pack lunches - save money?

[mumblecrumble]

Hi,

Being made redundant in 2 weeks so refining our money saving.

Packed lunches - are they cheaper in the long run? DD's meals are £2 a day and she is a good eater.

I am thinking about giving her the following which is prob what we would have if going out for the day or something. In terms of eating it she is happy - is it enough do you think? And practical?

Sandwiches - ham is favourite but probably rotate with cheaper stuff, maybe wraps/pot of pasta (she would eat sandwiches every meal if I let her!)
Whole apple or pear
Squeezy tube yogurt (6 for £1 in Morrisons) frozen to keep it cool
Little treat - 4 chewy sweets/crisps or maybe freddo bar on fridays.

We usually have main meal in evenign as DH and I don;t have much time to at at work...

:( :( Just remembered I wont be at work..

Anyway - does that sound enough?
And will it be cheaper?

I wouldn't put sweets or choc in, most schools don't allow them. Something like a penguin bar I might sometimes include as a Friday treat. What about buying a box of mini flapjack bites (around £1.50 in Sains for 20 bites I think) and including those as a sweet treat?

very cheap is carrot batons, maybe with hummus to dip?

my tip is to buy little containers that the sandwich fits in, and others for a few grapes, or a few raisins, or carrot/cucumber./pepper sticks. Costs a bit initially, but much cheaper than lots of bags or clingfilm in the long run.

and to answer your q, yes does sound enough, and you will save money from the £2 a day

We easily spend more than £10 a week on dds packed lunch. It's annoying but I know she wouldn't eat the school lunch anyway

I sometimes cook extra pasta and put it in DDs lunch box with a bit of tuna mayo. You can get lots of lunchbox treats when they are on offer. It is cheaper for me than a cooked lunch but I have 2 DDs and lunches are £2.30 here.

dh is being made redundant in 2 weeks aswell . We already do packed lunches, so cant make that cut back, BUT it does save money. I do a sandwich, piece of fruit, a snack and a yogurt- def cheaper than £2 a day- good luck in the money saving, send any tips our way!!

Always works out cheaper for us. Most things I put in lunch box would ordinarily be in the cupboards anyway

Ham sandwich
Small cooked sausages/lump of cheese
Fruit
Squeeze yoghurt tube
Water in reusable bottle

Flapjacks are very cheap to make too. The only thing that bumps up price
Ate those packaged snacks/fruit loops/fruit drops/biscuits etc

Sorry to hear about your job

Every cloud has a silver lining and that :)

Are you near an Aldi. It's super cheap, 12 fromage frais for less than a quid, joint of cooked easy to carve ham 2.49, lovely bread £1 or less, fruit mega cheap....

Packed lunches are much cheaper than school meals in our house! I make flourless peanut butter cookies that are very cheap to make, soup or pasta salads are also cheap. Spanish Tortilla is easy to make & uses only eggs/onion & left over potatoes and is delicious cold. Buy a large pot of yogurt & decant into little tubs. Once a week mine get a slice of cold pizza in theirs.

I wouldnt put in sweets/freddo - swap for homemade healthier biscuits or flapjack! Better for slow release energy to get them through afternoons at school.

School meals are £10 per week here. I can do packed lunches for all four of us for that.

2 Sliced loaves £2, 1 bag apples £1, 1 bag Bananas £1, 1 bag carrots 70p, Tesco pate (Fussy DS2's favourite) 59p, block of cheese £1.50, couple of home made fruit cakes or maderia cakes, approx £2. Leaves £1.21 for some wafer thin ham or tinned fish for some different sandwiches.

Other cheap sandwich fillings are fish paste and cream cheese. Left over meat or sausages from the weekend or night before's dinner are also popular here.

Sorry about your job. FWIW DH and I both lost our jobs in Dec 2010. Was horrible at the time, but in hindsight was the best thing that ever happened to us, enabled us to take stock of what's really important to us and we're both now in jobs we enjoy far more than the old ones, plus our quality of life is much better (but our income still lower) Good luck with whatever you're planning to do next.

yes, definitely cheaper.
dd1 has a sandwich, some carrot sticks, a piece of fruit, a piece of cheese or basics yoghurt, and a flask of squash. sometimes a cake or biscuit if I've been baking. sometimes she has felafel, or chicken pieces instead of a sandwich. although most of DC i know like to have pretty much the same thing everyday, so there's no need to stress about variety.

ikea do lots of tiny tupperware for a couple of quid, for carrot sticks/fruit

I don't buy pre-packaged "lunchbox" stuff and find it is much cheaper than school dinners. If you but some dinky little pots like these (or get some in Poundland) then it will make it more fun.

DS is a creature of habit so will have:
Wrap/sandwich/pitta filled with chicken leftover from roast, or ham (also do tuna pasta and sweetcorn and sometimes cold homemade pizza) 30p-ish
cucumber or carrot battons 10p
cubes cheese 20p
Fruit 25p
Occasional homemade flapjack, fruity fairy cake 10p
Total 95p

Children are not allowed crisps, choc or sweets in their lunch box at DS's school.

we spend around 1£ a day on the lunchbox.
usually dc has: 1 slice of homemade bread with ham/salami/cheese and cucumber or cougette or tomatoe (depending on what is cheaper), 1 pot of yoghurt or homemade rice pudding (freezes well) with jam or stewed fruit (from a bigger pot decanted into tupperware), a flapjack or cereal bar, a carton of juice.

I can see no difference between sweets & a Penguin bar - both are full of empty calories - the school probably will ban the sweet though - idiots!
No idea whether you'll save money - I expect you could spend a lot if you buy lots of processed food and a lot less if you make stuff yourself.

Sorry to hear about your job.

Mine have water plus 4 things

Sandwich, usually ham
Biscuit or slice of cake
2 pieces of fruit/veg,
If they have yoghurt its from a big tub poured into a little pot

Or they have pasta with a mini salad plus biscuit.

You could buy the ingredients in aldi, they do really nice ham and part baked rolls etc.

Wraps can be made with smartprice plain flour.

You can buy tiny tupperware pots in asda which you could fill with yoghurt from a big tub of plain smartprice and flavour it with vanilla and sugar.

Betty you're absolutely right, but schools have no clue about healthy eating. At ours children can take either fruit or a cereal bar for break - a sugar, trans fat laden cereal bar, but not homemade fruit cake! And yes then can have a penguin but not a mini mars at lunch

This is a school that in the last 2 months has had huge amounts of sweets doled out at the disco, The Great Debate Haribo v Chocolate buttons, with the whole school given a bag of each, Book Sleepover with cookies and hot chocolate, sweets regularly given as rewards in class, cooking classes where they've made flapjack, chocolate mousse and rocky road, sugar coated cereals and croissants and jam provided for breakfast in SATS week, I could go on....

And at the same time skinny DS2 has been taught "everyone" needs to reduce their fat intake and that calories are a very bad thing. Like to see anyone live without them. Anyway enough hijack, but it drives me wild.

Agree O2B I have skinny dcs who eat well but they are not allowed a piece of cheese at break - its time we banned processed crap rather than real food - but that would be a bit too controversial. Cereal bars are no better than choc bars - they are full of sugar.

It will definitely be cheaper, nursery lunches are £2.50 here and I've costed DD's partly organic lunch at around £1.30 a day

She has the following most often:

Homemade bread with cheese or egg mayo
Or Pesto pasta with cheese and cherry tomatoes
Or cheese omelette with cold corn on the cob

With

Ants on a log - celery filled with peanut butter and dotted with raisins
Or mixed fruit salad
Or an apple

She often takes a yoghurt too

Blackaffronted how do you make the peanut butter cookies?

Gluten Free Peanut Butter cookies

Ingredients

1 cup of peanut butter

1 cup of soft brown sugar

1 large egg

Instructions

Mix, scoop spoonfuls of the mixture on a baking tray and flatten, then cook for 12-15 mins

You can add raisins/dried fruit if you like.

Thank you

yummy - think I'll amkea packed lunch for me too!

Going on packed lunches after half term and lucking forward to making lovely things for my grown up school girl baby to eat and enjoy.

Last paid day at work (will be popping in to teach....as a 'volunteer' a few times). Thanks for your postive words, am feeling very nostalgic/sad this evening but thinking ahead to better things. Also has some money worries eased for immediate and food/mortgage stuff.

Thanks for your suggestions folks