Little Pots of Love will be back soon with Round 2 of Chip Wars, but in the meantime I thought I would do a quick post about school dinners/packed lunches. School dinners north of the border used to be well regarded, even by a certain Mr Oliver in his TV series to overhaul the sorry looking offerings dished up to kids. I never used to mind if Alister wanted to have school dinners as they usually had a really good choice of hot meals, baked potatoes, salad bar etc etc. Even if he didn't fancy something hot he would choose salad and a ham baguette, he's good at making healthy food choices. But over the past year or so there seems to be more food being bought in and less being made from scratch by proper school cooks, which is a shame. A few times when he had school dinners I found I was paying £1.75 for him to have a tiny hot dog and a yoghurt. I'm sure he could have chosen more but who would want hot dog and carrots, for example??
He's always preferred packed lunches anyway, but last term we both got a bit lazy. He always asked for a wrap with cheese spread and ham, and it was easy to do so that's what he got. Pretty much EVERY day! So this year it's changing. Packed lunches can be healthy, tasty, varied and cheap so I have bought a few different sized tubs and I am trying out some things on him. Thank goodness I have brought him up to enjoy pretty much everything!
Today was his first day back. Last night I cooked some pasta and stirred some green pesto through it, I toasted a few pine kernels and added them plus a handful of halved baby plum tomatoes. He had that plus a yoghurt, some fruit squash, some grapes and a little biscuit for afterwards in the playground. He loved it, except there was far too much pasta!
For tomorrow I have just made this:
Pasta again, although if I had any I would have used noodles instead. I stir fried some sliced carrots, yellow pepper, green pepper and cooked pork in a little rapeseed oil, added some teriyaki sauce to warm ti through then added the pasta back in. It smells lovely, or so the boy shouted from his bed anyway!
My next change I need to make is to stop giving him a bag of crisps for tuck at breaktime. We've agreed he can have crisps on Fridays for a little end of the week treat but otherwise it will be something healthier. He's a good fruit eater, but for a bit of variety I think I'll try some breadsticks, or cheese twists, or maybe make some mini muffins with fruit in them. Apple and cinnamon muffins sound good!
All of your suggestions for healthy lunches and snacks are welcomed, I have a lot of packed lunches still to make!!
