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Both boys (3&5) have been eating green/berry smoothies for breakfast since they were babies. I add raw oats, seeds, nuts as well. They CRAVE this and don't want anything else in the morning.

For snack I send raw nuts, crackers, cheese, always carrots and usually grape tomatoes.

For lunch (for my 5 year old 1st grader) I make casseroles or other meals in big batches and freeze them. Easy to just heat up in the morning. I put it in a heated up thermos before taking him to school. I always have each meal include a good carb (quinoa, brown rice etc) a protein (eggs, chicken, turkey) and 2 veggies. Have a good, healthy, fairly easy system going with this and the boys like it.

We do an O's type cereal and healthy turkey sausage, then yogurt and popcorn or some other grain like good crackers for snack. We pack snack and lunch separately. They really emphasize that at school bc the kids eat their lunch at snack all the time apparently. I just tuck snack into the outer pocket of dd's lunch bag that holds her lunchbox... For lunch she eats little flower punched shapes of turkey (was hoping shed switch to sandwiches after eating a ton this summer but she requested the flowers and hey whatever helps her eat her protein!), a big tiffin of berries, and then often a grain like crackers or puffed kamut, and often a veggie squeezer bc she will NOT eat veggies at lunch she likes them HOT or COLD but not lunchbox even w ice pack. Sometimes I've done goat cheese on crackers, w berries... We mix things up. Oh and her box has room for a tiny treat so like chocolate covered sunflower seeds, and sometimes whatever we've had around for a party, like muffins or veggie chips etc. we just found out the school is not nut free anymore so we can do pbj, muffins w nuts, pistachios.... But I still feel weird about that bc I'm pretty sure there's a kid in the grade up w a strong enough allergy that the classroom was nut free last year... But DD will be very conscientious about cleaning her hands after. Clearly folks send nuts everyday, I guess it switched last year and I'd read an old school handbook. But still.

Dd eats a ton of protein and veggies and pretty much anything at dinner. She's always starving after school so we do a free for all snack then, normally crackers and cheese and yogurt and nuts. She used to be sensitive to some foods but seems to be growing out of that, and seems to be doing ok on what she eats--but she definitely needs those three meals and two snacks! I stuck to the schedule over summer and woe to me when I delayed snack!

I'm envious of all of you whose kids still eat the healthy foods you taught them to like as babies. Mine will just completely stop eating things that were once their favourite for no known reason. Also when as6 starts eating a new food he drops one of the old ones. Drives me crazy. Ds4s preschool is nut, seed and egg free which makes his lunch harder.

We actually do this daily. My son is allergic to eggs and I have found the day goes best if it starts with dinner... This morning he had ground beef, fresh carrots, and fresh peaches with a glass of almond milk.

I just had to quote your answer when I read that when you rarely let your child eat Ramen, you throw out the MSG-laden flavor packet! LoL I do the same thing! I like to add a mixed veggie to it and my hubby always adds an egg to make a sort of fast food noodle soup.

FWIW- When DS was a toddler, I looked high and low to find an organic dried alphabet noodle for my son so I could add my own seasoning and meat to make a "homemade" alphabet soup.

This sounds really good. So I'd throw in some kale, strawberries, and the rest in the blender and it'd come out okay?

Do you happen to have a basic recipe you could share please?

Your DD has it right. Who needs to cook when you can just eat at room temp?



We have a new grocery store in a nearby town: Natural Grocers . We bought all our son's snack food there.

Healthy Lunches for Kids

(I love how that store smells. I just feel my stress-level sinking every time I go in there.)

Enteric coated capsules? I need to write that down. We don't eat a lot of fish these days because we really don't know where it's coming from. We're not so keen on Pacific-caught fish right now.
It would be nice if we could find farm-raised nearby. (I'm in Oregon, so if anyone knows of organic-raised Tilapia, etc. let me know.)

I am with you on the "unusual" breakfasts. I love to eat homemade burritos for breakfast. Not with eggs, but with meat and beans!

(Where's the "licking chops" icon??? LoL)

That sounds very nutritious and I know my son would love the berry taste. We have wild blackberries to add to that!

Will you post your recipe?

I've been looking for a study I heard about on the radio today (Sunday; Channel 1220am; Oregon-at around 2pm.) from the University at Albany, NY. It was done by (?) and concentrated on sugar and it's effects on the brain. There was some conversation (this was a fifteen minute interview of which I caught ten...) about how the scientists think there's a link to sugar and Type 3 diabetes. (I think this refers to dementia?) But the interviewee was also speaking about children and optimum learning.

Anyway, if anyone has a way to find this study and can post it here so I can read it in full, I'd appreciate it.