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Help! We are struggling with ideas for variety in our girls' packed lunches and need some inspiration. They currently have things like sandwiches (obviously), pasta with cheese, chicken nuggets, noodles with honey and soy, soup, baked beans etc and they always have a snack (such as a oat bar), fruit and yogurt too.
So - what do you all feed your kids and give me some inspiration! Thank you.
- Tuna pasta salads
- Potato/Beetroot/tuna salads
- Coucous and chargrilled vegetable with feta salads
- Cheese and Ham quesadillas (just a slight twist on the sarnies)
- Cucumber/ Watermelon / Halloumi and quinoa/green bean salad
- wraps of various sorts - pulled pork with apple slices
- in the past some tortilla chips, cold chilli, sour cream and avocado (I squeeze some lemon on it to keep it from going brown)
hope that helps I must admit we alternate it packed lunches and school lunches every term cos I struggle to do the weekly cook and then packed lunches
Greggs sausage rolls, you know you can buy packs of them from Greggs? 😀
Seriously, it's the faff of packed lunches that make me happy to pay for school meals! They're pretty good value too
They used to do school lunches but they weren't too keen.
Sorry, I wasn't judging, in many ways I feel your pain. The effort of making sarnies every day, even though it would probably be my wife, is something we're happily avoiding right now. Hopefully that continues
Do your kids actually want something different? I reckon mine would happily have a cheese/ham sandwich every day!
Do your kids actually want something different?
No, it is us trying to ensure they get a reasonably well balanced diet (they would happily eat Greggs sausage rolls every day though).
There's a difference between a balanced diet and 'something different every day'. A 'something and salad' sandwich, yoghurt and a piece of fruit is a reasonably well-balanced meal, you may just be overcomplicating it and making a rod for your own back.
you may just be overcomplicating it and making a rod for your own back.
Possibly we are but we do want them to have variety.
my 9 year old daughter switched back to packed lunches recently because she's on a gluten free diet and was fed up with variations of jacket potato everyday at school.
today she has -
Gluten free bread with Chicken/sweetcorn/bacon sandwich filling (yes I know the pre-made sandwich fillings are a bit crap - but she likes it)
A blueberry yoghurt
A whole red pepper -chopped up
A bag of cheese and onion crisps.
tomorrow i'll probably switch the pepper for a tub of cherry tomatoes.
She is a messy eater (dispraxic - drops stuff everywhere) so rice/pasta salad not a great idea.
I'm sure I could make it a bit healthier, but we eat fairly well at home, and I'd rather give her stuff she actually likes, than things which will get sneaked into the bin.
- Coucous and chargrilled vegetable with feta salads
Have I wandered into the "how to get your child mercilessly bullied for the next three years" thread by mistake? (-:
mini quiches?
Beat up some eggs in a bowl, add in fillings (ham/bacon/lardons, spinach, cheese, soy beans, are all favourites in our house) and then pour out into cupcake cases - silicone ones are best, eg:
Then they can be oven baked or microwaved to get them to set, and then they can be turned out to make little pastryless quiches.
I also quite fancy making up some rice cakes - Saxo Tinkoff here but there are others, and if you use risotto rice then you can make savoury ones too
Hmmm, mini quiches sound good. We do hard boiled eggs sometimes, never thought of quiche 🙂
And yet another nail in the bad dad coffin for me.
- Tuna pasta salads
- Potato/Beetroot/tuna salads
- Coucous and chargrilled vegetable with feta salads
- Cheese and Ham quesadillas (just a slight twist on the sarnies)
- Cucumber/ Watermelon / Halloumi and quinoa/green bean salad
- wraps of various sorts - pulled pork with apple slices
F*** my boots, how do you manage that AND go to work / have any spare time at all!
Have I wandered into the "how to get your child mercilessly bullied for the next three years" thread by mistake? (-:
hahaha my daughter got some comments early on.. more like yuck etc but she's moved past, my son couldn't care less what his mates thought.
F*** my boots, how do you manage that AND go to work / have any spare time at all!
Wake up at silly hours in the morning, tbh I can only manage it for one term at a time. This term they are on school lunches. Have to steel myself for next term!
Jeepers I feel like a rubbish dad too now.
I just do a ham & cheese sandwich with lettuce or wrap or a fajita chicken wrap if I'm feeling super kind.
plus
Pepper/tomato/cucumber
Grapes or Apple
1/2 packet of crisps or similar but healthier option
Caramel waffer
Yoghurt
They've never wanted much different and hated the school dinners, and we always have a good proper evening meal anyway.
My two lads have near enough the same thing every day.
Apple or pear
Tangerine or plum
A club -today's is mint
A packet of plain popcorn
A container with chopped up cucumber, peppers, celery, carrots and cherry tomatoes
A big bottle of water
They view eating at lunchtime as something to get done quickly as it cuts into playtime. Minimum hassle, minimum mess and fast eating.
Don't have any childerbeasts, but for packed lunch ideas,we tend to have-
Snacks - homemade banana bread,nuts, celery + carrot sticks with peanut butter, fruit, popcorn
Leftovers from previous night, Omelette + salad, roasties+ meat, soup (microwave access needed,or thermos it)
Any sort of salad - feta, meat, boiled eggs, beetroot,loadsa salad stuff, nuts, rice or posh stuff like freekah
I went in and threatened the teachers so that my two can use the kettle in the staff room before anyone can have a brew....
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Some of the recipes from 'feedzone portables' make decent packed lunch food, 2 bite pies and the some of the baked eggs are favourites here. Just make them up in batches. It was sweetcorn and feta fritters today.
Other than that, wraps or pitta stuffed with chicken etc. or made into quesadilla.
Edit: That comes across proper poncy, she has sandwiches sometimes honest!
My boys usually have ham and lettuce sandwiches, grapes, cherry tomatoes, banana, yogurt tube, boiled egg and either some cooked jerk chicken or homemade beef jerky.
I don't have kids but from (vague old) memory, sandwiches in packed lunches are vile. They may start off okay but they end up mushed up warm horrible meh and I always chucked them.
One of the rare occasions that "deconstructed" food actually has a purpose. Individual ingredients and get them to prepare the stuff at lunch for a nice fresh sandwich. Personally, not white bread, which likewise is easily squished or bashed up in a packed lunch pack. Wholemeal/grain type bread seems to cope better.
Anyway, whatever the case, from memory, don't assume they'll actually eat the stuff and aren't finding other means to get nicer tasting grub. Bunking off and getting chips from the takeaway for example 😀
Have you considered asking the kids?
Because you do realise right, for all your well-meaning fruits and yoghurts and salads, all of that goes straight in the bin or traded for pies as soon as they're out of sight, yes? If you're already giving them honey and soy noodles and reaching out for better ideas as you've run out of inspiration, the ship has sailed I'm afraid.
Talk to them. or suck it up, give them jam butties, a bag of crisps and a Mars bar. If you're packing them off to school with a lunch they don't want, they'll absolutely find alternatives. I had a trade agreement with a kid at my school for a couple of years.
the place for a balanced diet is in the evening when they get home again, at school your biggest challenge is whether they'll eat it or not.
Coronation chicken.
Wensleydale and apple.
Tuna mayonnaise.
Egg and cheese mayonnaise.
Plus usual fruit and sugar snap peas or a carrot.
Well done to everyone involved although school dinners are pretty good apparently (bacon butties mid morning!).
School meals are compulsory at my school and I'm glad. It's a great system.
Based in what my boys like to eat for picnics though:
peanut butter sandwiches
marmite sandwiches
more peanut butter sandwiches
cubed chicken breasts - lightly cajun seasoned, baked, chopped and frozen in largish batches
chunks of cheese. supermarket brand cheddar
cold sausages
cold pork belly
croissants
plain Ritz or buttered Jacobs crackers
cold fried or boiled egg
frittata
fruit - almost always small oranges or bananas.
Have you considered asking the kids?
Yes and we took them to the shops to let them have a look around to see if there was anythign else they would like to try just last weekend in fact.
Because you do realise right, for all your well-meaning fruits and yoghurts and salads, all of that goes straight in the bin or traded for pies as soon as they're out of sight, yes?
No. They are only 7 and are still of an age where they are honest about what they do and don't eat – anything they don't eat still comes home (which they then get to eat as / after their evening meal).