Packed lunch beginner needs ideas!

[RebeccaJames]

My son has just asked to switch from school dinners to packed lunches (and I'm in favour as the portions are so small at school!).

I'm trying to cobble together a list of things to put in his lunches, so that there's lots of variety and I don't end up doing wraps and sarnies with fruit on the side all the time.

I'm thinking of the Japanese way of doing lots of little bits in compartments, but struggling to think what!

Any ideas? What do you put in?

Corn on the cobs - chopped up into mini portions.
Babybel mini cheese
Yoghurt
Roasted parsnips & carrots (although I may be weird in liking these cold)
Sausages
Pasta with different sauces - pesto/cheesey/tomato/tuna etc
Pitta, carrots, homous

Is that the sort of thing you were thinking of?

Depends on your child, my son is fussy so I usually put a ham or cheese sandwich, raisins, yogurt and a smoothie. He never eat his fruits at school so I don't put them in, he has fruits when he comes home. Sometimes I do a boil egg, a sausage, sushi- I put them in compartments like a bento box. I just put things in I know he would eat but I never put sweets, chocolate or crisp as I know he could happily eat junk than sandwiches.

Lots of picky things can be good - little pots of raisins, Cheerios etc. I would vary the bread as well - naan, pitta, bagels etc. To be honest you may find yourself just doing a sandwich-plus-one-other-thing simply because that's what everyone else has and he doesn't want to be different - we've recently been through this with DD. Lots of things I know she likes don't get eaten at lunchtime because other people don't have them.

Apart from the standard ham/cheese/tuna sandwiches I also do:

Buttered crackers, blocks of cheese,naice ham
Leftover spaghetti bolognese/cottage pie/curry and rice (have special wide neck thermos for this)
Wrap, grated cheese, naice ham, shredded carrot and cucumber
Chicken and pepper skewers
Pasta salad

I also include a mixture of snacks like mini peperami, raisins, fruit, vegetable sticks, mini cheddars, yoghurt, cake, flapjack and crisps sometimes on a Friday.

I much prefer lunches like this for myself, lots of little things I can nibble on at my desk at work (especially since being pregnant and finding that eating little & often works much better for me than 3 big meals)
I get lots of ideas from 'easy lunch boxes' which is a USA brand and I can't seem to get the actual lunch boxes here in the UK but I use the lunch ideas a lot! link here with lots of pictures!

Very good link, thanks Keep! Love those lunch ideas. Might get DH to pick up a couple of those next time he's in the US.

Actually some of these are very cool:
becky.easylunchboxes.co.uk/childrens-lunchboxes/lunch-boxes-with-compartments