Lunchboxes at school - do you put refrigerated stuff in like yogurts/cheese sandwiches?

[Jessicoolaa]

I remember when I was at school and all the lunchboxes were kept at room temp at school. Is that still the case? I am hesitant to give my son a cheese sandwich because I dont like the idea of it getting warm and being unsafe to eat? And yoghurts etc. for the same reason? Anyone got any ideas?

I have been sending my kids to school with packed lunches for 10 years with cheese/meats/yogurts etc and its never been a problem. They just use regular sandwich boxes/lunch bags and yes they are stored room temperature 😊

I make the night before and pack it into her school bag with a freezer pack.

Cheese is fine - it’s made to last, and for a few hours - most safely standards on things like ham slicesand such are based on the idea it could take 4 hrs to get home and put stuff in the fridge

yoghurt I am less sure of

I don't think it will go bad in 4 hours at room temperature.

Just put an ice block in the lunchbox. And get an insulated lunch box/bag to help keep things cool. It will be fine. Kids up and down the country are eating cheese/meats/yoghurt that has sat in a classroom all morning.

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I don’t put meat in DS’ lunchbox although I’m sure it would be fine. No issue putting cheese in though.

I used to freeze capri sun foil packaged drinks, put one in the lunchbox every morning, kept the food cool and fresh and kids had a cold drink with their lunch as by then it had just about melted.

We are not to send meat or dairy without a cool pack. I often use an insulated lunch box, which has been refrigerated overnight with everything bring put in also fridge cold. Then I put in a frozen Frube to keep it chilled.

Apparently, it is melted by lunch, but still very cold.

Our lunch boxes have sections though and I often have a thermos with spaghetti bol or curry etc in another section and apparently it stays hot.

yes these are normal items for a kids school lunchbox. I use a small ice pack in the summer

The first home fridge was invented in 1913, what do you think humans did for the hundreds of years before then?

I use an insulated lunch box and a freezer pack.

Alternatively, if we are sending a drink I will freeze that. It thaws by lunch, but keeps everything else cold.

You’ve answered your own question: were you and your classmates regularly struck down with food poisoning? I’m guessing not….

I send DS with yoghurt and meat in his lunch box every day. Also stored at room temp.

I only bother with an ice pack in the summer when it's properly hot.

I recall having these random meat spread sort of sandwich fillings as a kid and I survived in the 80s… what were they?!

Yes, they are only at room temperature a couple of hours and that probably only gets the chilled items to room temperature. I wouldn’t want a ham sandwich sitting out for 8-10 hours, but 2-3 is fine, assuming it’s not melting in direct sun.The only place I draw the line is sushi (like the raw fish sort). If it’s a super baking hot day, I might include an ice pack.

My dc have insulated lunchboxes but most of the year I’m not worried. It’s only in a heatwave that take extra measures like freezing Frubes or putting in a frozen drink or ice pack.

It's fine for 4h.
Put a frozen frube in.

We make sandwich with frozen bread night before (bread in our house is in freezer as otherwise it would get wasted before it was eaten), into fridge then into school. It'll stay cool enough for 3 hours. We make night before because I would rather DS stuck with school dinners so he has to help make his own sandwich and there wouldn't be time in the morning.

But yoghurt isn't going to go off in that length of time, that's kind of the point of making yoghurt really. Nor is cheese (assuming we're talking cheddar type) going to become in anyway a hazard in that time either

Occasionally my dc goes on a school trip where we have to provide a packed tea as well, like when they went to do that school singing thing at the O2. That’s when I start freezing things, or scratching my head about providing something that isn’t Haribo which will last!

My kids went to school in Australia and they kept their lunches in their (massive) backpacks outside the classroom in the heat. You just use an insulated lunchbox and put in a frozen drink or ice block.

1 Cheese texture might deteriorate over the time, but there's no danger in eating that cheese

2 Meat like ham etc would also be fine.

3 Because of issue 1 above, we have revelled in the invention of easily acceible, well sized, often quite fun lunch boxes (definitely NOT a thing in my day - it was a wrapped sandwich in tin foil for me!!). When it's especially hot, we put little ice packs in as well or mini bottles of water that have been frozen so they can have ice cold water later in the day. This is not necessary, but it does make it all nicer.

We use insulated lunch boxes (almost all are) and an ice pack. Keeps it cold until they're home.

I make yoghurt and it has given me a lot of confidence in how you can treat it. Cheese is fine at room temperature (doesn't need to be in the fridge in the first place), preserved meats are fine at room temperature, yoghurt is fine at room temperature. All of those are fine for hours. And hours. All things that were created to preserve food before refrigeration existed.

True, although the average life expectancy in 1913 was about 50, all that room temp food 🤣

Thanks for all your replies, all really helpful 😊 ill keep it in the fridge overnight and stick an icepack frozen capri sun/frube in!