Brown Bag Lunch Recipes
Pack A Brown Bag Lunch That Won’t Be Traded
Kids Lunches
Lunchbox Recipes
One of the best parts of shopping for school supplies is picking out the lunch box that your child will love to tote to school every day. Once you have the equipment, you need to fill it! You’ve all heard the famous stories about lunchbox content trading.
To make sure that the lunches you pack are envied by other kids, but eaten by your child, include your child in the planning process. There’s no point in making turkey salad wraps for school lunch if little Jamie doesn’t like turkey or tortillas.
Here are some quick lunchbox tips:
Actual time for eating lunch at most schools only lasts for 15 to 20 minutes and is filled with distractions. Make sure the lunch foods you pack are easy to eat, packed in easily opened packages, and don’t require peeling or special tools.
Small children may not eat very much at one sitting. Think about packing appetizers instead of a large sandwich and whole banana. You can also include more choices if the quantity of each is smaller. Fill a mini muffin tin with small amounts of foods, wrap with foil, and pack into the lunch box.
Small foods are not only easier for children to handle, but they are more fun to eat. Cut sandwiches into smaller pieces, use tiny tortillas for wraps and small sandwich buns, serve baby carrots and peel and cut fruit into smaller pieces to interest your child in the foods you pack.
Think about different types of bread for sandwiches and dippers. Try crackers, mini waffles, rice cakes, mini croissants, pita bread, mini muffins, small bagels, tortillas, focaccia, raisin or cinnamon bread.
If your child wants the same thing day after day, go ahead and pack it, as long as the overall meal is nutritious and you are sure your child eats it. Kids don’t like a lot of change in what they eat. Did you know that it takes 10 to 12 introductions to a new food before a child is usually willing to even taste it?
Take some time to look at the prepackaged lunches in your grocer’s refrigerated section. These appeal to kids, but aren’t very nutritious. You can pack the same types of snack foods, but use healthier choices for more kid appeal.
Salsa, hummus, bean dips, or fruit dips with baked chips and veggies or fruit are good lunchbox choices, since these foods contain more vitamins and fiber.
Make sure to think about food safety. Freeze juice boxes or small gel packs and place in the bag. The juice will keep other foods cool and will thaw to just the right temperature and consistency by lunchtime.
Use an insulated thermos for hot foods like soups and stews, and cold salads too. For best results, rinse out a thermos with very hot water to heat it before adding hot soups. Rinse it out with ice water to chill the thermos before adding cold soups.
If you make your own snack mixes, you can include healthy additions like dried fruits, unsalted nuts, pretzels, and baked crackers. Kids love to munch on something crunchy and sweet or savory.
Instead of making sandwiches, consider packing individual sandwich ingredients to let your child make their own sandwich at lunch, or eat the ingredients separately. Many children don’t like to eat more than one food at a time, since their sense of taste is very intense.
Cereal bars can pack a lot of nutrition into a food kids love to eat. Include raisins, currants, or other dried fruits in the recipe for additional flavor, color and nutrition.
Make sure to include something fun – a sticker, cookies wrapped in plastic wrap with a ribbon tie, sandwiches cut into playful shapes, or meats and cheeses or fruits threaded on a caramel apple stick (which is safer than a traditional kabob stick.
These recipes can certainly be packed in brown bags, but there are such wonderful and high tech insulated lunch boxes and sacks on the market that have built in food safety features: thermoses, a space to slip a pre frozen gel pack, even pockets for wet wipes and utensils. Take some time to browse through the selection at your store or online and your child will be well equipped all year.
Portion size is critical when planning lunches and recipes for your children. Here’s a general guide for grade school lunch portion sizes:
Two to three ounces of meat or cheese
One or two slices of bread OR 1/2 cup grain or rice
At least two different fruits or vegetables
1 cup milk or 4 ounces dairy product
Lunchbox Recipes
Tuna Sandwiches
These delicious sandwiches from my cookbook can be made ahead and frozen, then tucked into the lunch box; it will thaw to perfection by lunch time.
Franks ‘n Bean Soup
Kids think it’s hard to beat this soup; pack a small container full of cheese for your child to sprinkle on top of the soup before they eat.
Turkey Hummus Sandwiches
Prepared hummus is a great timesaver, but you can also make your own to use in these easy sandwiches.
Mini Hero Sandwiches
Remember that you can create sandwiches to your child’s tastes. If he or she doesn’t like mustard, leave it out!
Cannellini Bean Spread Wraps
This spread is milder than Hummus, and also freezes beautifully. Make a bunch and you’ll be able to slip one into the lunch box once a week.
Tomato Tortellini Soup
Kids love to be creative with their food; package the cheese separately so they can sprinkle it on the soup themselves, or think about packing shredded veggies they could use in the same way.
Chilled Cucumber Soup
Hey, there have to be some children out there who would like this soup! Aren’t there? It’s smooth, suave, and cool, just like your teenager.
Sour Cream Pesto Dip
Place this easy and savory dip in the lunch box along with baby carrots and tiny celery sticks and your kid will have a party!
Salmon Cucumber Sandwiches
Again, if cucumbers aren’t a favorite at your house, leave them out and use chopped celery or shredded carrot.
Crisp Tuna Salad
Canned potato sticks are the ‘crisp’ in this easy salad. You could also use fried chow mein noodles, or peanuts.
Chicken Chowder
If your children like chicken, corn, and potatoes, they will like this soup!
Chicken Santa Fe Soup
You can also make this delicious soup ahead of time and freeze it, then reheat and pour into warmed thermoses for a cold day.
Creamy Fruit Pasta Salad
This three ingredient recipe is so quick and easy, and very delicious.
Waldorf Chicken Salad Sandwich
Pack the four ingredients for this sandwich separately and let your child assemble it himself.
Updated Peanut Butter Sandwiches
Carrots, sunflower seeds, and currants update regular peanut butter; use one or all three!
Bologna Slaw Wrap Sandwiches
I love using flour tortillas for just about any sandwich filling; it holds together so well and tastes wonderful.
Shrimp Salad Sandwiches
Boy, I would have gobbled these down if they had been in my lunch box! For kids, I’d leave out the cabbage and add a few more shrimp.
Chewy Picnic Bars
Boy, these are good bar cookies! If your child doesn’t like raisins, nuts, or coconut, leave them out and substitute chocolate chips.
Oatmeal Cookies
I love this recipe for oatmeal cookies; it’s chewy, crunchy, and delicious.
Chewy Cereal Bars
There’s no candy bar in the world better than this bar cookie. And you can make it healthy (well, healthier) by adding wholesome ingredients like raisins.
Applesauce Granola Cookies
These cookies just say ‘fall’ to me. I love the combination of sweet applesauce and crunchy granola.
Crisp Peanut Butter Cookies
Peanut butter cookies are made even better with crisp rice cereal and chocolate chips. Yum.
Peanut Blossoms
For a real treat, pack these classic and delicious peanut and chocolate cookies.
Snickerdoodles
This classic cookie, rolled in sugar and cinnamon before baking, is a perfect lunchbox treat.
Apricot Banana Bars
Yes, a bar cookie can be healthy too! But don’t tell your kids!
When you are planning brown bag school lunches, one way to save time is to plan a whole week of lunches when you do your grocery shopping. Some fruits may need that extra time to ripen in a closed paper bag on the counter.
You can make sandwiches for school lunches in an assembly line ahead of time and freeze them, following the tips in Freezing Chart and Tips. In fact, freezing any type of bread before you start assembling sandwiches helps stop the bread from tearing when you spread it with butter or other spreads.
By Linda Larsen, About.com