About the bloody packed lunches?

[Illbefinejustbloodyfine]

I have 2 DC at primary school. One has packed lunch every day, the other 3 times a week. Every day, they eat about 3 bits of sandwich and leave the rest. Or dc2 will leave the crackers

Today he asked for chicken pieces and bread and butter. He also had some cucumber, some Greek yogurt, and a slice of Swiss roll. He left most of the bread. Yesterday left most of the sandwich. Weds left the crackers.

They go straight for a snack when they get home and it drives me nuts to find uneaten sandwickes/crackers/whatever in the lunchbox.

Several times I've said to eat the sandwich first. Yesterday I made a big point of it . Today, dc2 has snuck the uneaten bread into the bin.

Aibu to just give a sandwich and piece of fruit next week? Funnily enough it's never the "treat" that's uneaten.

For context, it's a 1 slice folded in half sandwich. They sometimes have wraps or bagels but do the same with those too.

I'm so fed up of throwing food away.

I absolutely wouldn’t be sending treats in whilst the main food was being wasted.

... just give them their left over lunches as snack. I did that with my DD and she complained but I said it's "crackers/apple or nothing". She ate the packed lunch food.

Oh and they're 8 and 9.

Thank you. I wasn't sure if I was being too harsh.

I'd not bother with the sandwich and just give a selection of fruit, salad and veg and the yoghurt.

Oh and they'd eat the sandwich at home.

Remove the junk. If you're dead set on giving it to them every day save it for pudding/snack at home

Yes it’s fine to give less food if not eating it. They finish school so early so perhaps split lunch in 2 - so half at school eg sandwich and cucumber and half after school so yoghurt and fruit.

Also, what is the after school “snack”? If it’s more junk then stop it. Offer real food and they will get used to it.

I can’t get worked up about one meal a day, so they eat a bit of Swiss roll instead of a sandwich? Either way they have had some carbs to give them energy for the rest of the day. Hungry kids can’t learn.

If it’s sarnies, wraps, bagels they’re leaving then it’s bread they’re struggling with. I’d leave it out entirely and switch to pasta or noodles.

Freshly made sandwiches are always nicer than one that's been sat in a lunch box for ages.
I do quite like the meal deal sandwiches from the shops but one of the shops (Boots I think??) you can now have a large fruit salad as the main so the other day I had that, a yogurt as the snack and a drink.
It was actually very filling.

Awful lunch. No carbs for a growing child at school? You know the brain needs carbohydrate to function??

You know there are carbs in fruit, veg and yoghurt??

To @DownsideUpside

It's just lunch.
They can get plenty of carbs for breakfast and tea.

Did you read the bit where the kids don't eat the bread? Or can't you read?

They get a "treat to kind of line up with the school dinner dessert. I think you're right though. It's not necessary.

They eat a lot of good healthy food also.

It's more the waste that bothers me.

Also, pretty sure school would have something to say if I sent only Swiss roll and yogurt for lunch 😂

I'm.not a fan of sandwiches etc in a packed lunch.just my preference. How do they do if you give them for example chicken pieces and maybe a few breadsticks instead.

Yes get one of those 4 compartment tub things to put chopped fruit/veg in

Ask them what they do like as its obviously not bread. Wrap? Pasta?bread sticks?

Have you checked they have enough time to eat it all? At our school we ended up complaining as the kids were half eating lunch so that they had time to play, lunch time just wasn’t long enough for both.

Do they not like bread? If so just give ham/cheese and salad separately?
But yeah, I'd stop the treats in the lunchbox as they're asking for more treats at home anyway.

Put fruit, veg, yoghurt and sandwich (bread seperate or missing?) only and see how they get on. If they then ask for snacks after school it's more justified if they've eaten nearly all the healthy stuff.

Once they're a bit older they may well just always bin things and lie they've eaten them so there's only so much you can do.

Pasta, breadsticks, noodles, pancakes, pitta, wraps….

They do like bread. And bagels, wraps, crackers, breadsticks. They just don't eat it at school!

One of them will take a food flask with pasta and will eat it all. But doesn't want it more than once a week.

They’re 8 and 9, not a 30 year old woman on atkins. They need carbs and calories not crudités.