What I’m Sending My Oneonta Kids Back to School with in 2012

It’s almost back to school time and you might be wondering “Oh boy, here come packing school lunches again, yuck!” Maybe little Johnny or Susie is a picky eater. Well, I’ve got some lunch ideas for you from a mom who has very picky eaters in my house. We are constantly experimenting with different foods and the kids’ tastes are always changing, so it’s a challenging task to feed them healthy foods. I’d like to share some of my successful lunch meal ideas with you. Keep in mind that what works one day does not necessarily work the next day and the more ideas you’re armed with, the better.

The following is a list of foods that you can mix and match for a balanced meal, especially if you’re kids aren't into sandwiches:

Any kind of fruit: experiment with small amounts of different fruits and have your kids try them all so they can tell you what they like.

Whole wheat crackers: this is a great choice to get a grain into the meal when you have a non-sandwich eater.

Kid friendly veggies: I have found that baby carrots and cucumbers are the easiest for kids to like but it's best to have them try a bunch of different things and pick their favorites.

Cheese: cheese sticks (pre-packaged) or just slices of their favorite cheese (we like Meunster and chedder in our house) are great adds to a lunch.

Alternative to bread: small tortillas with their favorite lunch meat. You can add in shredded cheese and even shredded lettuce to make it taco-like. If that doesn’t work, you could use peanut butter or Nutella (hazelnut spread) although it has sugar in it so we use it sparingly. You could add in thin slices of apple in your peanut butter burrito to make it extra yummy.

Lunch add-ons: Natural or organic tortilla chips (healthy snack choice), raisins, craisins (dried cranberries), unsweetened apple sauce, trailmix, good quality granola bars (check labels since most are loaded with sugar), yogurt covered raisins, yogurt (we like Stoneyfield Farms which is organic since most yogurt is very sugary), and mixed nuts area great add-in for a lunch to get that protein in. We use a “lightly” salted mix because many of the mixed nuts have a lot of salt.

Hot Foods: get yourself a small thermos and you can put soup, rice, spaghetti, or any kind of noodles or leftovers that your kids like in there. Our kids get bored with the same stuff so we mix it up with hot foods.

I hope this helps. Good luck! If you have any great lunch ideas please share with us.