The Lunch Box
By Stacey Nolan Young
It’s arrived again. The dreaded end of your summer vacations quickly turn into the monotony of routine. The lines at the stores have diminished. There are no more people elbowing others out of their way to get the latest Hannah Montana pencil case. The shopping is complete. The schedules are in place. The school bus has been and gone. September has arrived. The kids are back in school. Gone are the lazy days wondering what to grill on the barbeque for your guests. Now you find yourself faced with a new dilemma.
What do I put in my child’s lunch box?
Of course, you could always fill your child up with the junk that the grocery stores carry packed “conveniently” into neat little packages. There are tons of options when it comes to snacks all wrapped up in bright packaging. Candy, crackers, cookies and bars are all around. You could do this but do you really want to?
To put it to you as real and honestly as I can, you are essentially poisoning your child by “providing” these options for them day after day. You are giving their little bodies foods that do not provide nourishment. That will not help them to grow up healthy and happy. You are teaching them unhealthy habits that they will take with them into adulthood. You are making them sick.
But what can you do when you lead a busy life and can’t spend all day cooking? I will provide you with some general rules to follow when it comes to packing a lunch for your child.
Rule #1 – Stay away from beige foods
School cafeterias are the worst for this. Have you ever noticed that most fast food is beige in colour? Think about it. Fast, fried foods are generally not very appealing to look at. Continued consumption of these foods makes the person ingesting them not very appealing to look at either. While it may be easy to throw in crackers, chips, bologna sandwiches on white bread and cookies in a lunch box you are definitely not doing your child any favours. In general avoid the beige foods.
Rule #2 – Balance the meal
Think about what you are packing for your children. Will they need snacks? Are they getting enough fruits and vegetables? Do they have a good mix of protein, fats and carbohydrates? Snacks should be healthy and nutritious. Some options for these would be fruits, cut up vegetables, yogurt, cottage cheese or a small amount of nuts.
As for the lunch meal, be sure to balance this. A sandwich or wrap would work great. Choose healthy starches like whole grain breads. Make sure the sandwich contains a lean protein source like tuna, chicken or turkey breast. Add lettuce, pickles, tomatoes and as many veggies as you want to it. Mustard is a great condiment. An apple, pear or orange compliments the meal. Add a bottle of water and your child now has the required nutrients and energy in order to focus for the rest of the day. Poor eating habits and lack of nutrition play an important role in kids performing inadequately in school.
Rule #3 – Batch Cook
Snacks are nice and easy to pack in your child’s lunch. Fruits generally come as they are and you can throw them into a lunch box without difficulty. Same goes with yogurt and nuts. As for the sandwich you do have to put it together. It may be a good idea to spend a couple of hours on the weekend preparing your child’s food for the week. This takes away the scrambling around that goes on each morning trying to throw things together. Grill up a bunch of chicken breasts while you have a turkey breast roasting in the oven. Cut up your chicken and turkey into slices and place in Tupperware containers. Leave enough out in the fridge for two days. Freeze the rest.
While everything is cooking grab your veggies from the fridge and cut them up. Place them in a bowl filled with water in your fridge so they are accessible to you in the morning to place in a container and put in that lunch box.
Lunch meats are not the ideal food item to feed to your children because of the processing and the harmful nitrates in them but these can be a valid option if you are in a bind. There is no reason to have to turn to “Lunchables” if you were too busy to prepare.
***NOTE FOR THOSE IN SOUTHERN ONTARIO***
You’d have to be living in a box not to know about the recent outbreak of listeriosis and its link to Maple Leaf Foods. If you are afraid of this for your kids then by all means do not buy cold meats. That would be preferable for health anyway. BUT do not get so afraid of these possibilities that you cut out meat altogether. If your concerns are grave then why not opt for organic? Yes it is more expensive but what would you pay to keep your child healthy? There are options other than processed foods out there.
Rule #4 – Stay away from daily sweets
I’m not saying to never treat your kids. I know very well that the majority of children at school will have unhealthy items in their lunches. Therefore I do know how most children will react if their own lunches changed dramatically while they could still see what their friends are eating. I realize that this would be difficult for them and that you would hear about it. I also realize that you cannot control what happens once your child leaves your sight.
The occasional treat will make your child happy. That said there are ways to make even these options healthier. Cut up fruit like pineapple and strawberries is a great treat for kids. Make cookies from whole grain flour. Be conscious of what goes into your child’s mouth. If you can’t pronounce the ingredients on the label then it probably shouldn’t enter their bodies.
Rule #5 – Don’t pack calorie containing beverages
This is as simple as it sounds. The majority of the population does not drink near enough water. This is something that is learned from childhood. To get your child healthy pack a bottle of water instead of a juice box in their lunch bag. While some juice contains nutrients they also contain a lot of sugar. Give your child whole fruit instead. Pop should never be consumed by anyone. It is simply void of any kind of nutrition whatsoever and it is chalk full of sugar. For example one can of Pepsi contains 41 grams or roughly 10 teaspoons of sugar!
Rule #6 – Involve your child
I don’t know how many times I’ve heard people tell me “But they won’t eat anything healthy! All they’ll eat is…” I have the same answer now that I always have. If you give your child the option to eat a carrot or a cookie then most often they will choose the cookie. Take the option away. Your child will not starve. They will eventually eat what you provide.
The best and most effective way to get a child to eat something that is new to them is to get them involved in the process. Cook with them. Have them help you prepare the food. If they feel a sense of accomplishment and know that they had a part in it then they are much more likely to try it. As a bonus they get a lesson in self sufficiency and when they are old enough to live on their own perhaps they won’t live off of popcorn and KD.
As responsible parents we do have a duty to make sure that our children are healthy and happy. There is an obesity epidemic in North America and more and more children are having the health problems that people experience in their later years. There are things that we can do to prevent this from happening to our kids. Take my advice above and you take steps to stop this wave from touching your life.
”What a child doesn’t receive he can seldom later give.” ~P.D. James
Add comment September 10th, 2008