Lunch Box Ideas – March

I received fantastic comments, ideas and feedback on my Lunch Box Ideas – February post. Thanks so much to everyone who added to the conversation on the blog and the facebook page.

One of the changes I made based on the feedback was to increase the level of protein in the kids lunch boxes. After receiving a lovely email from a reader I did want to note one thing. If you read this post and think ‘wow that is too much work for lunch boxes for me”, please don’t compare and feel bad if you don’t make this sort of food for your kids lunch boxes. The reader said she felt guilty now only giving her kids sandwiches.

This is the first time in a number of years that I have started making more food for the kids school lunches and where I am not just relying on sandwiches or the like for the their main item every day. It is something I want to work on and am happy to spend a bit more time doing it. When I had very little ones, this was not something that I felt I could or even wanted to do.

So with that in mind………

Lunch Box Ideas – March Set 1

Zucchini and Pasta slice which I posted the recipe for last week.

Chocolate Balls

And this is what it looks like altogether, Zucchini and Pasta slice, chocolate balls, strawberries, banana and organic corn chips. Each child has five items and they are not necessarily exactly the same. I will tweak the seasonal fruits to suit their preferences.

Lunch Box Ideas – March Set 2

Chicken Balls as suggested by Sinead!

Three out of the four kids took them as a wrap combo, just one of them preferring to have them straight up.

I actually made a double batch (used 1kg of chicken mince) when I made the chicken balls and froze large batches to use in the coming weeks. This is a more efficient use of my time and I will try and build up a stash in the freezer of these type of lunch box items.

Chocolate Cupcake

Frozen orange – I cut an orange into quarters, wrap in plastic and freeze overnight. (I actually do a whole batch at the start of the week!) It does mean that the lunch box does contain one bit of rubbish, but the boys really love these on a hot day. They also have the added benefit of keeping the whole lunch box cooler too.

Hard boiled eggs – as suggested by Lynda, I tried hard boiling eggs as an additional protein source for the lunch boxes. According to the United States Department of Agriculture hard boiled eggs will keep for a week:

When shell eggs are hard cooked, the protective coating is washed away, leaving bare the pores in the shell for bacteria to enter and contaminate it. Hard-cooked eggs should be refrigerated within 2 hours of cooking and used within a week. Source

I hard boiled 6 and just shelled them the night before they went into the lunch box. However, only the preppie liked having them in his lunch box, so I will make fewer next time around.

And this is what it looks like altogether, Chicken ball wrap, chocolate cup cake, grapes (they also freeze well too), frozen orange and Vita Weat Original crackers. As with the other lunch box idea, each child has five items and they are not necessarily exactly the same, but pretty similar.

For more inspiration, the tables below list some fruit and veg which are in season for March. This isn’t a complete list, but just a selection of items that you might like to try including in the kids lunch boxes, either raw or baked into a snack / meal:

You can see more lunch box ideas here and read more about my school lunch box process here.

Have you tried some new things in the kids lunch boxes recently?