Lunch is my least favourite time of day. We have to eat, but no one loves the options, or we get bored, or they won’t eat it or we are out. You get the picture.
I don’t want to make full on-the-stove meals all the time for lunch. Breakfast is usually a good, healthy meal and supper is more complete. But lunch sits there, making me hate it.
Really, my kids are grazers lately. Short of making breakfast food all the time (pancakes for lunch? often), they tend to eat mid-morning snack, lunch ‘snack’, and mid-afternoon snack. Some days we have success with sandwiches and left overs, but I get so bored.
Our lunches rotate between:
- Pita and dip (baba ganouj/hummus) and cheese
- Peanut butter sandwiches
- Salmon/tuna sandwiches
- Pasta left overs
- Scrambled eggs or egg sandwiches
- Left over pancakes, frozen from the weekend
- Always a fruit or some sort.
- Sometimes carrot sticks – if he’ll eat them.
YAWN.
What do you do for lunch? I’d love to add to my list of ideas! (note: they don’t eat hot dogs (yet) – their choice – so that summer time idea is out!)
Hello,
A few different things that we eat are mackrel on toast, eggy bread, omlette, dippy egg and soldiers, cheese on toast,savory rice, pasta cold, crackers/breadsticks, all very yummy 🙂 x
If I had to deal with lunch everyday, I’d go nuts. As it is my weekends are frequently about trying to get my kids to eat something. Both of them are total grazers lately. Crackers here, a piece of cheese there…
seriously, HOW DO THEY SURVIVE???
My one saving grace is both love protein bars. So one of my big concerns about getting some protein (since we are vegetarian) is alleviated since they do eat those.
I know you mentioned tuna and salmon, but tuna and salmon melts are a little different from the every day.
We also eat tortilla shells a lot, and there’s plenty of things you can do with them:
– wrap them up with cream cheese (and add some grated veggies if you think you can get away with it)
– wrap them with pb and jam or pb and honey
– make easy quesadillas by melting some cheese and black beans in a folded wrap in the microwave for 20 seconds; can also serve with avocado
And there’s nothing wrong with eating snacks for lunch. My son’s lunch often consists of nuts, fruit and some cheese. Very easy.
My kids love making “sandwiches” with crackers and cheese. And you could get some nice crackers and cheese for yourself.
There are some good frozen veggie patties out there that just require a quick heat-up in a fry pan. They all taste a bit different so you’d have to try them to see what your kids like.
we do grilled cheese, homemade chicken strips, quesadillas with cheese, chicken and veggies, muffin tin lunches, burgers, and soup.
Amanda, the muffin tin lunches are adorable! We often just end up doing a lunch buffet – small portions of different things as Sox suggested
Quesadillas with cheese and refried beans here as well, or cucumber and cream cheese sandwiches. Crackers and cheese. Beans and toast.
susie 🙂
Susie, refried beans would be a great idea – I should have added that they love baked beans.
Great ideas. I don’t have to do lunch every day and struggle with it on the weekend… only because I don’t plan in advance. Quesadillas reminded me of when I worked at the campus pub. You could do mini pizzas and the kids could add their own toppings or a chicken melt… take a bun open faced, spread with garlic butter and add chunks of chicken that you could cook up the night before and sprinkle on cheddar and mozzarella and then pop in the oven until cheese is melted. Mmmm. Potato pancakes are a yummy idea. First Meals by Annabelle Karmel also has some good ideas.
Kathleen, I want that chicken melt. Maybe I’ll stick with boring for the kids and mix it up for me!
We usually have a hot lunch, either made in advance and warmed at lunch time or (on-purpose) leftovers from the night before. When I do my batch cooking or when we have ample leftovers, I freeze it in very small amounts for the kids. Sometimes I’ll prepare a soup or small casserole on the week-end when I do my meal prep and then I just have to heat and serve during the week.
One of my favourite quick and easy lunches is Spaghetti Pizza. The kids think it’s a treat and it’s easy and nutritious. Win win!
http://momicon.wordpress.com/2010/04/30/whats-for-lunch/
Maranda, what is spaghetti pizza?!!
Leftovers are okay sometimes (I love them!) but the kids don’t always eat them the first time around – ha!
I am sooo ready to stop making lunches for school. Great suggestions which I’ll use during the summer. Unfortunately my kids are limited because of classmates with life threatening allergies. I’m not complaining about that at all – I just have picky eaters so we rotate between a few boring sandwiches and soup/pasta in a thermos, fruit, vegetables and yogurt. (That’s what they like) Thank goodness for pizza lunches. 🙂
We will do bagels with cream cheese, or melted herbed havarti. My kids also like a cheese and lettuce wrap — we sometimes throw in some lunch meat as well.
I left the recipe for the spaghetti pizza, it’s a favorite of my little ones.
We don’t eat a lot of sandwiches b/c we don’t eat a lot of what goes on them, but when i do i make them pinwheel style (tea sandwiches) by rolling the bread thin with a rolling pin, and then adding cream cheese, cucumber, avocado, peppers, etc. Roll up and slice into circles. The kids think it’s fun and they’re hard to pick apart, so there’s rarely any bits leftover on their plates.
Quesidillas are a great suggestion too. I warm black beans with salsa for a quick and easy filling.
Quesidillia, Pirogies, mini pizzas (scratch, build yourself), “lunchovers” (leftovers), sometimes the evil nuggets from the freezer pop out. (heh)