By: Jess Drummond
Simplify school lunches with time-saving tips, budget-friendly tricks, and nutritious meal ideas that kids will actually eat.
I’ve heard the sentiment numerous times among school mums and dads: “School lunches are the bane of my existence!”
How can parents and carers do this necessary task day after day, in a way that doesn’t drain all their time and finances, while also providing nutritious meals that their children will eat?
We spoke with Dr Andrea Fuller, lecturer at the University of Southern Queensland and dietitian about how to make this process less stressful.
According to Dr Fuller, preparing ahead of time is key.
“[You can do] things like cutting up vegetables the night before, or if you’re putting a roast on, to put in some extra vegetables that you can throw into a salad,” Dr Fuller said.
She also recommends cutting up vegetables to make coleslaw that can go into a wrap with some chicken, or to be dipped into hommus or tomato salsa.
“Whether it be carrot sticks, zucchini, mushrooms, snow peas… if you’ve got a container in the fridge with all of those things already cut up, you can just pop some in a zip-lock bag in the morning, get some little cheap containers from discount stores, and put your [home-made or store-bought] hommus in there.”
“If you’re going to have roast chicken for dinner, maybe put a second chicken in [the oven] at the same time, and the second one you can use for school lunches, whether it be sandwiches or salads. Also, while you’re cooking dinner, put another pot on and cook some pasta or rice, if you’re not already having it with dinner, and then you can just add your veggies according to what the kids like, to make up their salads for them.”
Addressing the issue of fussy eaters, Dr Fuller says it can be useful to include a variety of things in small quantities.
“If you’ve got a boiled egg, maybe some meatballs, those veggie sticks I mentioned earlier, fruit… the kids are much more likely to eat things that are just small serves [and] variety. It just becomes more appealing for the kids, and easier and quicker for them to eat.”
“Another little snack idea [is that] if the kids are having nuts – if the school allows it – buy a large bag of almonds because they’re usually the cheapest, put them in with some dried apple and apricot, and then add a couple of chocolate buttons. [The children then] have got that nutrition of the nuts, which fills them up as well (being a healthy fat), you’ve got the fruit from the dried fruit, and then they’ve got that extra little treat of the chocolate buttons as well.”
Dr Fuller says buying in bulk for things such as hommus, nuts, and yoghurt can keep costs down.
“If the kids are enjoying yoghurt, it can be quite expensive to buy individual yoghurt pots or pouches. If you buy a large container of the plain Greek yoghurt, like the one-kilo containers, and then [if] you’ve got some canned fruit, drain the juice out of the fruit, and then you can put the fruit in the bottom of a small container [with] a couple of dollops of yoghurt. Then you’ve got a much healthier and cheaper yoghurt option.”
While putting in the effort for nutritious school meals can be challenging, Dr Fuller says it makes a difference to a child’s mood, concentration, memory, and fatigue levels.
Article supplied with thanks to Jess Drummond at 96five.
Feature image: Photo by Hillshire Farm on Unsplash