Lunch Ideas - Aurora,IL

My almost 4 year old loves to help "make" his lunch. He has a cookbook that my mom got for him that has several kid friendly recipies. His favorite is Falling from the Sky Apple Wraps. You mash up banana and peanut butter together and then spread it on a tortilla, top with apple pieces and then roll up and chill. It breaks up the monotony of sandwiches all the time and he loves to get to help!

You've gotten great ideas! I see many that I'm going to try as well. Here's a couple I used with my eldest who went through a very picky stage:
- broccoli & pesto pasta; make the pasta and buy a pesto season packet; make the pesto sauce (add olive oil and water to the season packet - takes like two minutes) and combine with finely chopped cooked broccoli. Pour over the pasta. They're both green and they can't tell the basil from the broccoli. Make a lot and store for quick reheat for lunch or a dinner side.
- 'fruit' smoothies; make a fruit smoothie and throw in some cucumber or carrot, protein powder or any other mild raw veggie. They can't taste it over the fruit. Add some flax oil - it's great for their skin & yours (has a nutty flavor)!
- fresh applesauce (especially now in the fall); peel & slice apples, add a tsp or so sugar & cinnamon + a little water and blend. Really good applesauce without cooking out the vitamins. Add some lemon juice and it won't brown as quickly or eat it right away.
- hummus is awesome with fresh veggies and/or pita bread and you can put whatever you want in it. it's so easy to make. i usually add fresh spinach and avocado. you cannot taste the veggies & it has lots of good fat and protein.
- finally, if you grow it, they will eat it. consider having a small garden (or containers) next spring for her to plant cucumbers, grape tomatoes, potatoes, corn, lettuce, carrots, etc. They're fascinated by the growing process.

Most important - make it fun and let your daughter help! Have a step stool in the kitchen that puts her at counter height so she can stir, pour, spread, watch.

I never knew what to make for lunch either. It was like having to prepare another whole meal each day, and I was overwhelmed. What I did was create seven different lunches, and we rotate through them each week. That way I know what to have on the grocery list, and I know what to make for lunch every day. Kids don't pick up much from one week to the next, so it will be a loooooong time until your child says, "hey mom, why do we have peanut butter and banana sandwiches every Tuesday?" Actually, they might like the routine.
I also love the website www.veganlunchbox.com. This woman made fabulous lunches for her son every day and then took pictures of them. At the homepage, click on BLOG, and then scroll down the left side and look for ARCHIVES. There are many months worth of lunches to look through. They're all vegan, but you can subsitute meat and dairy no problem.
Good luck!

Hi J.,

Does your daughter like cheese? One of my girlfriends makes cheese casadillas for her daughter and hides broccoli in the cheese. She says it works wonders! And you can get pretty heatlhy tortillas these days - low carb varieties are available, and there are even ones with veggies baked right into them too. Best of all, I think kids find them fun to eat! Could be a good option.

Hope that helps!

I like to put several small things on their plates - a couple of grapes, a couple of carrot sticks, etc. They don't eat that much (in quantity) at that age. Sometimes when they have friends over I make a few different kinds of sandwiches cut into 4s and piled on a plate like British tea or something. (my kids like cucumber sandwiches, too, and provolone and mayonnaise - I only know these things by trial and error, because they aren't favorites of mine!) Soup, quesadillas are also favorites.

Anything that can be dipped or spread or assembled is popular here. Apples dipped in peanut butter. Veggies and dip. Put out ritz crackers and small condiment dishes of peanut butter (or almond butter or similar) and jelly and she can make her own "sandwich."

I use a small custard cup and microwave some refried beans with cheese on top and give them taco chips to dip. You can spread a little spaghetti sauce on a flour tortilla, sprinkle on some mozzarella cheese, microwave for a minute and you have a small pizza (she can help to assemble, too.) Hard boiled eggs - my kids love peeling and salting them by themselves.

Small pieces of fruit on skewers or toothpicks, with yogurt "dip" is also easy (anything on a stick!) Oh, and wraps - you can take just about any sandwich item and turn it into a wrap or roll it tightly and slice into pretty spiral slices.

whatever you eat for dinner, you can eat for lunch. My little one is a pretty good eater but has gotten more picky as she reaches 2. Lunch options include: ham and cheese sandwich on whole grain bread, pasta with tomato sauce or with cheese, scrambled eggs (sometimes with pesto or veggies etc in it), egg in a cup with bread, tofu with veggies, salmon spread on toast, beans on toast (a bit messy), yoghurt, all kinds of fruits, broccoli, squash, roasted sweet potatoes, mashed potatoes, spinach, brussel sprouts, carrots, chicken nuggets (dino from costco), peas, avocado, couscous with veggies. I read recently that children at that age can need up to 20 tries to get used to a new item. Parents are inclined to give up after one or two tries but just keeping giving that item until it becomes familiar with out any pressure to eat it, seems to work in general.

Don't overlook frozen dinners--the healthy grown up kind. My daughters both loved meatball stroganoff...personally it totally grosses me out but they loved it. Also, spaghettios, raviolios. They may be a bit high in sodium but every now and then is ok. And if your daughter likes breakfast serve it for lunch too!

Hi J.- I am a SAHM of 4 (2 now in school) and I have found lunch is just repetitous- there is no getting around it. We do a lot of soup in our house for my 5 and 2 year old-(chunky, progresso etc) and I will even send it occasionally to my older girls. We also do chicken salad, egg salad, I will do "breakfast for lunch" and we will have bagels and eggs- but in the end it still is a lot of the same.
Good Luck getting out of the rut (I haven't seemed to!)!
Beth

Lunch is probably my favorite meal to serve. Even making sack lunches for my kids is fun. 'm sure you are much better at dinners that I. My kids still love quesadillas, with cheese or you can add any left over veggies, chicken, beef. peppers, onions, tomatoes....My kids love crackers and cheese and pepperoni or lunch meat/sandwiches, apples w/ dip or any fruit w/ dip, string cheese, bagel bites, smoothies, tortilla pinwheels - made w/ ham, shredded cheese or slices of cheese, lettuce, ranch dressing..or cream cheese w/ some spices in it. Make in morning/slice in small 1/2" thick slices and arrange on plate w/ fresh fruit or yogurt. Even making fruit nachos... flour tortillas buttered w/ cinnamon/sugar, cut into small triangles, then baked and served w/ yoplait vanilla yogurt, mixed w/ fresh fruit (i.e. grapes, strawberries, blueberries, really any fruit). Even making banana bread and serving w/ fruit or carrot sticks or veggies w/ dip. My kids love many different kinds of foods and I give my husband a lot of credit for encouraging variety. If she doesn't like something, just try it again, weeks or months later. Good luck.