Brown Bag Lunches© Maureen Fleury
Jun 29, 1999
Children of working parents learn they have to carry a lunch to school every day. This has to be the most difficult meal to prepare because if you don't do it right, there is no second chance. Here are some suggestions that I would like to share:
Make lunches the night before school & work and put them in the fridge.
Use an insulated lunch bag. The ones I use have a removable inner bucket and I put the food inside it and then place in the fridge.
My kids may have different things in their lunches so I have put their names on the outside of each bucket. You may forget what you had put in each bucket.
Use small freezer packs that can be refrozen every night. Nothing is worse than a cold lunch pretending to be a warm one
If you don't have freezer packs, freeze a juice box overnight and then put in the lunch bag. It will keep the contents cool and will be nicely thawed by lunch time.
Wrap lettuce separately in a baggie with a sprinkle of water. It keeps it nice and crisp.
If you run out of lettuce for sandwiches, use sliced pickles.
Kids are usually sick of sandwiches within 2 weeks of starting school so use substitutes such as cheese & crackers, cup of soup (if the school has hot water available) or something hot in a thermos
Use a variety of breads, such as pita pockets, kaiser buns, croissants, and bagels.
Buy plastic forks & spoons to use with soups or puddings. They can be reused if your kid remembers to bring them back. Keep the plastic spoons or forks you have used at fast food places. Same with napkins, if you happen to grab more than what you actually used at the eatery.
Use cold cuts without bread but add servings of sliced cheese,pickles, carrots, celery, broccoli, and cauliflower. The kids will wrap the meat around the items.
If you have a meat grinder, try ground up bologna or ham with pickle and mayo.
Buy individual serving packages of ranch salad dressing to use as dip for carrots & celery or with salad that has been put in plastic containers.
Buy individual packages of peanut butter to use with crackers. Check with your child's school in regard to peanut products. More schools are adopting a "no peanut" policy due to children having allergies.
Put drinks from large containers and into re-usable plastic drink containers (some containers have built-in straws).
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The copyright of the article Brown Bag Lunches in Tips for Working Mothers is owned by Maureen Fleury. Permission to republish Brown Bag Lunches in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.
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