To ask you all for help in putting together a healthy lunchbox for my dd age 5?

[Florenceandgrace]

Dd1 has decided she does not want to eat the free school meals for reception children as she doesn't like them. I am having real trouble putting together a healthy packed lunch for her. At the moment she is having a ham sandwich, cucumber or red or yellow pepper slices, a pack of skips and a penguin, and a carton of apple juice. I am not happy with this in the context of the rest of her diet, I feel it is too much junk for a 5 year old? Her breakfast is Nutella on toast, morning milk at school, her packed lunch, after school is a fig roll or cookie (or several), dinner is a healthy home cooked meal and desert is ice cream or jelly. She hates all fruit even dried fruit, will not eat yogurt or malt loaf and she hates cheese. I am at a loss what to put in her packed lunch. I am happy with the ham sandwich and cucumber and pepper strips but what can I put in for desert?? Also looking at her daily intake it doesn't look great does it? She is so fussy though :(

She will not eat any sandwich filling other than ham, she would rather starve :(

We
Don't do puddings in this house and just sweets/treats on a Saturday. Don't have biscuits in the house either or crisps!

Fruit bowl is unlimited but neither of my kids are mad on fruit, both prefer raw veg.
My two eat-
Pita, wraps, crackers, rice cakes, bread with-
Marmite, ham, salami, salmon, chicken
Some raw veg cut up
Flask of water
Maybe a frozen frube, some
Mixed nuts/trail
Mix or tracker bar every other day.

Pudding alternatives-
Greek yoghurt with a blob of honey, or jam
Frozen yoghurt
Fruit
Fruit smoothies
Handful or nuts
Dried fruits- but go careful as laden with sugar.

We stopped all fruit juices and cordials and kids just drink water now. Except on treats like when we are in france where we all enjoy orangina by the gallon!

Yes good idea, I will get rid of the jelly and I've cream and offer her fruit or yogurt like her sister. I don't want her sister to copy!! Maybe I could make frozen yogurt so it's kind of like ice cream?

I would drop the penguin, the skips and the juice. I'd give a sandwich or pita plus the peppers and maybe some veg. I'd give a bottle of water and an oat cake or a rice cake for a snack.

I would only give one sweet thing a day. So either biscuits after school or dessert but not both. I always used the one treat a day rule and even now my DC are adults and away at uni they still stick to rule non of my other rules have stuck though, sigh

Come on Florence are you a man or a mouse

Would she do a unconstructed sandwich?
We do snack bowls so in there might be-

Some cut up fruit, a slice of meat, a wedge of cheese, a few cucumber sticks.

Also my kids don't like cheese very much, until I grated it. This apparently is manna from heaven!

What about soup?

Don't want to hijack but has anyone got a healthy flap jack recipe. The ones I've seen don't seem very healthy.

I will try grated cheese! So far she rejects cheese cubes, slices, baby eels, cheese spread, cheese dippers etc

Soup is great but probably a bit tricky for a reception child. Instead of trying to make frozen yoghurt can you just freeze a frube and present it as an ice-cream?

When you say she will eat a healthy, home-cooked meal what kind of things will she eat? Is there anything from dinner which can be adapted for a lunchtime meal?

I agree the original diet isn't fantastic, but some of you guys are really hard core - only having pudding once a week? I couldn't live like that!

I often make a homemade "mousse" - whip some whipping cream and add pureed fruit. There's no added sugar and my kids are really skinny so need the extra calories from eating pudding. Or you could make homemade rice pudding, use cinnamon and pureed dried fruit e.g. dates to make it sweet.

How about homemade savoury muffins after school or even a more savoury "treat" like a croissant zapped in the microwave with ham/cream cheese inside?

healthy flapjacks

To be fair, I'd reject baby eels in my lunch box too

Call me fussy if you like

We also never had crisps, biscuits, desserts or fizzy drinks in the house. My kids were not deprived though their 'one treat a day' was often a pack of sweets. They were allowed a fizzy drink when we went out at the weekends.

My kids were quite fussy so I thought it would be a really bad idea to let them fill up on junk food. Their diets were not hugely varied though.

My kids only ever had a sandwich, an apple and a water drink for school.

Worra

Cucumber and Pepper are quite strong flavours, does she really not like cherry toms?

I would ditch the apple juice.What's wrong with water? Save you money as well.
Also,what about Greek yoghurt with a bit of honey or raisins for pudding?You can buy all sorts of fancy insulated packed lunch containers now so keeping it cool/leak proof won't be an issue.

Generally her diet sounds high in sugar. I thought we were a " healthily eating " family so was horrified when I discovered my 5 year old had early signs of decay at a recent dentist trip and since then we've make an effort to reduce sugar in between meals. The sugary after school snack was first to go and now they have savoury crackers,cheese and biscuits or toast and butter instead.Despite their love for sugary things it was accepted quite easily so give it a go.After 2 or 3 days she'll realise that is the way from then on.It will be worth it for her teeth alone!

That's all I had as a kid IKnewYou and it's basically what I give mine too.

A sandwich

A piece of fruit

A drink (sometimes water, sometimes squash)

They really don't need more than that, given that they're going to run round the playground, or do PE afterwards.

I agree the original diet isn't fantastic, but some of you guys are really hard core - only having pudding once a week? I couldn't live like that!

My DH and DS never eat puddings - I wish I could be like that, then I wouldn't be so fat !!

I really disagree with the comment that school lunches provide a 'balanced' meal - perhaps a few do but my experience of school meals (3 different primary schools) were that they were full of cheap stuff and excess sugar/processed food. And I am by no means a 'health freak'.

The original packed lunch sounds fine, just ditch the Penguin and crisps - put in two sandwiches if she is hungry but that is a lot of food for a 5 year old. My 14 year old has less than that for lunch and he is incredibly active and sporty.

For dinner she will eat things like jacket potato and beans, pasta and sauce and veg sticks and hummus, home made pizza, hotdog and veg sticks, fish finger chips and peas, toad in the hole, chicken pie, spag Bol

I agree Worra - all my DS gets for lunch is one sandwich and an apple or banana (and the fruit is rarely eaten ).

'Lunch box food' has become a really useful marketing tool for all the food manufacturers.

Haha that was supposed to say baby bells!

How is having dessert once a week 'hardcore'?

We're the most relaxed family in the world when it comes to food, but it would never enter my head to give them dessert on anything other than a Sunday, or if they have a friend to tea.

Unless you count fruit as a dessert?

I don't. Fruit is just fruit and they can eat it any time.

Mum to a brown food eater, here.

Today's lunch was a small brown roll, full of houmous, a sausage roll and a home made banana muffin.

Most lunches follow a similar format. I keep a stash of baked "treats" in the freezer which I put into his lunchbag in the morning, to keep everything else cool.

www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/bananamuffins_71268

I make this one without the topping, use ground lamonds in place of the wholemeal flour and use butter, simplty because it tastes better!
rapeseedoilbenefits.hgca.com/recipes-rapeseed-oil/carrot-cake.aspx

See we only ever had desert on a Sunday after our roast so it has never been an issue here.

I do a sandwich, piece of fruit, yogurt. I thrown in a cereal bar or snack of popcorn on swimming days.

you say above she eats hotdogs? Vut them up, they are lovely cold! Veg stick and hummous, right there you say she eats them. Thats the skips and the crap replaced.

Get her drinking the water, make it non negotiable, you sound like you are afraid of her reaction if she doesnt get what she wants

Personally I tbh I'd focus on broadening tastes at home first.

at school they need to have eaten and be able to concentrate. stick to either/or with the crisps and chocolate though. Once you have cracked it at home then she may he more adventurous with lunch. bit when there's a few mins to eat and a day of lessons then you do not want to he starving them into submission at school.

If she likes chicken nuggets what about breaded chicken? chuck in some parmasan or sesame seeds into the bread crumbs.

experiment with dips. cut tortillas into triangles and bake with a drizzle of olive oil and a small sprinkling of salt and pepper instead of fried tortilla chips from a packet.

pop corn is good and you can add different flavours.

would she eat toasted nuts and seeds.

I'd wait until half term and try her on a few things. healthy home made versions. of what she likes.

chocolate (well cocoa powder) and beetroot muffins or carrot and come tye muffins, hidden veg tomato sauce as a base for pizza or spag bol are a good way of getting extra veg on there.