Lunchbox Ideas

Abby starts kindergarten soon (August 24th), so she'll start taking her lunch ever day. She doesn't like sandwiches, so I've been trying to think of some "sandwich alternative" ideas. We have some insulated containers, so she can take potsickers and rice, or scrambled eggs and bacon, but we need some other options.

Right now* I'm trying out two things. I have dough rising to make Portuguese Corn Bread**. My "Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day" has a recipe to use the corn bread dough to make spicy pork buns. I read through that recipe and it doesn't seem like something that Abby would like, however I'm thinking that I can use the technique to make buns that are filled with ham and cheese and maybe tomatoes or some kind of vegetable. I think that Abby would eat that and it would be a sandwich alternative.

I'm also trying to make-over my banana bread recipe. My recipe is the one that my mom always made and it comes from my aunt's neighbor. It has a lot of sugar in it, so I've tried it with an extra smashed banana and almost no sugar. I added a little bit extra flour to take the place of the bulk of the sugar. The batter tasted right,*** so will hope that the bread comes out okay. I have no idea if I need to adjust the baking time because I took the sugar out. The reason for the banana break make-over is that Abby likes banana bread and cream cheese sandwiches, and that will be a viable lunch option as long as the banana bread isn't like cake.

Finally I'm making Jell-O Jigglers with strawberries. I feel like Abby (and me) doesn't eat enough fruit and vegetables, so I thought that the jigglers would be fun to make. I have tiny flower cookie cutters that I want to use to cut them out, once the Jell-O has set.

I talked to my sister yesterday and I think that she is a homemade yogurt convert. She lives in Phoenix and is trying to figure out a way to keep her milk at 110 degrees using solar power/the heat of Phoenix. If you want to try making your own yogurt, I recommend the directions at http://www.makeyourownyogurt.com/.

Happy cooking!!!

*Literally, right now
**I don't know what makes it Portuguese--I haven't made corn bread from scratch before
***Yes, I taste things with raw eggs in them while cooking because I like to live on the edge.