ideas on packing "hot" lunches for preschoolers? (picky eater, milk, son)
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
I'm switching my boys' preschool in the fall where the new school will not offer hot lunch. It's a pro for us because we won't be spending $110 a month anymore on pricey organic lunches (although it has gotten our 4-year-old to try new things like southwestern turkey tacos, hummus, and broccoli mash). The con is that we now have to make sure he gets a similarly varied lunch that will stay hot (school doesn't microwave as does his current school). He's too old to throw a stew or soup into a thermos. His younger brother is in that stage now and loves it. I can see us degrading into PB&J and I don't want to do that everyday (although he'd love it).
Their current school uses an organic food company called Yummy in my Tummy in Sunrise, FL but what you can buy from their store directly is very limited and doesn't compare to what you get through preschool lunches. I'm not the greatest cook so making our own meals will be tough going.
Any ideas as to what I can pack and what I can pack it to keep it relatively warm until lunchtime?
Yeah I wonder why it needs to be hot too. Presumable they are inside most of the time in winter, so don;t need something hot to warm themselves up. Our twins are 3.5, they go to playschool twice a week. The rules in their school are the lunch must contain a protein, veggie and fruit, and if you don't provide milk to drink, a dairy. No nuts or candy or chips.
About half the time I provide a sandwich (lunchmeat or thinly cut roast) and some carrot sticks, or stuffed flatbread, and a cheese stick. The other times it's mostly left overs from the day before's dinner, such as pasta and chicken, or potatoes and steak bits, or rice and tofu- stuff which is fine to eat cold. Desert is always fruit, whatever we have in the house at the time.
That being said, if you really want stuff to stay warm, I recommend buying a thermos pouch; you may find these in camping supplies. It's basically an insulated small lunch bag.
He's too old for soup in a thermos? In pre-school?
Why does it have to be a hot lunch?
He's "grown out of" soup according to him, so he says he wants something more substantial for lunch and he prefers hot lunches to cold (unless it's a PB&J). He's just been a picky eater all of his life, and we've just gotten him started on eating different things with condiments instead of oatmeal all the time. He loves rice and beans which he enjoys eating with grandma, hamburgers with spinach, and casseroles (some of the time - he's suspicious of mixed textures and foods, just like I was when I was little). We're staying away from too many sandwiches unless the bread is gluten-free because he seems to have an intolerance to wheat (just like I do). He'll eat yogurt, cheese, and garlic and sweet potato "fries" but beyond that, we have to push him to try new things, especially veggies. As it stands now, he's demanding sausage every morning so we have to try something else.
Yeah I wonder why it needs to be hot too. Presumable they are inside most of the time in winter, so don;t need something hot to warm themselves up. Our twins are 3.5, they go to playschool twice a week. The rules in their school are the lunch must contain a protein, veggie and fruit, and if you don't provide milk to drink, a dairy. No nuts or candy or chips.
About half the time I provide a sandwich (lunchmeat or thinly cut roast) and some carrot sticks, or stuffed flatbread, and a cheese stick. The other times it's mostly left overs from the day before's dinner, such as pasta and chicken, or potatoes and steak bits, or rice and tofu- stuff which is fine to eat cold. Desert is always fruit, whatever we have in the house at the time.
That being said, if you really want stuff to stay warm, I recommend buying a thermos pouch; you may find these in camping supplies. It's basically an insulated small lunch bag.
Penguin, all great ideas except he hates roast chicken, hot or cold, and I find that packing gluten-free bread especially hardens like a rock by the time it's lunchtime. He won't eat pasta cold. He's a very "things are supposed to be a certain way" child and if he's experienced it and liked it hot, he refuses to eat it cold, even pizza, which is probably the only "hot" food I can tolerate cold. I guess he gets this from me, the more I think about it! My husband will eat anything hot or cold.
I don't really have any great ideas on what to pack as my son is a pretty picky eater and likes to stay with his standard selections. However, one of his favorites was Mac n' Cheese. We bought an insulated hot thermos and would heat up his lunch in the morning. It stayed warm in the container for about 4 hours, it definitely wasn't "hot" when he ate it, but it worked. We also used it for spaghetti and meatballs.
We also bought one of these when he went on a pancake kick and it certainly did the trick. The issue with it was that he needed two bags (drink, fruit, snack) as anything in the Lunch and Go will get hot. Overall, this worked much better than the thermos, but the thermos was more convenient for some things.
Can he work a microwave? You might offer to purchase a small inexpensive one for the class. If he can do it himself, without making more work for the teacher, they might be amenable to that.
Actually, I taught preschool years ago, and didn't mind at all taking a bowl down to the kitchen & heating it up. Wish I'd thought to bring a little microwave oven to the room! Out of reach except at lunch.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
