We are making some progress on breakfast food options, so now it’s time to work on school food options.
It would be so much easier if the girls just ate sandwiches… but no, that would be way too easy, normal and kid-like wouldn’t it!?! The thought of something squished between two slices of bread is just not their idea of lunch food. They’d prefer a bowl of noodles, or a mixed salad plate, or sushi…. all of which are going to take some effort from me to make lunch box ready.
To add to the no sandwich thing, I’m also trying to keep the amount of shop bought, pre-made, snack foods to a minimum. Both for budgetary reasons and to try and keep the additives and crap out of our lives as much as possible. So here is a list of lunch box options the girls and I have come up with….
* Tuna, lettuce and mayo flat bread wraps – their favourite easily portable lunch.
* Biscuits and dip – I’m going to try this recipe for home made savoury biscuits
* Grissini/Mini bread sticks with dip – have found a recipe to make these, I’ll blog if it works out.
* Muesli bars – I am determined to make our own but so far am not having much success.
* Pasta Salad
* Pop Corn – hoping our home grown pop corn plants will eventually produce but if not it’s cheap and easy to buy.
* Mini Salads – they’ll eat a variety of salad foods which is great for summer.
* Home made pizza rolls – hoping I can alter my foccacia bread recipe to make our own
* Cookies – will use the 100’s of biscuits recipe so I always have some in the freezer for emergencies, but will also make others.
* Muffins/cup cakes
* fruit fruit and more fruit – might try these frozen fruit cups for a bit of a treat
* Pita chips – using the leftover pita bread, it’s never any good fresh after a day or two.
* Yoghurt.
So what are you putting in your kid’s lunch boxes?
Can anyone out there give me some more suggestions?
Point me towards some good recipes? books? websites?
Commiserate over children who don’t eat sandwiches?
I just picked up the Feb issue of Super Food Ideas at Safeway and they had some great lunch ideas. CousCous with sausage, baked beans dip.
Annie loves hummus with veggie sticks.
We got a Foogo pot from Thermos and use it to keep banana and yogurt chilled. I :heart: Foogo pots. I can buy a large 1kg container of yogurt which is heaps cheaper than individual snack portions and add any fruit I want to it. Foogo pots also keep hot foods hot :)
A friend on Facebook was talking about her no bake muesli bars yesterday. We tried them and both girls loved it.
1 cup muesli (here I substitute the rolled oats)
3/4 cup coconut
125 g butter
4 tablespoons honey
1/2 cup sugar
3 cups ricebubbles
* dried fruit option – reduce coconut to 1/2 cup and add 1/4 cup of dried fruit (eg. sultanas)
Combine muesli, coconut and ricebubbles in a bowl.
Melt butter, honey and sugar in a pan, simmer for about 5 minutes.
Pour butter mixture into dry ingredients and mix.
Press mixture into a slice tin and refrigerate until set.
Cut into bars… and at this point, I also freeze :-)
Annie (my oldest) suggested making some with cornflakes instead of rice bubbles so that is what we have done today. Also super tasty.
I have a yummy bannana choc, coconut muffin recipe, that freezes well ready to pop into lunchboxes in the morning. Can get it if you like?
And Splatz, they are in the tinned fruit aisle. As far as pre packaged snacks go, theres not too much sugar in them and they are pretty all fruit. Great frozen so by lunch they are slushie like.
We’re getting into bento in a big way, in my case it’s to try to get a kid with limited ingredients to eat something! She loves making little faces and doing her own lunch, at the moment I’m working with her staples and hope to introduce new things when we get quicker at it.
I’m lucky because she’s in an afternoon session, I have a year before I have to cope with school mornings :D
My son went off sandwiches too. So now I do sausage rolls. He also likes a cooked sausage, egg, cucumber, tomato and now every now and again I can get away with a sandwich. I too try to stay away from pre-packaged stuff because I’m opposed to it on a lot of levels.
We love wraps as well. Mackenzie is happy to have a little tin of tuna, some rice crackers, a boiled egg, cheese little tomatoes, snow peas and hommus so she can dip to her hearts content!
some great ideas here , pita pockets work well too , put the wet ingredients (mixed) into a container and the girls can open the pita pocket and tip in the mix. So nothing goes soggy.
Oh I hear ya!!! We also have an aversion to sammies in our house and its proving a challenge. I am also trying to do the, not too much packaged food and sticking to the budget. But I find every morning Im cringing about making lunches everyday. My eldest, 8, is happy to take a salad or especially loves sushi, my 6 year old will usually eat anything, but needs A LOT in his lunchbox (dont know what it will be like when he’s a teenager – eats so much now!) and to add to the mix this year, miss 4 starts kindy next week and the rules for their lunch boxes are really strict. On top of this I am gluten free so have to think out the square all the time for our other meals. So I will think about some ideas and pass them on, when I quit hiding in the laundry during lunch preparations LOL. love to hear any other ideas you have :)