Move over frozen chicken nuggets and French fries! Brown bag lunches can be fun and good for you too. Even the pickiest eater can get excited about eating a healthy lunch this year by including these fun ideas in his or her lunchbox.
Day 1: Add a fun-to-eat-good-for-you treat
If your child is accustomed to ordering pizza and burgers from the cafeteria menu, sending them off to school with a lunch bag filled with fruits and veggies might be too much change for them to take. Start small and include some steamed edamame to go along with their favorite PB&J or ham sandwich.
Edamame is fun to eat. All kids love squeezing them out of their shells and have so much fun with the process of eating them they don’t even think about the fact that their good for you too.
Day 2: Everything tastes better on a stick with a dip
Skewer your child’s favorite fruits on a lollipop stick (found in any craft store). Choose a few different colors to make them look colorful and fun – green grapes, yellow pineapple, red strawberries. Your child can even help make these with you the night before.
Serve the fruit skewers with a yogurt dipping sauce. Simply mix plain or vanilla yogurt with some of your favorite preserves, coconut, chopped nuts or honey. Creating your own yogurt flavors allows you to control the amount of sugar.
Day 3: Egg-cellent lunch Mom!
Eggs are a wonderful and healthy source of protein and make a great addition to a child’s lunch. Give your child a surprise in their lunch bag today by including some eggs made with egg molds. Egg molds are very popular for creating Japanese Bento boxes but are now readily available in the United States in places like Williams-Sonoma or online at Amazon.
You can shape your eggs into cute bunnies, hearts, flowers, or cars. They are sure to delight your pre-school and elementary school kids and they are fun for adults too!
Day 4: Fun Finger Foods
Who doesn’t like food better when you can eat it with your hands? Children especially enjoy eating bite-sized items they can easily pop in their mouths. Create a lunch today that is made up of fun finger foods using a plastic container with lots of little compartments, a bento box, or some silicone cupcake liners. Fill each compartment with cubes of cheese, ham, grapes, dried fruit, pretzels, baby carrots, slices of cucumber, pepperoni slices. You get the idea!
Day 5: Fast and Fruity
For a quick, yummy additional to your child’s lunch try whipping up a fruit smoothie today and adding it to your child’s thermos. Fill a blender with some milk, some fresh or frozen berries, bananas, a little wheat germ, and a drizzle of maple syrup. You can even sneak in some baby spinach and your child won’t even realize they are getting an iron-packed, healthy meal. They will love the flavor and you will have gotten a full serving of fruits and veggies into your child. Everyone’s happy!
What fun lunch ideas do you have for your kids’ lunchbox?
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Healthy and appealing school lunches have been challenging for me and I’ve recently switched to “Bento-box” style lunches for my three kids which they all seem to enjoy. The ideas in this article will definitely help me expand their variety and still keep it healthy!