As someone who spends a lot of time supervising TK lunch, this is all such wonderful advice. Things teachers love: 1. When parents can send a few different options so that we don’t have to beg their kids to eat something they decided they hate even though they ate it yesterday. 2. When we don’t have to open 100 packages for 24 kids in five minutes. 3. When parents buy us lunch (kidding, unless… lol).
Love this perspective!! I've thought about how annoying it must for teachers to have to open individually packed items for kids — it was a very exciting day when my boys could open their own string cheese ha!
We get lunch at school, but I still pack them a sandwich and snacks just in case. 9 times out of ten the sandwich becomes a ready to eat afterschool snack, which lightens the afternoon frenzy!
Soom makes a chocolate tahini that is like a nut and dairy free Nutella and it’s delicious! My kids love it in a sandwich with sliced banana, as a dip for strawberries, just spread on crackers…
My favorite thing to pack is what I call the performative fruit. The apple slices go to school, the apple slices come home from school. I know they won’t get eaten, they are just to be seen by the lunch monitors!
My kids love crescent rolls baked with ham and cheese and honey mustard inside of themm. I bake a bunch and freeze them! So easy! They eat them heated and in a thermos but they aren’t bad cool either!
My son loves boiled okinawan sweet potatoes (the purple ones). So filling, and great energy booster before afterschool sports.
My daughter loves anything cold and crunchy. I learned a trick where you slice apples, soak them in salt water, give them a quick rinse, and the apples don’t brown. So now I slice a few apples, soak them with a LMNT hydration pack, pour myself the hydration water and rinse the apples and serve/save them for today plus tomorrow. I’m hydrated. She gets her cold and crunchy. We both win.
Love the lunch formula - use the same one! My kids love when I pack them pasta with a dipping sauce and always include a little sweet treat such as chocolate chips
Leftovers!l from dinner the night before. Everyday. If I don’t have leftovers it’s quesadilla or pb&j. Always a veggie (cucumber, cherry tomato, bell pepper) and a fruit (apple, strawberries, whatever we have)
Cheese quesadillas! I make sure they’re room temp before I pack them so they don’t sweat. My 6 and 3 year old love them. I also use dried fruit like cranberries or blueberries instead of fruit snacks/gummies.
As someone who spends a lot of time supervising TK lunch, this is all such wonderful advice. Things teachers love: 1. When parents can send a few different options so that we don’t have to beg their kids to eat something they decided they hate even though they ate it yesterday. 2. When we don’t have to open 100 packages for 24 kids in five minutes. 3. When parents buy us lunch (kidding, unless… lol).
Love this perspective!! I've thought about how annoying it must for teachers to have to open individually packed items for kids — it was a very exciting day when my boys could open their own string cheese ha!
We get lunch at school, but I still pack them a sandwich and snacks just in case. 9 times out of ten the sandwich becomes a ready to eat afterschool snack, which lightens the afternoon frenzy!
Soom makes a chocolate tahini that is like a nut and dairy free Nutella and it’s delicious! My kids love it in a sandwich with sliced banana, as a dip for strawberries, just spread on crackers…
I needed a Nutella sub for one kid! Thanks
Oooh intrigued!!
My favorite thing to pack is what I call the performative fruit. The apple slices go to school, the apple slices come home from school. I know they won’t get eaten, they are just to be seen by the lunch monitors!
too real
Performative fruit 😂
I ❤️this!
My kids love crescent rolls baked with ham and cheese and honey mustard inside of themm. I bake a bunch and freeze them! So easy! They eat them heated and in a thermos but they aren’t bad cool either!
Yum, love this idea, adding it to my list!
We love a banana, pb, tortilla roll up that we slice like sushi! Fun and crosses off fat, carb, protein, and fruit.
Greek yogurt topped with some rainbow sprinkles is a random lunchbox hit at our house!
Copying this!! I put a shake of rainbow sprinkles in things all the time to get my kids to try it, how have I not done this with Greek yogurt yet?!
This is my 3 year old daughter's favorite breakfast! Plain whole milk Greek yogurt with rainbow sprinkles! I count it as a win.
As an adult trying to be better about packing a lunch for in-office days, thank you!
Right... school lunches, office lunches - all can come from her list!
My son loves boiled okinawan sweet potatoes (the purple ones). So filling, and great energy booster before afterschool sports.
My daughter loves anything cold and crunchy. I learned a trick where you slice apples, soak them in salt water, give them a quick rinse, and the apples don’t brown. So now I slice a few apples, soak them with a LMNT hydration pack, pour myself the hydration water and rinse the apples and serve/save them for today plus tomorrow. I’m hydrated. She gets her cold and crunchy. We both win.
HOT TIP!!
actual genius.
I only recently learned the salt water soak, but I must say, the electrolyte water soak is BRILLIANT. Thanks for being the best thing I learned today!
Love the lunch formula - use the same one! My kids love when I pack them pasta with a dipping sauce and always include a little sweet treat such as chocolate chips
Great idea! What dipping sauce?
Red sauce, pesto, sometimes they like Ranch 😂😂
Leftovers!l from dinner the night before. Everyday. If I don’t have leftovers it’s quesadilla or pb&j. Always a veggie (cucumber, cherry tomato, bell pepper) and a fruit (apple, strawberries, whatever we have)
I call meals like this “snack plates,” and the name alone gets them more excited to eat it!
I do this too!! "Snack dinner" is always a hit in our house!
Immediately printing out the cheat sheet and putting on the fridge! Cuties, strawberries, blueberries, watermelon - fruit always wins here.
Yes, same! Fruit for the win always
Cheese quesadillas! I make sure they’re room temp before I pack them so they don’t sweat. My 6 and 3 year old love them. I also use dried fruit like cranberries or blueberries instead of fruit snacks/gummies.
I love a good leftover ques for my office lunch. I heat in the micro and it's still amazing.
This is a treasure trove! A go-to is Trader Joe's meatballs 😂
Meatballs are how one of my sons consumes 50 percent of his protein ha!!
we put those in our lunches today!
We’ve been in a real rut with preschool lunch lately but he’s been into cold leftover pizza the last week which has been so easy