Best Lunch Box Ever (2 page)

• Support growth and development.

• Promote healthful eating habits.

• Energize them to participate to their fullest in everything from physics to phys ed.

• Provide fiber, vitamins, minerals, and other key nutrients.

• Help them maintain an appropriate weight.

• Offset moodiness.

• Let them know how much you care, especially if you include a loving note or other thoughtful gesture.

So what really needs to be packed in that lunch box to ensure it's well balanced?

Start by emphasizing fresh, seasonal, whole food that has spent more time on a farm than in a manufacturing plant. Cobbling together a nutritious lunch gets a lot easier if you rely on real food from the get-go. It needn't be complicated or scientific. Here's the lowdown on the building blocks of a healthful midday meal.

WHOLE-GRAIN FOODS

Whether it's the whole-wheat bread on a sandwich or the brown rice in a stir-fry, whole grains are the core of a solid school lunch. These complex carbs provide the quickest form of energy and are the number-one fuel for those hardworking brains. Whole grains take longer to digest than processed ones, supplying your child with a steady source of energy.

Using whole grains is key since they haven't been stripped of the bran and germ (and the nutrients that go along with them). Don't be duped by deceptive marketing. Many foods made from grains, breads in particular, get paraded around as if they are more healthful than they are. Read the label and look for the word
whole
as in
whole wheat
instead of just
wheat
.

Grocery and specialty stores now stock an array of grains from which to choose: barley, farro, quinoa, oats, bulgur wheat, brown rice, spelt, amaranth, teff, buckwheat, and millet. You can also buy a huge variety of whole-grain pastas and breads. And get this: Popcorn is a whole grain, too. How cool is that?

PROTEIN FOODS

It's essential to balance grains with protein-rich foods, which provide important nutrients and help to keep blood sugar steady so your child doesn't bottom out in class. Protein also stimulates brain activity, promoting the alertness necessary for a successful school day.

The likes of meat and chicken usually come to mind when we think of protein, but plant-based foods shouldn't be overlooked. Choosing, say, black beans over ground beef for example, costs less, and they're lower in unhealthful fats. Plus, they're gentler to the environment since growing beans produces less greenhouse gases than raising and processing meat.

Protein-rich lunch box–friendly foods include beans, lentils, chickpeas, split peas, peanuts, nuts, nut butters, seeds, seed butters, tofu, tempeh, soybeans (edamame), soy nuts, milk, yogurt, cheese, cottage cheese, eggs, chicken, turkey, pork, beef, lamb, sardines, shrimp, salmon, and tuna.

HEALTHFUL FATS

Fats get a bad rap despite the fact that they are necessary for health and have a place in a balanced diet. Fats not only carry essential vitamins, they can actually increase the absorption of nutrients from other foods. Oh, and those healthy omega-3s you're always hearing about? Those are fats found in foods such as walnuts, canola oil, flaxseeds, and salmon.

On a more practical front, fats may help us feel satiated since they take their sweet ol' time to digest. Add a smear of pumpkin seed butter to your child's jam sandwich, and it will likely fill him up a whole lot longer.

While it's important not to turn your skinny nose up at fats, be smart about the types you choose and how much of them you serve to your child. Certain fats are better for you than others, which I've spelled out below. Keep in mind that all fats are high in calories, so love your almond butter, but don't go swimming in it.

Better fats.
Avocados, nuts and nut butters, seeds and seed butters, olives, sardines, and salmon are all rich in healthful fats, including (in a few cases) the coveted omega-3s.

Best to minimize.
Fatty processed meats such as salami, hot dogs, bacon, and sausage; heavily marbled beef and other rich meats; and palm oil, palm kernel oil, and fully hydrogenated oils are all sources of saturated fat and should be kept in check. The same goes for full-fat dairy products, including heavy cream, butter, whole milk, and full-fat cheeses.

Skip altogether.
Many margarines, baked goods, and snack foods are made with partially hydrogenated vegetable oils, ingredients known as trans fats. These oils are considered particularly unhealthful because they both raise your “bad” cholesterol and lower your “good” cholesterol. Keep them out of your shopping cart entirely.

FRUITS AND VEGETABLES

It's tricky to meet the USDA's recommendation that half of our plates be filled with fruits and vegetables. If we've got any hope of reaching that goal, some of that produce has got to show up at lunch. Getting a couple of fruits and veggies in during the school day isn't as challenging as you might think. If you include, say, a generous thermos of vegetable soup and a lovely ripe peach in a school lunch, you've knocked out 1
¹
/
₂
cups of produce right there. Not bad.

Also, aim for variety rather than choosing the same foods over and over again. Be sure to tap into every hue of the fruit-and-vegetable rainbow. Offering your child a colorful mix of produce means they'll take in a broad range of nutrients. For example, orange vegetables apples tend to be high in beta-carotene, dark leafy greens are typically rich in folic acid, and purple foods are often packed with anthocyanins, a powerful antioxidant.

ORGANIC OPTIONS

Fruits and vegetables are a must, but which ones? Ideally, buy produce grown without pesticides, which is better for the environment, better for farming communities, and better for your kids.

If routinely buying organic isn't accessible, either economically or practically, have a look at the Dirty Dozen and the Clean 15, two useful lists developed by the folks at the Environmental Working Group that can help you decide where to put your organic food dollars.

DIRTY DOZEN

It's best to opt for organic when buying these fruits and veggies since they tend to have the highest levels of pesticide residues:

• apples
  
• celery
  
• strawberries
  
• peaches
  
• spinach
  
• nectarines (imported)
  
• grapes (imported)
  
• bell peppers
  
• potatoes
  
• blueberries (domestic)
  
• lettuce
  
• kale/collard greens
  

CLEAN 15

These fruits and vegetables are your best bets when buying conventionally grown produce since they tend to have the lowest levels of pesticide residues:

• onions
  
• sweet corn
  
• pineapples
  
• avocados
  
• asparagus
  
• peas
  
• mangoes
  
• eggplants
  
• cantaloupes (domestic)
  
• kiwis
  
• cabbages
  
• watermelons
  
• sweet potatoes
  
• grapefruits
  
• mushrooms
  

CALCIUM-RICH FOODS

Many kids today drink more soda than milk, which is just one of the reasons they may not be getting enough calcium. Children need three to four servings of milk or other calcium-rich food or drink a day. Send your child to school with yogurt and a sandwich with a slice of cheese, and you've already met about half of their daily needs.

Here are a handful of high-calcium sources, which offer about one-quarter to one-third of the daily requirements, depending on a child's age. (Be aware that calcium levels can vary by manufacturer.)

• 1 cup nonfat milk
  
• 1 cup calcium-fortified soy milk
  
• 1
  ¹
  /
  ₂
  ounces Cheddar, mozzarella, or Muenster cheese
  
• ¹
  /
  ₂
  cup part-skim ricotta cheese
  
• ²
  /
  ₃
  cup plain nonfat yogurt
  
• 1 cup chopped cooked spinach
  
• 1 cup calcium-fortified orange juice
  
• ¹
  /
  ₃
  cup instant nonfat dry milk powder
  

Other good calcium sources include dried beans, chickpeas, almonds, calcium-fortified breakfast cereals, broccoli, kale, turnip greens, okra, bok choy, and canned sardines. You can boost calcium further by adding a spoonful or two of nonfat dry milk powder to soups, baked goods, puddings, and casseroles.

DRINKS

Colorful juice boxes, shiny drink pouches, and flavored milks are awfully tempting for kids. Slipping one into the lunch box on occasion is a fine way to keep things interesting, but these beverages should be seen for what they are: treats. Are they tasty? Yes. A good everyday way to kill thirst? Not so much.

Really, kids should hydrate with water and low- or nonfat milk. Even 100-percent juice isn't a great bet. Your child is better off getting fruit from a whole apple than a glass of apple juice. If you decide to serve chocolate milk, make it yourself. You'll be in control of how much fat and sugar is added, which is preferable, since store-bought flavored milk is often high in both.

Do water and milk seem boring? Invest in a charming reusable bottle, and get drinks good and cold before sending them off to school. Other ideas include packing sparkling water or making “spa water” by spiking tap water with citrus or cucumbers.

No matter what your kid's drink of choice, relying on reusable bottles means that fewer plastic bottles, aseptic boxes, and cans end up in the trash heap.

HEY THERE, SWEET STUFF

Sometimes sugar seems hard to avoid. It shows up in everything from sandwich bread to salty snack foods. Overdoing the sweets is hard on kids' teeth and provides empty calories. That said, if your child's diet is largely fresh, whole foods, there's wiggle room for sweets. Here are a few pointers on keeping tabs on sugar and enjoying sweets in moderation:

Read food labels:
You may be surprised to see how much sugar is added to something you might consider healthful. Some brands of jarred spaghetti sauce, for example, pack in 1
¹
/
₂
tablespoons of sugar in a single serving.

Snack on nature's treats:
Opt for foods that are naturally sweet, such as fresh and dried fruit, rather than ones with added sugar, such as fruit roll-ups or heavily sweetened yogurt.

Know sugar's synonyms:
Sugar comes in many forms and has many names, including cane sugar, high-fructose corn syrup, dextrose, brown rice syrup, evaporated cane juice, honey, molasses, maple syrup, and agave nectar, just to cite a few.

Sweeten foods yourself:
Food manufacturers tend to go overboard with sugar. Adding your own honey, jam, or chopped fruit to plain yogurt, for example, is likely to be a lot lower in sugar than store-bought sweetened yogurt.