How good is good enough for school lunches?

[CheerfulYank]

DS (seven years old) buys his lunch at school most days. It's a struggle for me but I have to admit it makes life easier!

But is it good enough? Tomorrow is popcorn chicken (not happy with that at all, I don't ever serve chicken nuggets or anything like that at home), but the rest of the meal is okay...brown rice, steamed veggies, an apple, and milk.

I wish I could commit to packing lunch for him a lot more but I just seem to fall into a peanut butter sandwich rut! I don't know if that would be better or worse.

Anyone else struggle with this?

DDs are very fussy, I'd love it if they'd have school dinners (they have it on a Friday for fish fingers but that's about it). If he's going to eat all the meal (so the rice, veg, fruit and milk) I'd be happy with the meal you've listed, although I don't know what popcorn chicken is?

We're in a total packed lunches rut but they eat it so I'm happy and it's fairly balanced (bread or crackers and butter, little cheese, banana or grapes, half a pack of crisps, yogurt), although how they don't get bored stiff is beyond me.

School does a three week rolling menu so if they'd eat it that would be loads more variety than they'd get from me, and it's a pretty good menu I think so I'd love them to have it all the time.

Mine want the exact same lunch every day (dearth of fruit or veg) & it's a lot cheaper than the school meal. It's good enough for my standards.

Not sure what popcorn chicken is but the rest of it sounds ok. I think it depends on the quality and variety of the school meals surely? My ds isn't anywhere near school yet but it seems like mn gets a bit hysterical about packed lunches etc, if your ds eats well at home and has a decent breakfast I reckon that good enough is good enough!

Popcorn chicken is processed chicken, a little like very small nuggets, the size of popcorn :)
I have 2 dds, 7 and 11. I would be happy with the rest of the lunch, obviously in an ideal world it would be grilled pieces of chicken breast, but the school has to cart for the majority. I think with school lunches there will always be some processed elements. My dds, esp dd2, top up at the salad bar. E.g. Wholemeal bread, cucumber chunks, fresh fruit.

Yes it is processed tiny bits of breaded chicken. :)

I asked him and he said he did eat his rice and veggies and apple. I'm sure he eats almost everything every day, he's a bottomless pit! :o

He has breakfast at school a lot of the time too but that's usually pretty good...oatmeal or scrambled eggs or something like that.

I suppose it is "good enough", I just see schools in other places having plates and plates of fresh veg and I get a little wistful. :)

I think it's a balance. If they were having popcorn chicken everyday, then I wouldn't be over impressed. If they never had veg or salad, then I wouldn't be impressed, but over the course of the week or fortnight the menu runs across, I wouldn't fret at all if they have a mix of meals.
My dc were lucky enough to go to a school with a fabulous cook who made wonderful meals, but I'm not sure anywhere literally has "plates and plates of fresh veg", that might just be in your imagination

Was it that thingy you looked at that showed the lunches around the world?

We didn't do too well did we!

With the rest of the dinner I wouldn't be too concerned about the breaded chicken personally..

Dd is in reception and decided over half term that she wants packed lunch so I have tried to come up with something nutritious that she might eat and I found it so hard! She was barely eating any of the free school meals and is generally pretty fussy and not keen on vegetables unless they're raw so I was a bit depressed to realise she was just eating minimal amounts of orange food day in, day out. I am also conscious that I gave it a fair bit of thought for day one but can see myself struggling once the novelty wears off. Tomorrow she is having:

Small pot of pasta salad which contains cherry toms, raw pepper, a couple of chopped up olives and some chopped mozzarella
A couple of breadsticks
Small bunch of grapes
Squeezy yogurt tube
Small fruit/cereal bar

I'd love to see other peoples' ideas to inspire me!

Terry it was indeed that thing! :o I'm American and I think the meal they showed for us actually was popcorn chicken!

Maybe I'll just look through the menu and try to pick out what I can live with and what I can't, and try to send something better on those days.

That sounds good Lisa :)

Whenever I pack for DS it seems to be a sandwich or else a Lunchable type thing I've made myself- crackers with meat and cheese etc. And then some sort of veggie, usually fresh with dip, and some fruit.

Well the good news is the pasta salad was a success - she ate the lot and wants it every day! Bit nervous of how much of an effort this is going to be if she wants that level of thought going into it every day! I need to lower her expectations....

I would like you to make my lunches. That sounds lovely!

Have you thought about making extra at dinner the night before so you can use it for packed lunches? Or buying healthy things that are easy to assemble rather than have to take time making? Google kids bento box ideas (japanese phenomenon but easy as pie to do for british style packed lunches - might give you some ideas)

There's nothing wrong with sandwiches is there? Mine have cheese or hummus and cucumber sandwich, piece of fruit, yogurt pouch every day. I'm happy with that.

So far this week DS's lunches have been - chicken and pineapple pizza with peas, yoghurt for pudding. Roast beef, broccoli and roast potatoes, chocolate cake and custard. Sausage and mash with carrots, fruit salad for pudding. I think they're fine - a little low on fruit and veg but they have fruit or carrots for snack time too.

Tell you what, move to S Korea or Greece to improve the school lunches!
www.telegraph.co.uk/foodanddrink/foodanddrinkpicturegalleries/11422254/School-lunches-around-the-world.html