Low UPF and dairy free packed lunch ideas

[Stripeypyjamas]

The school menu is looking pretty dire this year so we are having to provide a packed lunch for my DD(8). Could you share ideas for low UPF lunches? It needs to be dairy and nut free. I have a breadmaker.

Extra points for things that can be frozen.

I do as much low UPF food for my kids in their packed lunches. Re crisps sometimes the most basic in their ingredients are the ready salted - just potato salt and oil. Also plain tortilla chips - they only seem to come in the large size bags but you can put a portion in a sandwich bag.

veg sticks and humus. oatcakes and humus.

we bake muffins and flapjack type things - you’ll have to look for dairy free recipes. Lots of American muffin recipes seem to use oil rather than butter so that might be a thing?

for yoghurts we either do plain Greek with fruit compote in a tub or just buy the best options from the supermarket ones. I think it’s the bone maman ones which come four to a pack.

bread and rolls you can make yourself but I don’t sweat it if we can’t be bothered one week.

Ah just realised I recommended the yoghurts but you need dairy free!

Thank you, we can do coconut yog but she's not a fan (don't blame her).

Her class mate has an allergy to sesame, so I think I'd need to make the hummus without tahini. Can you freeze hummus? I need as much as possible in the freezer so I can just chuck things in the box in the morning and run.

My default is one carbs+protein, one fruit and one veg and one “rubbish”.

Fruit = easy, whatever you have at home. Grapes, banana, melon.

Veg = easy, cherry toms, carrots, decanted sweet corn

Carbs+protein = pasta salad, sandwich, roll-up (Eg cream cheese, hummus, avocado, tuna, chicken breast)

Rubbish = granola bar, penguin, Kit Kat etc

I think you’ll be hard pressed to have a variety of non-UPFs that can be frozen and be a complete meal and provide a balance over the course of a whole term/month/week.

Could you use a food flask and give leftovers from dinner? As long as the heatwave doesn't continue! Pasta, rice dishes, cottage pie etc all work well

Thank you, good break down. What is a roll up?

Can't have cream cheese (the df version is basically just coconut oil and salt) I don't think they're allowed crisps or chocolate at the school but could do granola bar.

Leftovers could work. I'll see if I am allowed to send her in with a food flask.

Having a dry baked potato with no topping every day is seeming more appealing!

Sorry - a roll-up is a tortilla wrap, rolled up! Not exactly unprocessed, especially when I put ham and boursin in it (bleurgh). Better, non-dairy option might be hummous and pumpkin seeds; slices of roast chicken breast.

Does your non-dairy exclude eggs (do you mean lactose)? If not, they're a good option but don't send them in whole otherwise the whole classroom will stink!

Can have eggs, it's cows milk protein she's allergic to not lactose or eggs. But I'm not sure I can shake the memories of the shame put upon my peers of the 1980s for daring to bring in egg.

So true! They smell less if you don't peel them first. Also makes lunch "interactive".

Depending on the season, I send mine in with little tubs of salad I've made: chick pea and tomato (I add mozzarella balls, perhaps you can add goat's cheese like bulgarian feta?), farfalle with peppers and corn, salsa and guacamole with tortilla chips. Avocado doesn't freeze well at all but it's a good option for lunchboxes. Then in the winter months I'll put warm pasta into a flask, tortellini or fusilli with a meat-based sauce. It wouldn't be overly delicious cold, but it would be safe (if you're not allowed flasks). Where I live I can easily access tamales which are the ultimate in unprocessed convenience foods. Can you lay your hands on empanadas, or small pasties?

Mine also love sushi. The rolls transport best but everything has to be packed in tightly because of course they fling their backpacks around.

And if flasks are allowed, of course soup and a roll is great in winter. Minestrone, chicken noodle etc.

Lots of options, just a question of being bothered and thinking ahead.

I've made a list for the next few weeks while it's hot. After that I'll get a flask and switch to more hot foods. So far beyond fruit and veg:

Carbs/protein:

• sandwich with marmite (Tesco's own seems reasonable)
• quesadillas with tomato, black beans and vegan cheese, the cheese is upf but pretty unavoidable
• carbonara quiches, found a recipe they look nice..going to use low nitrate bacon
• tuna and sweetcorn frittatas
• tuna croquettes.

Rubbish:

• banana and choc muffins
• oatmeal and raisin cookies

So I'm going to do some batch cooking of the above. I think most will freeze ok, I'll trial it at least.

I'll also look into the other ideas posted here. She's a bit fussy and can't have some other foods (soya based) so need to customise things a bit.

Fruit: apples, grapes, satsumas all keep well for the week

Veg: cucumber, carrots, celery chopped in advance and kept in tupperware, then you just grab some each day. Also cherry tomatoes.

Carb: a slab of your homemade bread with DF spread if you use it

Protein: cooked (by you) chicken/beef/other meat pieces, little pot of tuna with DF mayo. Cold meatballs made by you could be frozen in batches?

Bit of homemade cake or a muffin. You can get recipes with less sugar, more fruit etc if that works and they can pretty much all be frozen.

Aaaaand now I’m hungry 😂

It is fruit/veg and sandwiches or leftovers pasta/rice meat around here. Schools do not allow much in the way of UPF here and no yogurts. The schools (all of them it is a big thing around here) healthy eating policies have meant there has never been any issues with kids not having junk as no one else does either. It is great.

My kids are dairy free and have packed lunches, also try to avoid UPF as much as possible.
This week they've had -
Pasta with home made tomato sauce
Pasta with pesto (has nuts though)
Roast chicken pieces
Tofu cubes
Olives
Cherry Tomato/cucumber/carrot
Oatcakes with flora (UFP)
Home made pizza with violife (UFP)
salt and shake crisps
Home made flapjack
Pots of sunflower seeds
Salami (UFP)
Kiddilicious smoothie melts
Sojade soya yogurt

Lots of vegan substitutes are extremely highly processed. But, everything in moderation and nbd when you're avoiding dairy. A bit now and then won't harm anyone. Your meal plan sounds great, and reading the oatmeal raisin cookie suggestion reminded me that overnight oats made with milk (not for your DD)/oat mill/almond milk is a favourite lunch when it's hot out. Lots of protein, keeps them full, one tub and spoon, and my son especially likes to have little tubs of berries or maple syrup (or choc chips near the end of term!) that he can stir in himself. Honestly, a tub of that plus a banana/half an avocado would be filling and healthy and largely unprocessed. But only good in hot weather.

I make wraps - my life improved when I accepted home made wraps don't bend like commercial ones, I just fill and fold them in half.
I batch cook freeze absolutely everything - everything I cook has to have at least two more outings mixed with other stuff
Hummus - I whizz pressured cookered chickpeas up with caramelised onions or roast red peppers. Spread on wrap add leaves.
Lots of portioned, frozen bean based pates - refried beans, tomato, quacamole; black bean, smashed roast sweet potato, spring onion, leaves; white beans, harissa, peppers; puy lentils, roast root veg, parsley. I make Felicity Cloake veggie sausage filling, grill in patties and use this, but sadly can't find pinhead oatmeal any longer.
DS only likes plain meat with lettuce in his wrap/ sandwich so freeze and portion meat from Sunday roast or crumbled meatballs. He went through a phase of eating tuna mixed with something creamy eg crème fraiche, sweetcorn, peppers, spring onions and pasta but he went off this - I think it was called smelly by a tuna hater.
I make seedy cereal bars, chocolate flapjacks, sweet potato brownies, malt loaf, wrap in portions and freeze, they're defrosted by lunchtime.

I’d second a good flask - Thermos do a good one with an incorporated spoon. Pasta isn’t UPF and you can batch cook bolognaise sauce / tomato sauce / ratatouille