dâoeuvres. Itty bitty burritos and taquitos, or mini quiches. If your kid eats seafood and no one in his class is going to keel over because of it⌠mini crabcakes!!
⢠falafel. Yup, falafel. The mixes are pretty good, and the kid loves them.
⢠Fritattas. A rich, egg pizza concoction with as many vegetables as I can sneak in there.
⢠A hollowed-out apple with tuna salad stuffed in the middle is a fun lunch, though hard to eat for little ones.
⢠Beans and rice. Why not? Itâs easy! Itâs good, and itâs good at room temperature.
⢠Build your own snack/sandwiches â cheaper than Lunchables, you just slice up cheese and deli meats into bite-sized pieces, add some whole grain crackers, a yogurt, some fruit, some carrot sticks, and youâve got lunch.
Remember, snacks shouldnât be something that gives kids the Three OâClock Crazies. We do apples with a dip, either peanut butter or vanilla yogurt, or some other, healthy snack that isnât full of refined sugars.
And if youâre ever stuck when you get home, thereâs no reason you canât eat breakfast for dinner (another secret: when I was a kid, my mom would sometimes let me eat apple pie for breakfast, in a bowl full of milk, and I loved itâŚ. so relax a little and have some fun).
cooking, eating, healthy choices, healthy diet, healthy food, lunch boxes, New York Times, School Lunch Test, vegan lunchbox
