Brown-Bag Boosters

Autumn is falling upon us. The school supplies have all been purchased. The yellow buses are rumbling through our neighborhoods. Ah, life is back on track!

Now, how do you pack a super school lunch for a teenager?

Don't Do It!

No self-respecting parent should be packing a teen's lunch, at least not on a daily basis. OK, once in a while you might decide to bail out a kid in a hurry. Even so, adolescents are young adults. If they're old enough to drive, they can certainly make a sandwich or two.

Besides, have you ever seen a teen who couldn't find his way around a refrigerator, even in someone else's home?

Here are a few realistic lunch options:

Give 'Em Dough.

Why not save everyone the trouble and simply give your teen a few dollars a day to buy lunch at school? Better yet, why not purchase school lunch tickets or a punch card, if these are available?

Sure, it's fashionable to complain about school lunches. Ask any student. The cafeteria food is either too hot or too cold; it's too dry or too greasy; and it's too starchy or too healthy. But the point is: Everyone's eating it.

In most schools, teens have a la carte choices. If they don't like the main meal, they can usually pick up soup, a salad, a burrito or a bagel. Resourceful kids often find a way to pocket some change! After all, they never know when a friend may invite them out for fast food after school.

Offer Options.

If you stock your cupboard and refrigerator with simple, healthy options, your teen can whip up a lunch fairly easily. Why not make a tuna salad and have it ready in the fridge? Pick up some sliced meats and cheeses in the deli section of the grocery store. You can have cleaned lettuce and tomatoes ready in the produce drawer.

Be sure you always have plenty of peanut butter and jelly on hand too. Kids never outgrow this perennial preference.

Pick up several single-sized packets of pretzels, chips and other snacks. Grab a bag of pre-cleaned baby carrots too. Fill a bowl with fresh apples, bananas, pears and other favorite fruits. Have a dish of cleaned strawberries or blueberries in the fridge.

Keep a stock of plastic sandwich bags in the cupboard. This makes lunch preparation pretty simple.

You can stock your freezer with instant personal pizzas, pot pies, frozen sandwiches, and TV dinners. These should stay fairly frozen till your teen's lunch period, and most high school cafeterias offer self-service microwave ovens for students to use.

Keep Leftovers.

In our kitchen, we have an entire cupboard devoted to recycled throw-away plastic containers. Margarine tubs, deli cups with tops, domed salad servers and even styrofoam boxes. You can do this too!

After dinner, why not place leftovers in single-portion packages for school lunches? Teens love burgers, casseroles, hot dogs, meatballs, pastas, pizza and more.

If you dine out one night, you can ask your server to package unfinished portions. Most teenagers are not picky about doggy-bags. They love second-hand steak, chicken parmesan, ribs or other favorites. Skip the sushi, however, as it may stink up a school locker before noon!

Encourage Independence.

High school is the last station of childhood. By their mid-teens, young people can legally marry. (Yikes!) Within a couple of years, your adolescent may be helping to pick the next President, heading off to college, starting a full-time job or even enlisting in the military.

Isn't it time for him to make his own lunch?