Healthy Back to School Lunches

Many schools have horrible choices in their cafeterias during lunch hour. I can tell you when I was in school, we had choices like PIzza and French Fries, Chili Con Carne and Hot Dogs with French Fries. The choices of unhealthy food were in abundance, but we never had a salad bar or anything extra that we could pick from. Now that we are going into a new school year, determine to pick healthier lunch ideas even if it means it's going to be a slow, gradual process.

For example, if your child is used to having hot dogs, pizza and burgers, instead of adding fries try them out on a side salad. You can put this into a container but keep your dressing in a separate container. If you put dressing on the salad and let it sit, it will end up making the salad very soggy. If they don't like salad, you can try adding a pack of fresh carrot sticks, or a piece of fruit like an apple, an orange, a pear or any favorite fruit they have. It's a good start.

When your kids have a food they really like, but they make mention that they are not willing to give it up, you might want to look up a healthier spin on that same recipe. You can make your own chili from fresh ingredients, and try organic products. Your chili may not be all that different, but the product is fresher because it's not made from processed foods. You can also try vegetarian chili, or chili made with ground turkey meat. Don't tell them, they may not notice it's not ground beef. In fact, most of my family cannot tell the difference and they would say "wow this ground beef taste great where did you find it?" I never did tell them the truth!

When your kids love cheese, no problem. Just try them out on lower fat cheese or skim instead of the 2%. String cheese is a great snack item to put into their lunches, but 2% has a lot of fat content. Again, if you don't tell them they may not notice. Cabot makes great cheese products, and offers a low fat content with great taste at a fair price.

Soda is probably one of the worst options you could give your child. Soda is high in sugar, and is loaded with calories. You can try a few things with this. You can get them to drink more water, or convert them to unsweet tea while using Stevia as a sweetener. Stevia is not a sugar of any kind but it was discovered that you could use it as a sweetener. Stevia has zero fat, zero calores, and is fibrous. That way if the don't like whole grain breads, they will still get a little fiber! Stevia is an all around good sweetener, and you don't have to use a lot. With Stevia a little goes a long way. I use Stevia anytime I have iced tea. It's great and doesn't have that "artificial" taste to it.

All in all, there are many things you can do to switch up the lunch routine and still make it taste great. You can still do the all time favorite peanut butter and jelly, but opt for all natural peanut butter, and jelly that is made from real fruit. Try to stay away from the perservatives and artificial processed items. Natural peanut butter is no2 available at most of your local grocers now. Because peanut butter is used so much, it was one of the few items that some of these stores carry in their small natural food section. Make sure you stir it, because the natural unprocessed peanut butter has natural oils that rise to the top of the jar. Just stir it well with a spoon then enjoy!