good lunch ideas for kids

Discussion in 'Parenting' started by barefoot_kirstyn, Feb 14, 2007.

  1. barefoot_kirstyn

    barefoot_kirstyn belly flop

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    Ok, I think Leane is getting bored with the same foods all the time.
    For breakfast, I give her a banana and an egg along with milk.
    Then on the week days, she goes to her dayhome, and I send along a yogurt and she is fed lunch there.
    Then for supper, she eats whatever we're having.

    The problem is on the weekends.....I am always out of ideas about what to give her for lunch. I don't want to be making KD or hot dogs all the time.
    She won't eat sanwiches for the most part....I have been trying to get her to like soup.....I'm just stuck. I have never been good at lunch. Even for myself.
    I just need some ideas!!! any help is GREATLY appreciated!
     
  2. Dakota's Mom

    Dakota's Mom Senior Member

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    My son eats mac and cheese all the time. It is his favorite food. Or chicken nuggets. She's old enough to eat mac and cheese. Annie's has an organic mac & cheese that is microwavable.

    Kathi
     
  3. Earthy Mama

    Earthy Mama Feel my wrath... ;)

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    Peas and thicker noodle chunks in a chicken broth (just keep the broth minimal if shes a bowl dumper, lol)

    Ground chicken seasoned lightly

    fruit salad
     
  4. HippyFreek

    HippyFreek Vintage Member

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    Cubed tofu with hummus, lightly steamed veggies, plain tortellini (toddlers LOVE this finger food!), zucchini cubes, veggies and breads and fruits in various dips.
     
  5. Maggie Sugar

    Maggie Sugar Senior Member

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    Good lunch ideas for toddlers.
    • Pastina (a small, round pasta) with some butter or olive oil, a little salt and occasionally a little parmasan. Give it without the parmasan if you have any dairy allergies, or if she starts to ONLY eat it with the cheese.
    • Well cooked cubes of carrot, potato, ect. Kids really like veggies, if they are served looking pretty and they can feed themselves. A little butter or salt is fine.
    • Hummus on Pita bread or crackers.
    • Scrambled egg. I would use this when we were out of everything, and my kids started asking for it for lunch
    • Red or black bean dip (make it yourself, or buy the organic Fantastic Brand mixes, my kids LOVED this for lunch with tortillas, or blue corn chips) Use pita bread or toast or soft totillas if she chokes on hard chips or you feel she's too young for them. Even crackers are OK with this, YUMMY!!!!
    • Home made fruit salad (with cooked fruit cubes, and no citrus for small toddlers) and whole wheat toast
    • Shell pasta with butter or olive oil. My kids would eat ANY pasta at all, and giving them lots of pasta in different ways, without tomato sauce increases their palate (sauce is OK, but it's good to get them used to pasta in other ways than with tomato sauce and cheese.)
    • Soy cheese sandwhiches, fried in butter or olive oil. Again, my kids loved this
    • Tomato soup. Messy, but great with "fishy" crackers or saltines.
    • Fish filets are good, even the frozen ones. Let her dip them in things like katchup, mayonaise ect. Fish sticks are fun, too.
    • A bowl of rice or brown rice, with butter or olive oil, and some well cooked veggies. VERY good for children.
     
  6. shaina

    shaina No War Know Peace

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    leftovers always work
     
  7. barefoot_kirstyn

    barefoot_kirstyn belly flop

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    yey!!!!!!!!!!!! thankyou so much!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
    As I was reading these, I was thinking "duh" to myself the whole time. oy. I feel a lot better now!
     
  8. JayzzMama

    JayzzMama Member

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    Jimmy loves frozen mixed vegetables and I like that they are all pre-cut just dump in a bowl and nuke. Another great trick we've found is to buy the sacks of frozen fruit chunks you can get in different mixes in the freezer section. They have a berries one and a tropical fruits one. What I love about these is when I nuke them to thaw them out they get a little soft and soupy and jim can handle them much better, being slightly toothless as he is! He slurps up the chunks then drinks the juice from the bottom of the bowl. I know it's not "lunch" exactly but it's part of a rounded diet!
     
  9. SucculentFlower

    SucculentFlower earthfirst!

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    Suggestion about the tofu-- I freeze mine, then thaw and squeeze out the water, then it'll soak up any marinated you like, it also gives it a tougher texture.Which we prefer over the mush kind. The mush kind is good for making vegan pies tho. My method stands up over even the firm tofu for stir fry... try it you might like it!

    Nutritional Yeast-- sprinkled over that pasta (adds more protein) try whole grain pasta instead of that white goo kind. It has a nutty-cheesy flavor.

    Sometimes the vegan mini-dogs go on sale and I buy a few boxes (worth it in the long run) foods that dunk are a big hit here.

    Try switching out types of apple that you serve.... we switched from fuji and galas to pink ladies... yummy

    soy-nut butter... non-hydrogenated high in good omegas. Our school has a nut ban.

    don't forget shelled edemame (fresh green soybeans, high in protein) found in the frozen section, be sure to thaw them in your fridge as they get slimy if left out to thaw! Fun finger food!

    Try the tofu pups or another option to hot dogs (regular kind are extremely high in nitrates which are harmful to little bodies)

    applesauce

    toast with apple-butter

    raisins, but stay away from fruit leather (it's a concentrated sweet and stick to the teeth and acts like acid on the enamel)

    We've been challenged to come up with a variety of lunches since my 2 year old started Montessori. He's a picky eater sometimes (not when he's in a growth spurt tho!)

    I miss the days of beans and rice, and am waiting for him to start liking beans. We keep trying, so far he only likes the rice! But we stick to brown rice.

    Couscous is a great easy option (it's still a pasta tho) but more economical if you get it from the bulk section rather than the boxed variety. It's super easy to make- boil water and pour it over the couscous and put a lid over it, let it stand for 5 min. and your done... add your butta and what-nots.

    Make quiche for dinner sometime, it's so good the next day for lunch. Goes good with ketchup. It's easy-

    Scramble-eggs, get a frozen pit shell and fill it loosely with chopped veg., I like chopped broccoli and sometime cheese, fill with the scrambled eggs and bake til firm. let cool. slice up like a pie an din-din. Hey and it's portable.

    One time I had dinner waiting in the kitchen, and I went to lounge on the couch and my son had grabbed the container of tofu that I had cooling. I had fried it up sliced like a loaf of bread with garlic after it had been marinated. Luckily it had cooled off, but anyway, he was exclaiming-- eeewwww! eeeewww! and brought over to me. I was like-- no son it's yummy tofu! You like tofu! And the he ate like half of the entree.

    I think he got that eeewww! thing from school.
     
  10. barefoot_kirstyn

    barefoot_kirstyn belly flop

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    thanks Jayzz and Flower!
    Leane LOVES those veggies, I make them all the time for her. I'm so happy that she likes them!
    Flower~I'm definately trying the quiche! That sounds yummy! Thanks!
     
  11. SparkleGal

    SparkleGal Member

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    My son loves Lunchables...they're easy for him to feed himself. Also Mac N cheese, fish fillets he can dip in ketchup....sliced apples he can dip in ranch or peanut butter...Rice a roni with chicken chunks cut up and mixed into it.....Ramen noodles....things like that.
     
  12. Bumble

    Bumble Senior Member

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    I would try healthy foods as much as you can because children this age set their eating habits for life. Hummus and tomatoe sandwichs are good and easy to make.


    mmmmm humus
     
  13. lucyloo

    lucyloo Member

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    I just found this website that has some good ideas. I also get very bored with food and I've been trying to eat a lot healthier lately so this site helped inspire me a bit...

    http://www.laptoplunches.com/ideas.html

    the actual lunch box sets they sell are so cute but are pretty expensive, but the ideas on there are good.

    hope it helps :)
     
  14. homeschoolmama

    homeschoolmama Senior Member

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    We've got some pretty funky diet requirements here and my son has texture issues with different foods, but we still have a LOT of fun making lunch.

    I have those plastic divided plates for lunch. (this helps with the whole "but MAMA... my food is TOUCHING!" complaint) The largest section is for our carbs & protein, and the smaller two sections are for fruits & veggies. I have the largest section preselected for each day, but its up to the to make choices for the other 2 sections, to round out the meal. (My daughter is a part-time vegetarian, so it's also her job to tell me where her protein is for each meal) It's a FUN game we play each day :)

    So that I'm not running around trying to figure out meals last minute, I make up a "menu" every 2 weeks. It helps with grocery shopping and to keep our diets balanced a little easier. I made up a weekly menu, and then we have several choices for each type of meal. For lunches, it looks like this:

    * Sunday: Soups & Stews - This is a quickie for me because I use the crockpot a lot for this. We'll bake fresh bread or muffins together to go with it. During hot weather, this is usually substituted with things like a fruit salad & some granola.
    * Monday: Salads & Sandwiches - This could be a pasta salad, a green salad or a fruit salad. And sandwiches could be tortilla-wrapped veggies & cream cheese, peanut butter on rice cakes, crackers meat & cheese, or your traditional grilled-cheese
    * Tuesday: Quickie Lunches - This is for my son... he cooks most of these himself :) Could be homemade chicken nuggets, loaded baked potatoes, personal pizzas, macaroni & cheese... you get the idea ;)
    * Wednesday: Healthy Snacks Lunch - This is field-trip day, so it's finger foods & things that will fit in a cooler bag; yogurt & fresh fruit, cheese sticks & pretzels, rice-cake sandwiches...
    * Thursday: Soups & Stews again.
    * Friday: Salads & Sandwiches again.
    * Saturday: Quickie Lunches again.

    My kids love a routine, so this works well for us. I have anywhere between 1-2 dozen ideas for each type of lunch, and I'll plug them in at random. So even though we're having salads & sandwiches twice each week we're not likely to have the same meal more than every other month... UNLESS it's my son's precious mac 'n cheese ;)
    love,
    mom
     
  15. IvoryVision

    IvoryVision Member

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    Gosh... I can remember trying to come up with baby appropriate lunches! :) Leo's been eating like a grown-up so long, it seems like forever ago. I love Hipforums for this kind of stuff... It makes me all nostalgic. *sniff*

    Some things that Leo liked at Lea Lea's age:

    Cottage Cheese! He loved it, and anything I put in with it went down the hatch too. I used the large curd(cause ya know fingers are gonna do most of the work) with whole or partial fat... It tasted way better to me. I'd put frozen berries, pineapple tidbits, or diced grapes in it, along with some wheatgerm or ground flax and he adored it. But I'd also throw in veggies, like diced tomato, teeny diced bell pepper, corn and he liked that too. Or I'd mix it with leftover chili or spaghetti... It would tame the adult flavor and make it creamy... He loved that too. Cottage cheese is awesome!

    Wraps... You can sneak all kinds of healthy stuff in them. Smear a whole grain tortilla with cream cheese or peanut butter and then get creative! One that Leo really liked, that I liked too was cream cheese with diced raw onion(yes, he ate RAW ONION this way!), cilantro, fresh spinich, and sunflower seeds. sprinkled with chili powder. Very yummy. :) With peanut butter I'd put ground flax(never can get too much omega three into your baby) and raisens, or you could put jelly, jam or fresh fruit in there. Roll it up tight, it helps to leave one edge with your selected goo exposed to seal it shut, cut it in half, and let it em have it! Leo would chow down, grawing away at this sandwich stick of sorts... Or you could cut it up and it will usually stick together well enough to be finger food.

    Quesadillas: Same story as above, put your tortilla on the griddle, spinkle on some cheese, and get creative with fillings. This is a great, relatively mess free finger food that can be dipped in cool stuff!

    Ahh! Reading through all of my stuff, it all involves cheese! Eeee! Well, cheese does work wonders to get the good stuff in. :)
     
  16. homeschoolmama

    homeschoolmama Senior Member

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    Eek! I forgot how young your lil one was! Okay, forget what I said before… when my kiddies were that young they liked:

    * Grilled cheese sandwiches & applesauce
    * Crackers with cookie-cutter pieces of cheese & meat
    * Pasta - toss veggies & fat-free Italian salad dressing. Or Mac ‘n Cheese, or Spaghetti… kids LOVE pasta
    * Cheerios with yogurt & chunks of fresh fruit
    * Chicken nuggets & fries (I baked them to make them healthier)
    * Cottage cheese with all sorts of things sprinkled in it (raisins, peaches, sunflower seeds)
    * Muffins – my kids would eat mini-muffins when they wouldn’t touch anything else. I used the smaller sized pan, and made flavors like carrot, carob-zucchini, pumpkin… add a little yogurt or applesauce to dip them in & it becomes EXTRA fun ;) I’d also spread a lil peanut butter on them while they were still warm, and use it as “frosting” to add a little protein
    * Pancakes – yeah it’s a “breakfast” food, but kids will eat them ANY time of the day!
    * Bean Dip – we’d layer refried beans with sour cream, diced tomatoes, mooshed avocado & black olive slices, and let the kids dip cut-up tortilla shells (and their fingers) into this… this was another meal they’d eat when they wouldn’t touch “real food”

    And a few favorite veggie tricks I used for sides were:

    * mashed sweet potato or pumpkin with one mini-marshmallow on the top – they thought it was CANDY!
    * green beans or steamed baby carrots – as finger food, with salad dressing “dip”
    * peas or pretty any “mixed veggie” blend got tossed into macaroni, or with all sorts of pasta
    * and I don’t know why, but my kids have always loved broccoli & cauliflower. They’ll eat it cooked with or without cheese, and LOVE it when I puree it & mix it in with a prepared soup!
     

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