Does the whole school lunch thing drive you mad? It’s a complicated business – we have to make sure it’s healthy, doesn’t go soggy and won’t give anyone salmonella! Then throw into the mix a fussy kid or two and a school policy on nuts and it’s the mums who are going nuts!!
My kids are a 14 and 11 and usually take a sandwich, two pieces of fruit and something else. They take filtered water to drink. The Natural New Age Dad also takes a packed lunch every day, so there is always lots of lunch making going on at our place!
♥ Let’s talk about sandwiches first. I try to make sure that the sandwiches contain protein and salad on a good quality grainy bread or wrap. I often make our own bread – we like Cyndi O’Meara’s bible bread and Tania’s GF Chia and Almond Bread. Sorj or Mountain Bread are the best brand of wraps I have found that contain no artificial stuff.
As far as protein goes, we gave up deli meats long ago. They just contain too many chemicals and are heavily processed. Find out some more here. Occasionally, I will buy some organic ham, as this one doesn’t contain sodium nitrates.
What I do instead is cook up large joints of roast beef, pork, lamb, chicken or corned beef, usually in the slow cooker, every week or two. Woolworths stock an organic corned beef now that is free of chemicals. It’s really tasty and not very expensive. After cooling in the fridge, the meat is sliced up or shredded in the thermomix. Then I freeze, label and date it in portions to suit two days worth of lunches. It’s easy to just pull out a portion the night before to let it thaw in the fridge.
To add a bit of variety, I also use boiled eggs with my homemade mayonnaise or tinned salmon or tuna (in springwater only) with mayonnaise. Sometimes the kids just feel like having my homemade nut butter – in which case the veges are ‘on the side’ in a little snack pack. We sometimes use organic butter but never, ever use margarine. Organic avocado is our choice of spread on sandwiches. It adds lots of other nutrients as well!
Sometimes they like to mix it up and take something else, besides a sandwich. Here are our other favourite healthy things that don’t involve bread.
♥ Fruit is an easy one. We try to eat mostly organic fruit. If we can’t, we give it a good wash off before eating! Fruit salad in a container with yoghurt on top is nice for a change.
♥ Something else – is not always so easy! My normal routine is to bake a couple of large batches of healthy muffins, cakes and slices, loaded with fruits, nuts and seeds. They are all portioned up and frozen. They thaw out by lunch time in the lunchbox. Here are some ideas:
Six Healthy Biscuits for Lunchboxes
What about choc-hazel bliss balls, carrot, pineapple and zucchini muffins or healthy cake?
If haven’t baked treats, then the kids (and the big kid) take things like:
Home-made airpopped organic popcorn (use Herbamare to keep the salt content down)
Vege sticks and cherry tomatoes with homemade dip
Dried fruit and nuts (make sure your dried fruit is safe)
Sometimes a packet snack sneaks it way in there for a treat. You can find some good packet snacks.
There are loads of ideas around the web too. You could try Vegie Smuggler’s amazing Cheese Puffs, Mamacino’s Really Easy Banana Bread or Feeding Fussy Kid’s Iron Booster Balls.
I always think it’s a good idea to get the kids involved in the lunch making too. The more input they have and ownership they take for their lunches, mean it’s more likely to get eaten. What doesn’t get eaten for lunch, gets eaten for afternoon tea at our place! Quality, organic food is not cheap and I hate waste.
I would love to hear what your lunch box ideas are. Leave me a comment and let me know!
Great idea on the cold meats Sonia. Love the idea of portioning and freezing. I cook up a roast a couple of times a term but i’m inspired to give up on the deli counter totally.
A bit of work on one day pays off! I usually cook up two chooks at a time or really large joints of meat so I don’t have to do it as often. Plus if I have a couple of meats on the go plus add in the egg and tuna, they don’t get bored!
I am definitely going to make those Anzacs…I love that list of ingredients! I think you are spot on Natural New Age Mum…there is no way around it, fruit, seeds, nuts, good grainy breads and some protein finished off with a good guzzle of water…a little preparation is required but it’s so worth it in the end!
Let me know if you like the Anzacs… they are very moreish! 🙂
Would you believe I was just mixing up your ANZAC’s when you commented on my blog?! Look forward to trying some more recipes 🙂
sorry to reply so late… you got stuck in my spam queue! did you like them Kristen? great minds huh?
my kids like quite a bit of food for school , a sandwich and fruit for lunch and fruit and something like a homemade muffin plus something else , drives me nuts trying to vary it , we have a no nuts policy at school and in one of my kids classes we have a no seeds thingy , aahhh makes it so hard ! am def going to start the cooking of joints instead of cold cuts , i have my very first slow cooker so i shall start there , thanks for the tips look forward to more in the comments 🙂
It is hard, you almost have to leave the treats for after school snacks! The slow cooker just makes it so much easier. I find 4 hours on high or 8 on low enough to cook the meat – it means I can go to work and it’s done when I get home. It’s really handy to have in the freezer for slack cooking nights too… just pull out a bit of meat, heat it up and add some veg! 🙂
Great ideas! My son just started prep this year and i do need lunchbox ideas! how hot is the meat when you put it in the fridge to cool off?
Hi Juliet… I read somewhere once for food safety, to wait until the steam stops rising, then wrap and refrigerate. I find it easier to slice in nice thin pieces when it’s been chilled ! Sonia 🙂
thanks, what are the best cuts of red meat that you use? i am prone to be a vegetarian but do my best to have good meat for the rest of the family :()
We use the organic corned beef, lamb leg, roast beef (trying to source organic for these) and organic roast pork. I just try to have a variety as I figure that all things in moderation are okay. I just avoid processed meats all together!
what do you pay per kg for those big cuts? at my nearest local market we buy small cuts (pricey stakes), will ask for big ones. Price in bulk is ok but we don’t have a big freezer. i need a long term solution (hmm, not sure how long we will stay here.. catch 22). could you please send me your recipe for homemade organic spelt toast? (love your things on pintrest, not familiar with it yet but looks like i will get addicted!). i want to buy a hand grinder and start from the grain (ordered 25kg organic spelt through a friend, hope i can get it soon).
Hi Juliet…. it depends on the cut really! I am trying to source organic beef and lamb as I have done with the chicken and pork. I still find it cheaper than deli meats as they can be $20-$30 a kilo! I only use a thin slice on sandwiches too, so it goes a long way. I will post up the organic spelt bread recipe on a blog post very soon. I also have a great GF one too. 🙂
made these today with the kids, in the thermomix. they were great. thanks!
HI Ruth, thanks for stopping by…. the anzacs?
yes the anzacs, sorry!
Loving your anzac biscuit recipe 🙂 though I’d have to use honey instead of the rapadura sugar which is off the scale price wise in the UK! Have you ever used lettuce wraps instead of grain wraps??? After a while you don’t miss the bread! Because we don’t eat meat we love hummus and other dips with green salads, bean salads and raw veggies too…I’ve only just discovered herbamare…I love it!
Hi Vicky…..it is quite exxy here too! But we don’t have treats very often, so it all works out! I will give the lettuce idea a go for my daughter!
My daughter is only at daycare, but I also e to pack her lunch because she is gluten free – my only worry is when she goes to school I can’t give her things that need to be heated up. She doesn’t have sandwhiches (lots of people suggest gluten free bread, but have you tasted it?) … so do you have any other suggestions? 🙂
My daughter is only at daycare, but I also have to pack her lunch because she is gluten free – my only worry is when she goes to school I can’t give her things that need to be heated up. She doesn’t have sandwiches (lots of people suggest gluten free bread, but have you tasted it?) … so do you have any other suggestions? 🙂
Hi Tracey. I agree some of the GF bread is disgusting and a lot of it has so much artificial stuff in it! I have a recipe on the blog for a nice one if you have time to make your own. My daughter takes corn cakes, rice cakes, rice crackers, corn and buckwheat crispbreads, rice paper rolls, sushi and salads.
I would love to see a post about quick school morning breakfast recipes for the children – porridge, shakes, etc. I would be interested to see what they rotate through!
A few people have asked me that now Justine, so I will work on it! 🙂
Thank you – look forward to it! 🙂
There’s some great ideas here. Thanks so much for the link, Sonia.
Thanks for stopping by Kellie – I hope you got some inspiration…. this lunchbox thing is never ending, isn’t it!! ??
Always looking for new ideas on lunchbox ideas…typically my daughter has either a sourdough sandwich with either hommous, avocado, tuna or nut butter, or a couple of boiled eggs, and a small pot of hommous with carrot sticks; plus homemade spelt banana bread or a couple of bliss balls / cashew or coconut butter stuffed dates for a treat, and also she loves olives, button mushrooms, and some feta , nuts and fruit…I can’t recommend the planetbox lunchbox highly enough..it is a stainless steel lunchbox with lots of compartments…bit on the expensive side, but being stainless steel, should last many, many years….
thanks Simone! Great ideas 🙂
My girlfriend and I have started our own “lunchbox revolution”. We both have four kids and I have three at school this year with the fourth starting next year. Over the last 2 months I have slowly saved and bought four Tupperware sandwich savers plus and tomorrow they start using them. I also have kept the saving up knowing they may get broken, lost etc.
Tomorrow they will eat bread I am about to bake (it is proofing) carrot sticks, fruit, homemade banana bread and homemade crackers. I am so proud of them for eating this food and us for sticking with our plan to cut back sugar and processed foods in their lunch boxes. They aren’t complaining at all and even my fussy eater is pleased with what is being served up.
Keep up these blog posts, it really helps to keep us motivated 🙂 thank you
Leanne xo
Wow Leanne ! That is so impressive. I want that lunch – sounds amazing!! Go the revolution!! 🙂
I like the idea of organic ham, never tried it before. Might give some of the ideas ago, thanks for sharing.
awesome! thanks for stopping by Olivia 🙂
Love the idea of eliminating Deli meats. I do corned beef in the slow cooker quite often but just wondering if you add any liquid or other things in with the other meats to stop them drying out? Or do you just throw the hunk of meat in on its own and return 8 hours later?
I usually add a splash of water to the bottom of the roast and half a cut onion to sit the meat on 🙂
Love your ideas and I’m getting some great advice from you. Just wondering what you use to stop the avocado going brown on school sandwiches when you use it as a spread. We’ve given up on margarine and use homemade butter. I’d love to use avo but have always been turned off of doing so cause I thought it would discolour by lunch time. Any advice would be great. Thank you!
I never worry about that Laura – I think once you have the sandwich together and it’s wrapped up or in a container, it’s okay! Well, none of my kids have complained yet! LOL
Excellent. Thanks for that. I suppose it’s oxidisation which makes it brown so, like you say, once the sandwich is pressed together it wouldn’t be exposed to the air. Looking forward to trying your Anzac biscuits and will definitely be doing the roast meats. Great ideas.
thanks Laura ! let me know what you think 🙂
We are similar to you. I have a 6 year old and two 13 year olds. We don’t do deli meats, so I do the same and cook roasts for lunch meats, tuna and boiled eggs. I make sausage rolls, sushi and Vietnamese spring rolls. The older 2 will take leftovers and heat them up at school, while the youngest will sometimes have a wrap or just an egg chopped up with homemade mayo, or half an avocado. I also pack my hubby’s lunch each day. He usually has leftovers (if there are any) and I always bake something (usually 3-4 times a week).
great tips thanks Jo!!
Thanks Sonia, I sometimes find myself overwhelmed but it’s good to know what’s freezable n what’s not, the meat idea sounds good too – my lil man seems to want Jam sandwiches everyday but i don’t like the sugar content – unfortunately he is one that will go without if he doesn’t like something so i don’t know – he loves egg n lettuce but we run out of eggs quickly here (we have our own chooks).
Have you tried the chia jam? it’s really good! 🙂