Issue Date: August 15, 2004
Lunch box rules
Recipes from a veteran brown bagger.
Designed for kids, these portable foods please adults, too.
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Back in the days when I was still sending kids out to catch the school bus, I never could understand why both my daughters preferred packed lunches and disdained the school cafeteria. Why would they choose a salad or turkey sandwich, apple, cookies and bottled water over pizza, hamburgers, French fries and chicken fingers?
When my younger daughter, Sharon, arrived home from her first year at college, I decided to ask her why. Now that she's more adult than adolescent, her recollections were surprising to me. Here's what I learned.
She liked to brown-bag it mostly because of long lunch lines. She was able to sit down immediately and enjoy her lunch at a leisurely pace, while the cafeteria kids waited up to 15 minutes for theirs and then had to scarf it down.
Then there was that little issue of taste and quality: Cafeteria food wasn't that good. The French fries were soggy; the pizza was greasy. And the so-called sandwiches? "We won't even go there," she says. To make matters worse, the menu was so monotonous that the lunch-line fare began to look like pet food.
Sharon still prefers to eat like a kid. So I asked her to help me develop the four recipes you see here today.
Chunky Pizza Dip is a healthy alternative to pizza.
Herbed Creamed Cheese With Scallions & Tuna brings together three kid pleasers: tuna, cream cheese and bagels.
With Southwestern-Flavored Ground Beef, you can simultaneously make tonight's dinner and tomorrow's lunch. Just save out and refrigerate some of the taco meat and fixings such as shredded cheese and lettuce, plus chopped scallions and tomatoes. A good-looking salad like this will draw potential lunch traders. More likely than not, they'll be out of luck.
And for something sweet, Caramel Chocolate Dip is a treat that will entice kids to eat their fruit.
Sharon's final piece of advice: "Don't tuck special notes in your kid's lunch. They draw seriously unwanted attention." In other words, let the lunch speak for itself.
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Herbed Cream Cheese With Scallions & Tuna
3 scallions (green onions), roughly chopped
1 tsp. grated lemon zest (peel)
1 tsp. dried basil
2 tsps. lemon juice
8 ounces light cream cheese
6 ounces canned white albacore tuna, drained and broken into small chunks
Salt and pepper, to taste
Process scallions, zest and basil in a food processor until minced. Add lemon juice and cream cheese; pulse until combined. Transfer to a small bowl. Stir in tuna, and season with salt and pepper. Refrigerate.
TO PACK: Put a portion of spread in a small lidded container. Add celery and carrot sticks, cherry tomatoes, cucumbers, a mini bagel and/or crackers for dipping or spreading. Include a plastic knife.
Serves: 4 (makes about 1 1/2 cups).
Per serving: 204 calories, 18g protein, 1g carbohydrates, 13g fat (8g saturated), 0.3g fiber, 411mg sodium.
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Caramel Chocolate Dip
8 ounces caramel candies (about 28 pieces)
2 ounces semisweet chocolate, chopped
1/2 cup milk
Heat caramels, chocolate and milk in a small heavy-duty saucepan over low heat until smooth. Cool and refrigerate.
TO PACK: Put a portion of the dip in a small lidded container. Add strawberries, bananas, grapes, apple slices, dried apricots, graham crackers, vanilla wafers or anything else that tastes good dipped in chocolate.
Serves: 6 (makes about 1 cup).
Per serving: 202 calories, 2.7g protein, 36g carbohydrates, 7g fat (5g saturated), 1g fiber, 103mg sodium.
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Chunky Pizza Dip
2 Tbs. olive oil
3 garlic cloves, minced
2 14.5-ounce cans petite diced tomatoes
1/4 cup tomato paste
1/2 tsp. dried basil
1/4 tsp. dried oregano
Heat oil and garlic in a large saucepan or Dutch oven until garlic starts to sizzle and turn golden. Add tomatoes, tomato paste, basil and oregano; bring to a simmer. Simmer, uncovered, until sauce is thick enough for dipping, 15 to 20 minutes. Cool and refrigerate.
TO PACK: Put a portion of dip in a small lidded container. Add favorite dippers, such as multicolored bell pepper strips, celery, small breadsticks, mozzarella sticks and pepperoni slices.
Serves: 6 (makes about 2 1/2 cups).
Per serving: 79 calories, 2g protein, 8.5g carbohydrates, 5g fat (1g saturated), 2g fiber, 310mg sodium.
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Southwestern-Flavored Ground Beef or Turkey for Tacos & Salad
There's enough here for tonight's tacos as well as tomorrow's lunchbox salad.
2 Tbs. olive oil
1 large onion, chopped
3 large garlic cloves, minced
3 Tbs. chili powder
2 tsps. dried oregano
1 Tb. ground cumin
3 pounds lean ground beef or turkey
1 14.5-ounce can petite diced tomatoes
Salt and pepper, to taste
1/4 cup cornmeal
Heat oil in a 12-inch skillet until shimmering. Add onion; sauté until soft, about 5 minutes. Add garlic, chili powder, oregano and cumin; sauté until fragrant, about 1 minute. Add beef or turkey and cook, stirring often, until it loses its raw color. Stir in tomatoes; simmer to blend flavors, about 5 minutes. Add salt and pepper, to taste. Stir in cornmeal; cook, stirring constantly, until it thickens, almost instantly. Cool and refrigerate (or serve warm for dinner as tacos or taco salad).
TO PACK: Put a portion of taco meat in a small container. Put some salsa in another small container. Put lettuce, tomatoes, bell peppers, scallions and shredded cheese in a plastic salad container or other lidded container. Pack tortilla chips in a baggie. Add a plastic fork and knife to the lunchbox.
Serves: 10.
Per serving, beef: 425 calories, 25g protein, 8g carbohydrates, 31g fat (12g saturated), 2g fiber, 186mg sodium.
Per serving, turkey: 259 calories, 25g protein, 8g carbohydrates, 13.6g fat (3g saturated), 2g fiber, 220mg sodium.
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Tips from the author's teen Sharon Anderson, just a year out of high school, offers these brown-bag tips:
School lunch is a compromise between what kids want to eat and what you want them to have. Want them to eat raw vegetables? Send along a little container of their favorite dip or dressing. How about that banana or apple? Pack a little peanut butter or caramel spread to dip it in.
Avoid repetition. Even a good lunch is a yawner if you have to eat it every day.
Spring for fresh-sliced deli meat when possible and good sandwich rolls instead of squishy sliced bread.
Invest in small, sturdy lidded containers for dips, spreads and dressings; Glad now makes disposable half-cup tubs. Also, reuse plastic salad containers.
The best part of school lunch? Dessert! Give kids a treat, even if it's a fun-size candy bar or a few small cookies.
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