Nutritious lunches for school that boomerang

We've done posts here in past years about packing nutritious lunches for kids that kids will eat, and have gotten some wonderful ideas. One of the biggest takeaways (ha--little meal joke for the Brits) from those conversations for me has been to let the kids themselves decide what they want to eat, even if it's a little unbalanced (because it'll all even out over the week anyway).So I've packed lunches that consist of grapes, an apple, and a bag of baby carrots, if that's what my son wanted.

Which is all well and good. Except that lately those lunches have been returning in the afternoon completely untouched from my younger child. And in the past few days I've had no fewer than two real-life and three online conversations about this same phenomenon: Children Who Choose Their Own Lunches But Don't Eat Them.

I've discovered two causes for my son's not eating his lunch: 1. He eats the hot lunch at school instead, and 2. He's too busy talking to eat. I'd be upset about 1 if the lunches at his new school were crap, but they're surprisingly healthy. And there's really nothing I can do about 2, and I suppose it's my own fault for being a talker myself.

One issue, as I see it, is with the waste. It's just a waste to spend my time and money packing stuff he won't eat, only to pull it out of the lunchbox that night (or have his dad pull it out of his lunchbox at night). Plus it's a food waste, too.

But the real thing that annoys me is that if he picked it, he should eat it. So I'm about to tell him that if any lunches come back uneaten this week, he's made his choice to eat school lunch and I'll stop packing anything for him.

But I know this isn't something that would make all of you comfortable. How do you deal with uneaten lunches? Is lunch important to you? Or are you not as concerned as long as your kid eats breakfast or some other big meal every day? Thoughts?

Comments

[meggiemoo]

Generally, lunch is the one meal out of 3 I can count on my kids to really chow down on. Occasionally, though, they bring back items untouched, which they'll often then eat before dinner. I'm not too bothered unless I see a trend of not eating for several meals in a row.

My 2-1/2 y.o. is in the toddler phase of just not seeming to be very hungry, while my 5-1/2 y.o. is eating everything in sight!

Moxie, will your kids eat the uneaten items (assuming they're still good) after school?

[caro]

Put a boo boo buddy in the lunch bag to keep it cool and fresh, and then if it boomerangs, feed it to them for dinner or boomerang it right back to school with them the next day. Especially if they chose it themselves, the waste is unacceptable.

[Jan]

Another possibility: My daughter, last year, had a school day that started at 9:20 and then lunch at 11:30. She just plain wasn't hungry yet at lunchtime.

Our other issue is that the kids have about 10 minutes where they're required to be in the lunchroom, but after that, if you're done, you can go out and play on the playground. Mine will always choose playing on the playground over eating lunch.

The waste is what bugs me the most, too. I try to address it a few ways:

Afternoon snack comes from leftover lunch.
Unpack lunchbox as soon as she gets home, so some things can be re-sent the next day.
Pack non-perishables (again, can be re-sent).

I don't worry about my kids getting enough to eat. They're big breakfast eaters.

(One thing I really don't like is if there's a snack available (daycare and preschool do this), then I see lunch coming home uneaten and I know my younger one ate 12 graham crackers for snack because he was starving. I use this as an opportunity to practice remembering that I cannot control the whole world for my children, much as I might like to!)

[Kate]

One thought - do you give him a choice to eat hot lunch instead of bringing it? If not could you start giving him that option?

Also, just saw the same excuse as #2 on this mom's blog:

http://greenlitebites.com/2011/09/13/my-little-chatterbox/

[Leanne]

You mean, this is a thing?! I thought my son was being jerky! It enrages me to unpack an untouched or mostly untouched lunch. I can't afford to throw out that much food! Plus, a couple years ago, I got a call from the teacher wondering if she could connect us with social resources so that we could get food for his lunch as he told his teacher he didn't have any lunch. But he DID have a lunch. He just chose not to eat it!

And then there is the changing taste. He used to eat bananas for years and then suddenly won't touch them. Except, he gets a piece of banana in something and declares it the most delicious thing ever, but still won't eat a banana. And you could substitute a hundred different things for banana. It's so frustrating.

[Moxie]

Kate, yes, he's gotten the choice to eat hot lunch and won't definitively choose it! Aggravating.

Oh, caro! You don't have my son if you think I could keep serving it again and again until he eats it. He'd starve himself rather than eat something he didn't want to eat at that moment. It makes way more sense (to me!) to just switch to hot lunch instead of setting up a power struggle.

Meggiemoo, yes, they'll eat it right after school if they remember. Which I guess is me or their dad remembering, really.

[Leanne]

Oh, and just to provide a tiny bit of context: my son is 8 and he has two nutrition breaks a day which are essentially 2 small lunches. No cafeteria or school lunches.

[yasmara]

I agree with those above who said to serve the uneaten lunch bits (with my kids, it's never the whole thing, just some part) as a) afternoon snack or b) part of dinner.

I only make an exception with stuff that doesn't keep over time (despite a cold pack in the lunch box - it is thawed by the end of the day) like cheese slices. Actually, I stopped sending cheese at all because it was the food most often (but not always) brought back home.

I present the food very matter-of-factly..."Oh, you didn't eat X in your lunch. You can have that for a snack & when you've finished it, you can have something else if you're still hungry."

One idea - maybe leave a cute note in his lunch saying something like, "Eat, then talk, so your body stays healthy! Love, Mama"? I wonder if that kind of gentle reminder would be helpful.

I think it's good that he is actually bringing the food home & not just throwing it away/hiding. It's a lot easier to address a problem that's out in the open like this (even if it is totally aggravating!). My younger brother was a food hider as a kid, which is sooo much more troubling.

[Moxie]

Leanne, he told his teacher he didn't have any lunch?? It must have been awful and mortifying at the time, but it made me laugh out loud reading it right now. Kids are jerks sometimes...

[Shanna]

Does the school offer a monthly or weekly hot lunch calendar? He might be picking out his lunch for each day because he wants some degree of certainty/control over what he's going to eat (similar to refusing once-rejected leftovers), but then is excited by the hot lunch option once he gets to school and sees it. Or if it's been a "hot lunch tomorrow is X, do you want it?" situation, maybe he feels like just saying yes and letting go of lunch packing is...relinquishing too much control? Leaving out an important evening ritual?

I wonder whether, instead of asking him each night/morning whether he wants packed lunch or hot lunch the next day, you could plan this out farther in in advance. Sit down with the hot lunch calendar/menu and ask him to select 2 lunches per week that he knows he likes. Those are hot lunch days where he gets a break from picking out what to pack, and you/his dad get a break from packing lunch. (I think it's worth framing it at a break for both of you. Maybe on those evenings you can have another 5-10 minute activity during the time that owuld have been spent packing lunch.) The other days he gets packed lunch as usual. After a few weeks you guys can evaluate whether the hot lunch/packed lunch balance is working. Is there less food waste? Less wasted time? Does he feel like he has an appropriate amount of control over the situation?

My kids are in pre-K and stay for lunch only one day each week. (Today is their first, actually.) After last year, I got used to them barely eating lunch on Tuesdays and would just put their leftovers out as an after-school snack, but I know I'm going to be a mess when lunch becomes a daily thing next year.

And - Yes! With the unhealthy snacks! Our preschool offers a weekly rotation of Saltines, graham crackers, pretzels, Cheez-its(!),and challah at snacktime, which comes only 90 minutes before a noon lunchtime. On most non-school days my kids don't even eat a midmorning snack, and on most school days I won't bother offering lunch before 1:00 because I know they carbed up at snacktime. I guess I shouldn't be surprised that they barely eat lunch at school...

[Chelle]

He probably makes the choice to eat hot lunch, because it looks appealing on that day. He won't commit to it because some days, it's not appealing. Plus if he decides he doesn't want it, he has a backup in his lunch box. This seems really sensible for a kid working out how to get what he wants and live in a consequence free environment... ( that wasn't meant in a snarky way.)

Maybe try getting the hot lunch schedule and have him pick the days he likes what he sees on the menu? The days he's not interested then pack him a lunch.

He should know that it's bad to waste food. I'm not sure how you teach that, my baby is only 5 months old, we haven't gotten to food yet.

[Rayne of Terror]

We get a monthly hot lunch calender that I keep on the fridge. In the morning we consult the menu and decide, hot lunch or packed lunch. That has cut down on food coming home at the end of the day. BUT - my son is in his second year at this school so he knows that when the menu says goulash, it's what we call chili mac and he likes that. Last year we didn't know what a lot of the items are. This year the school has made better choices for side dishes too, so I don't feel like I'm doing him a nutritional disservice to let him eat hot lunch like I did last year.

[Moxie]

Shanna, there are no "the night before" requests in my house! (Get off my lawn!) The kids have been required to tell me by Sunday what they want for the week for years, because I don't want any last-minute "but I really want celery instead of carrots" stuff. I am strongly predicting that when the younger one goes to all hot lunch he'll be happy as a lark. The older one eats everything I pack, so I don't mind his strange requests at all.

[Stacy]

This is slightly off topic, but still in the power struggle over lunch theme. My son just started full-day Kindergarten. I’ve been packing his lunch but allowing him to buy milk every day since at daycare, he was served milk with lunch each day and I wanted to keep that consistent since we’re not big milk drinkers at home. Our daycare provided a full lunch and two snacks so I never had to pack anything before. Anyway, even though I specify white milk on his “milk ticket” he comes home all excited because they have chocolate milk and that “he can’t help himself” (his words) and bought chocolate milk.

I’m not all that strict about what he eats, but I consider chocolate milk a once in a while treat, not an every-day item. It’s full of HFCS and he just doesn’t need that crap. So, his idea, we agreed that Thursdays would be chocolate milk day. Unfortunately, he doesn’t have the self control to choose white milk each day. It’s not enough of an issue that I’m going to contact the school, but it bothers me that his school has a “no treat” policy for birthday parties because of healthy food (not because of potential allergies, as I understand), yet they serve chocolate milk each day.

I’m not looking for answers – we’ll figure it out, even if I end up losing this battle (he is generally a very healthy eater). I’m just venting.

[Tine]

My approach is like Yasmara's up yonder. Although it's hard (every mama likes to know her kid's eating well), I try to keep food pressure on the down-low.

A slightly OT, but related, problem we had with son (then a 1st grader)...

He insisted that he wanted hot lunch every day. We had the lunch calendar at home, and we'd go over it every day. He'd get in line, buy a lunch, sit down with it....and eat nothing. Every single day. And I had NO IDEA till the end of the year, when a fellow parent (who happened to be a lunchroom volunteer) told me what he was doing. The kid had basically not eaten lunch all year, which made me want to cry. It explained why he was such a skinny minnie that year, when he'd always been a solid little guy before that. (A lesser issue in my mind was all the lunch money he'd literally thrown in the garbage -- but that irritated me too.) He never could explain why he wasn't eating his hot lunch, and why he never asked for a packed lunch.

From then on, we've packed lunch every day. He eats it. I still don't understand WTF was going on that 1st-grade year.

[SarcastiCarrie]

Stacy - I'm impressed they have milk tickets. I asked if I could make it so my child only bought milk (and white milk) and the cafeteria ladies said no. He would be able to buy hot lunch or strawberry milk (red dye!) or chocolate milk with his meal card (or fingerprint). So I could wind up with an account with no money since he'd been buying lunch and I didn't know about it. I decided then that I would send milk (in those little boxes or in a thermos) and I do send chocolate milk one day per week (usually on Friday). I get the chocolate at Costco (Kirkland brand) and the white milk is Horizon and I ordered it off of amazon for almost a dollar per little box. But I like the illusion of control.

I did contact the teacher because in my son's first days of full-day school, the lunches were coming home full (as were the lunches of other kids who were in half-day kidnergarten). There were a lot of rules at lunch, it is early (and they do morning snack), only a 20 minute period to wash hands, get lunch, get your seat, eat, clear away, and line up (in some weird separate boy-girl lines) for recess. The kids were really rushed. We worked on some things, I started sending smaller lunches, and that which is not eaten is usually devoured on the walk home.

[Katie]

@Stacy - same exact thing going on here too. Daughter just started kindergarten and we talked about choosing white milk over chocolate for the exact same reasons. She came home from school yesterday and said her teacher ordered everybody chocolate milk for the next nine weeks (the entire first quarter). Now, do I call her teacher and be a real PITA and ask that she have while milk? While all of her friends have chocolate? I'm annoyed but leaning towards the whole I can't control what she eats forever camp.

[Jennie]

I packed a lunch for my third grader the other day, and he chose to eat hot lunch instead (claiming he didn't know I'd packed a lunch). I was annoyed by the waste of both food and my 6:30am lunch-packing efforts. So, I told him that the cost of hot lunch would be coming out of his allowance. I have my kids eat lunch leftovers for afternoon snack and I tell them that they will only get treats when the previous day's lunch has been eaten. (Eat a good lunch on Monday, get a treat in your lunch on Tuesday).

My kids often claim that there "isn't enough time" to eat lunch at school. I think this gets back to the talking thing.

In the past, I have just let them buy hot lunch every day, but my daughter often comes home very hungry on days she didn't like the hot lunch choices.

Ugh. Lunch.

[Stacy]

Out of curiosity, how much does a hot lunch cost at your elementary school? Ours is $2.35. Milk alone is 50 cents. (Relatively affluent suburb of Boston for data point.)

I've always been a frugal, bring lunch from home person. I work full time and only buy lunch on special occasions if I go out with coworkers. It's really only a few times per year. I don't want to get into the habit of buying my son's lunch every day either. Maybe only once in a while if we've had a particularly frantic day and don't have time to make lunch or have food in the house, etc. I like the idea above of the kid using allowance money, but we're not doing an allowance yet.

This is all so new to me. Luckily he hasn't asked to buy lunch yet, but it has only been two weeks since he started Kindergarten.

And since the first couple of days, I've had to scale down how much food I give him. He has a very large appetite at home, but he wasn't eating very much in his packed lunch and I realized that he either doesn't have enough time, is a little nervous/talkative/etc, during lunch to eat all the food he'd eat at home. He does eat a large breakfast and dinner so I'm not worried about it. I just hate wasting food (see frugal above).

[SarcastiCarrie]

@Stacy - Student lunch is $2 and milk is 50 cents. Cash is not allowed. They can have a prepaid debit card or use their thumbprint to pay. You can send a check in or go online to add money to their account. I haven't done any of that since my kid doesn't buy lunch.

I've been bringing my lunch to work every day for 13 years (with exceptions of maybe 4x/year going out with coworkers). I'm frugal and going out is a pain and I'd be hard-pressed to get back within well over an hour...we're pretty remote from things here. So, I get it.

When I was a girl there was no such thing as hot lunch. Twice a year, the PTA did a thing where they brought in pizza, but outside of that you brought a lunch to school (or went home for lunch!!!) or if you got free lunch, you were given a sack lunch (sandwich, piece of fruit, and milk). And there was nothing other than 2% white milk offered at school. Sometimes I feel like it was simpler in the old days. Lunch was longer back then too (half hour to eat, half hour to play...nowadays it's 20 minutes for each).

[mary d]

Our son started full-day kindergarten in August. We haven't packed him a lunch yet because he was SO EXCITED to have Hot Lunch (he says it in capital letters) instead of cold lunch. I'm ok with it because it seems to be reasonably nutritious and he eats pretty much anything.

One thing his school does is their lunchtime recess is BEFORE they eat. So none of this "snarf your food [or don't eat it] so you can go outside". ALSO, they have a mandatory 5-minute quiet time at the end of lunch to ensure that the talkers get to eat as well. So far it seems to be working out ok. Something to think about, though.

@Leanne, I about died laughing at your kid saying he had no lunch. How embarrassing and enraging that must have been for you!

@Stacy and Katie, we're in the same boat -- he's getting "pink milk" most days, it seems. I think we kind of have to let it go. I hate and have always hated plain milk so I understand why they have the flavored kind. I just wish he'd have the control to not drink it. :)

[Erin]

My LO wouldn't eat any of the food provided for lunches at his daycare (and they didn't permit bring-in food except for kids with allergies/ intolerances). So I let them just load him up on snacks and decided not to care.

Am I the only one not really bothered by waste? I mean, I don't love waste or anything, but I don't feel like it's a moral imperative that a small child learn not to waste. I wouldn't force him to eat uneaten food later. We decided a long time ago that struggles over food were not our way. He's offered food. He has thank you bites. Everything else is his business, and is either eaten by someone else (his hoover of a brother, usually) or goes in the trash. I guess I'm just too used to throwing away a plate of half eaten food by my picky LO. Moreover, I, like my son and Moxie's son, would have starved to death rather than eat something I didn't want as a child. If I were in Moxie's shoes I'd probably switch him over to a hot lunch and if there were days he didn't eat, then that's that. (Or in contrast decide no hot lunch then if he didn't eat his lunchbox, then that's that.) Mine is only 3 but I don't find having him help me prepare lunch or choosing ever helps him eat more. (He also loves to bake with me and never eats more than a bite of what we make together, even cake and cookies.) So I just do it for him of things he generally eats.

I have to say I'm continually astonished that chocolate milk is provided/sold in elementary schools.

[My Kids Mom]

My sons (7 & 10) take a look at the week's menu and choose 2-3 days to eat at school and 2-3 days to bring a lunch. Then, if they don't eat everything, I hand it to them as an afternoon snack. I hate wasting food too.

[SarcastiCarrie]

@Erin - I am bothered by waste. I just am. It might be who I am. I will eat the kids' half-eaten disgusting food (canned green beans that they normally love and sometimes just reject...and I find them revolting) before I will throw it away.

We didn't always have enough to eat growing up, and it has deeply impacted me to this day (no fewer than 25 boxes of cereal in my pantry at all times...just in case we can't get to the store for a month, and I don't want to run out of food).

And since we didn't always have enough (or the right kind of) food growing up (am I the only one who sometimes ate a margarine sandwich for lunch?), it makes me irate when they don't eat (though I try very hard not to show it). They act like there will always be another meal or another snack coming down the pike! We don't argue about food, but if you don't eat it...it usually goes into the fridge and becomes your next snack or meal. There are always half-filled cups of milk on the shelf too.

[Rebekah]

Aidan is totally the same way. He's very distractable and also loves to talk and so a lot of food goes uneaten. I was with him for a week during lunchtime last year (doing a school project) and I was astounded how much he didn't eat. I've started asking him to make sure he eats the perishable items, like string cheese or yogurt and whatever he doesn't eat at school is his afternoon snack. (So he has to bring back whatever he doesn't eat at school.) That way no food or money is wasted.

[Alexicographer]

@Moxie how old are your boys? Could they pack their own lunches? If they put the work into assembling the parts, might that affect their willingness to eat them?

[MemeGRL]

@Stacy & others on chocolate milk: I "caved" on it and allowed my son to choose it (they pick for the year in K here--I pay $36 in Sept. and he gets milk daily of the kind you sign up for). The main reason I did is that the kids think the white milk tastes funny. Not funny-spoiled, just not good. And they love milk at home. I have tried sending our milk to school but inevitably some spills and ends up ruining the lunchbox or school bag, and two library books later, I'm not doing that again. So I explained to the boys: our rule has always been "no more than one chocolate milk a day;" this is it. They are fine with that. And I also explain: this is dessert. It will be a rare, rare day that you find a sweet in your lunch, knowing you are getting sugar and chocolate in your milk. That makes sense to them too. And I am grateful that our school removed pink milk two years ago.

@Moxie: my son is a gabber too, and I have learned over the years: no sandwiches. All snacks and things that are easy to eat. Because he cannot wait to get to the playground. Whoever said their school does recess first: I LOVE that. Excellent solution. Thanks!

[Lisa]

On the waste issue.... I have always felt the same, it's wastefull to simply throw away good food, so I'd eat it, or make an issue about my kids eating it.

Then a friend gave me a lightbulb moment. She said "if you don't really want it, and you eat it, it's still a waste". Which made sense to me. My body doesn't want or need that extra food, so it's still getting wasted in the big picture.

Food is fuel, and is also to be enjoyed. Forcing down food you don't want or need doesn't fulfill either of these purposes.

And I could talk for hours about lunch! ugh!

[Cori]

My son was blissfully unaware of the existence of chocolate milk until he started buying hot lunch at his public Pre-K. Schools that receive federal funds for free and reduced lunch programs are actually required to offer chocolate milk as an option. (I have no idea why!) Our district, San Francisco, had their funds witheld for a while for not offering it. They eventually found a local supplier who would make it without HFCS. We are a high poverty district with more than 50% of the kids qualifying free/reduced lunch so it is really important to get those funds. In my son's school about 2/3 of students are eligible for free or reduced lunch so I guess teachers get into the habit of just sending everyone through the line. Those of us who do pay spend $3/day for lunch and milk. I actually think it's an OK deal. My kid doesn't eat much of what I pack in a lunchbox and likely doesn't eat much of the hot lunch either. But at least it's effortless for me, and I don't have to see the waste.

[JMom]

I'm pretty resigned to throwing food out. Not saying I support wasting food because of course not. But, as a person who has fought weight my whole life and was "encouraged" to finish the food I was given, yeah not good. My young man is 5 and he inherited the weight thing. If he does not clean up all his food, it gets thrown away. No problem.

[Leah]

My kid will eat anything and more, I'm actually surprised she hasn't started asking to eat the lunch I pack AND the hot lunch. That said, the lunch transition to kindergarten is one reason i'm super glad my kids only think of milk as now and then and drink water 90% of the time. So much chocolate and strawberry! Ack

[crescentgirl]

Just for comparison: My son, a 3rd grader, is terrified of getting hot lunch. Anxiety disorder, possibly, but he doesn't want to look different, and he says there's no time to eat if you stand in the hot lunch line. So for the fourth year in a row, he will take a cold lunch every single day, and it must not deviate: peanut butter and honey sandwich on wheat; capri sun drink. Won't eat anything else I pack, nutritious, sweet, etc. Will eat the sandwich and juice and brings home his trash so I can see exactly what he ate/didn't.

Our goal is for him to buy a milk from the cafeteria before he graduates to 5th grade. I don't care what flavor. :)

My younger son has allergies, to corn specifically, so he MUST be a cold lunch packer, when the day comes ... so I'm getting good practice, I guess.

I found everyone's comments valuable. I tend to be a "eat the leftovers as your next snack" type but ease off that when I'm feeling relaxed. I grew up in a food-tense house so it's not easy to let the kids be in total control!! Working toward that.

[Maria]

OH my god the lunch thing. My daughter (2nd grade) is not a big eater anyway (as in, I didn't know they could live on AIR). She brought her lunch home virtually untouched every day last year.

This year I mandated that she plans and packs her lunch, in the hope that 1) she'd be more likely to eat it, and 2) I'd be less likely to resent it if she didn't. I told her she needs to include a fruit, a vegetable, a protein, and a grain in each lunch, and I made a little chart with a bunch of choices in each category. I am not strictly enforcing the "one of each category" rule, but at least it's a guideline, and hopefully giving her some sense of balanced nutrition. She has usually chosen soup in a thermos so far, and still brings it back at least 2/3 full.

I have tried the finish your lunch if you're hungry after school route, and she will not eat and also be a demon spawn from hunger.

[Chris]

I have a picky older child (3rd grade) who packs lunch 4 days a week (most times 5 days) and only occasionally wants hot lunch. She gets chocolate milk in her thermos because that is what she prefers and I see no problem with it. She also gets a sandwich (peanut butter and something) and a piece of fruit or an applesauce squeeze. Maybe a sweet treat, but she only has 20 minutes to eat before their 20 minute recess and she is a major gabber. That is all the food that she can eat in 20 minutes time. She gets a small morning snack (usually trail mix or granola bar), eats a later lunch (12:50) and come homes STARVING!

I have found out that the older elementary kids get the choice of a fruit roll up with their hot lunch (for an extra 50 cents) and also they have the option to pay 75 cents for a slushie on Wednesdays. Not thrilled about that to tell the truth. I think our stance on the slushies will be that it is ok if she decides to pay for them with her allowance or does not take hot lunch that week. We are a 1 income household and I am not willing to shell out every week for something I consider a sometimes treat!

My son just started Kindergarten this year and so far is only choosing hot lunch when his sister does. He can usually packs and can finish his sandwich and most of his fruit or applesauce and gets only a half a thermos of white milk. Sometimes he barely touches his milk. He is getting used to the routine though, and I think once he does, his consumption will go up. He eats lunch 2.5 hours after school starts and has an afternoon snack. Totally opposite of his sister and it royally screws up diner time!

Anything left in lunches that is not spoiled or smashed gets saved and eaten for snack or repacked the next day. The waste drives me nuts!!

[Laura]

What about taking your son to volunteer at a soup kitchen, Moxie, so he can see what food means to people who don't have it? That way, maybe he will choose one option (hot lunch or packed lunch), instead of having both & wasting the packed one. There's a program in Chicago where kids can volunteer to pack meals for hungry kids & I hope to take my son to do that as soon as he's five. Volunteering in a soup kitchen made a huge impression on me when I was growing up.

[DD]

My daughter's school is 80% free lunch, and they just set the lunches out on the tables before the kindergarteners come down to the cafeteria (nobody goes through the line, as far as I can tell. Kids who are buying (or getting for free) the hot lunch sit down in front of a lunch; kids who packed their lunch are all at one table.) That gives the kids more eating time. It also meant last year my daughter in pre-K really had no concept that there was any money involved in getting the school lunch and actually scammed a few free lunches for herself (to my great embarassment) just because she wanted to sit with friends at that table (bringing her packed lunch home uneaten.) So at that point realizing the hot lunch that important to her, I did send in money for her school lunch account and she buys her lunch just on pizza days (once a week.)

[ARC]

So we're a long way from this (3 years+ from K), but how does it work for kids with allergies? Are they expected at 5 to be able to sort it out on their own, does someone help them look out for the "bad" ingredients, or do we just pack lunch for them every single day?

Just thinking about this gives me the willies.

[Jilly]

I just pack less. He's hungry but he chats and then wants time to play. Hunger gets just just satisfied and then play wins, So I give him less, and no fussy items (no utensils) . He gets a morning tea at recess and then lunch and at aftercare if he goes. So he eats several small snacks throughout the day. If I think about it, he was never a huge lunch eater at home, more of a grazer, so It's probably not realistic to expect him to eat bigger amounts now.

[Wilhelmina]

@ ARC my 3.5 year old DD is severely allergic, as I've often said here, and it's a given as in the rule of the school that I supply all her food. The lunches are all brought in from home anyway for anyone and may contain no nuts or seeds, or chocolate or crisps( chips). And a strict no sharing rule.

But the school provides fruit for breaks and cow milk in the morning and there are treats too occasionally. And birthday cakes. And class parties.

I get the menu beforehand and replicate it in dairy- egg- peanut- chili pepper family- strawberry- and annatto- free fare.

The school seats her at the end of the long table and with a member of staff next to her.

I do think that in practice it's easiest to bring your own food in. Catering is a menace for allergies in the sense that they may make the same dish without dairy one day and get a good offer on milk the next and put it in. Sharing lunch boxes and trading is not good either.

I sorted it all out with the school before she started, and then fine tuned it as we went along.

My DD is at the moment handing back/ not eating all meals. Really. She requests the food, specifically, and then asks politely to put it in the bin please.

I'm not a believer in making her clear her plate or making her eat what she asked for but the wanton waste does upset me. As does the having to make the from scratch non allergenic dishes and then having them rejected.Even if politely. It's not a good feeling.

I just give the lunch after school, as in if she wants something, and don't allow snacks after dinner or top-ups after she refuses a meal. But daddy does. He's not around much at all though, so that could be why. Sleep is all to heck with four nightly wakings. So she does not eat and does not sleep and I am a bewildered zombie.

But! It's a breeze from the allergic perspective. No food is no reaction.

[Chris]

@ARC at my kids' school all the kids with allergies have their own table in the lunch room. I am not sure that is really enough as the children are not given any time to wash their hands after lunch so the majority of the children who do not have allergies are walking around school touching things with their allergen laden hands. Far as I know there hasn't been a problem yet, but I feel for the parents of kids with allergies.

Luckily for my peanut butter addicted children they have not been in a peanut or tree nut free/allergy classroom. Not sure what they would eat for snack time!

[Slim]

Our school district has been tweaking meals for the past few years in an effort to get the right balance of what the students will eat and what's nutritionally ideal (for some statistically normative child). So in addition to the whole eating weirdness that always seems to be part of the settling-in process during the first weeks of school -- which we are still in -- we also have the unfamiliar territory of the latest incarnation of school meals.
I figure I have some time before I need to try to figure anything out. Which is good, because packing lunches for summer camp wore me out. If you ask for it one day and change your mind at lunch, OK. But don't ask for it the next day.

[Elaine]

If I forced my son to eat whatever came home uneaten, I would probably have a hard time getting him to eat that food for a very long time. I might win that battle, but I'd lose the war.

I'm not sure how I'll handle this issue in 2 years when my son starts kindergarten. Getting him to eat is a hassle as it is - and my fil died of obesity so I've been trying hard to have healthy associations with food (no reward/punishment, etc.).

When I was pregnant I went to lunch at school with my then 2nd grade niece and sat with she and her friends in the cafeteria. I was shocked at how little of the good stuff got eaten. Most of what the kids ate was crappy carbs full of HFCS and food dye. I made a mental note that once my child started school they'd get plenty of junk food at school, so I'd keep it out of the house.

[el-e-e]

I haven't read all the comments yet, but ARRRRRGGGHHHH, I hate it when lunch comes back uneaten. WASTEFUL!! I think my son's problem is like yours, he just gets distracted and talks too much and forgets to eat (wish *I* had that problem, frankly).

One thing I realized at some point last year was that I was packing TOO MUCH food. I rarely do an "entree" (sandwich), side, drink and dessert anymore, but I'll pick 3 of the 4.

[meggiemoo]

@crescentgirl: My DS is in Kindergarten this year and terrified to buy the hot lunch. It involves standing in line, choosing things and remembering a 4-digit pin number. This is too much for him at the moment. I'm pleased as punch, since the hot lunch menu generally looks unappetizing and unhealthy.

I've packed my kids' lunches for preschool/daycare since the beginning, so I don't mind continuing to do it. I've sat in on lunches at preschool and am often shocked by what parents send in with their kids. For those kids, maybe the hot lunch *is* more nutritious. My kids get a sandwich of some kind, 2 fruits, a yogurt or cheese and something crunchy. I don't know how some kids function all day and learn on the processed food + sugar they're eating. It's sad.

[hush]

"But the real thing that annoys me is that if he picked it, he should eat it." Sounds just like that old saying 'As you make your bed, you so you must lie in it.' But you know, in life, some choices are just meant to be revoked. Even really, really major ones - and maybe it's unfortunate (i.e. the consequence is waste), but it's a part of growth. Sometimes too much choice is paralyzing, and perhaps even leads directly to the kind of waste so many people hate. (See Barry Schwartz's "The Paradox of Choice: Why More Is Less") Maybe more families would be happier if they actively chose not to make as many choices - i.e. just take the hot lunch option. Effectively delegate the lunch choice making to someone else.

And, honestly, isn't that ok? Especially in a place where the food is good enough. Plenty of adults are not in touch with what they really want in life 100% of the time, so maybe expecting a kid to be able to accurately predict days in advance what he's going to be hungry for all week long isn't the most realistic choice ever.

Amen, @Lisa: "if you don't really want it, and you eat it, it's still a waste". Which made sense to me. My body doesn't want or need that extra food, so it's still getting wasted in the big picture...Food is fuel, and is also to be enjoyed. Forcing down food you don't want or need doesn't fulfill either of these purposes." So true!

Amen, @Alexicographer: "Could they pack their own lunches? If they put the work into assembling the parts, might that affect their willingness to eat them?" Yes! Worth a try.

[T.]

In an effort to identify as many things as possible to not stress over, I have returned to the advice our pediatrician gave me about our picky toddler. "It's your job to provide healthy food. It's his job to eat it." So I try to pack a combination of healthy choices, putting in extra non-perishables so he has a choice in case what sounded good at home does not appeal at school. Whatever doesn't get eaten is the first choice for snacks when the kids come home. Sometimes I have to throw away uneaten perishable items. But I try not to let it raise my blood pressure. The fruits and veggies get composted, and the occasional wasted half sandwich won't really break the bank. When I was packing a lunch each day for myself, there were plenty of times I either wasn't hungry for what I'd packed come lunchtime, or was too busy to eat everything I'd brought. I figure I can't expect my kids to be any different.

[Erin]

@ Lisa - Yes, exactly on food and waste. One time I forced my son to eat something he really did not want to eat and he almost vomited - I mean, he was retching. And I thought, Wow, that really really wasn't worth it. I want him to have a happy, healthy relationship to food, which I didn't have partially because my parents constantly pressured/criticized me about what I would and wouldn't eat.

(Don't get me wrong on the waste issue - as a general category, I despise waste. My husband and I are hard core reuse/recycle/ buy used everything in sight. We eat leftovers (he even eats mouldy food) and use reusable containers for the kids' lunches, etc etc.)

[meggiemoo]

My DH was forced by his parents to eat food, and he has a very messed up relationship with food. When I met him (in his 20s), he was very thin and couldn't keep weight on. He couldn't eat in restaurants around other people. He's much more healthy now, but I remind him of his childhood if he gets worked up over the kids not eating something. I would personally never force my kids to eat a particular food or a particular amount of food.

My relationship with food was pretty messed up, too (overweight mother used food = love), and I'm still working on it. I want my kids to see food as a normal thing and not think about it too much. You eat when you're hungry and move on.

[Slim]

It's my kids' job to clean out their lunch totes when they take lunch to school. My intention was to give them useful skills, but as a bonus, I am not forced to face the waste head-on. I mean, I see things in the trash, I see carrots in the compost bucket, but it's a little better this way.
Waste is bad. Losing my mind over things I cannot control is pointless, and thus another form of waste.

[Dina Rose]

Everybody has a lot of great solutions regarding the lunch/waste issue. Here's an idea about the chocolate milk that a reader of mine uses with her children: every time the children opt to turn down a treat (in this case the chocolate milk) they accrue a point. After a certain number of points they get a predetermined excursion or other desired reward. This gives kids a very small incentive (so it's not coercive) to consider how much they want the chocolate milk that day and it gives them a happy reason to decline. I've never used it but it sounds like it would work well. Teaching kids to make choices about their treats is a great lifelong habit for them to develop.

Dina
www.itsnotaboutnutrition.com