Lunch rut? 5 steps to dig yourself out!

Are you in a lunch rut? Everyone loves a good sarnie. Don’t get me wrong here, there is a lot to be said for an easy peasy cheese sandwich and they often go down better than anything else. But it is nice to have something else to add into the mix; particularly if your kids are going through a fussy phase.

I sometimes find myself stuck for ideas so I went back through the last couple of months to see what we ate. I have also come up with a few tips to make lunches fun and a few new ideas.

1. Same food different approach.

If you have wraps a lot, make a quesidilla. Pasta…have spaghetti with carrot noodles (I don’t have a spiralizer I have a £5 julienne peeler that works fine). Bread? Try rye. You like what you like and that’s cool. So begin by thinking just a little outside the box.

2. Flip it around

Make your fruit dessert the star of the show and have a smaller, savoury dish. The other day I put a whole tomato in with Dex’s fruit salad to see if it would encourage him to try it. It did. (He still didn’t like it, mind. But he tried it!)

3. Picnics!

Even if it’s peeing it down. Change where you eat. Sometimes a change of scenery can encourage everyone to try something different.

4. Something hot

Anyone else forget you can have a hot dinner at lunchtime? Actually, most kids have a hot meal when they stay at school or nursery so why don’t I do it more at home? I have a recipe for a risotto that is lovely for lunch just here.

5. Make it fun.

Dips. Pictures. Colour. Sharing plates. A bit of something new with the yummy and familiar. Houmous and grapes, rainbow rice, sharing a massive fruit salad by dipping it in yoghurt or melted choc. Wrap your leftovers up in a little puff pastry or use a cookie cutter to make something looks cool. This sausage and mash took 30 seconds longer than usual and I’m NO artist!

You know all this. But sometimes it’s good to remind yourself you can break out of the crusty box.

Hope it helps!
Faye xx