Comfort Food at it's Finest

My girls love comfort food; warm, cheesy, buttery goodness.  Actually, so do I.  Really, who doesn't?!
When I got up this morning I had to pack lunches (mostly because I was a slacker last night and didn't plan very well), it was cold and the forecast called for rain; another big surprise for Oregon; and thought, "these girls need something that'll warm them from the inside out!".  I had a big bag of potatoes, lots of cheese (a staple in our house) and butter...perfect! Baked potatoes, filled with butter, cheese and sour cream on the side.   Throw in some fruit, a hard boiled egg for some extra protein and a granola bar for something extra, some organic apple juice...and viola lunch. 

This was an easy lunch to pack, but it did take a little longer to prep then a normal lunch.  I baked the potatoes in the microwave while I fed the girls breakfast, split them and topped them, the girls can heat them up at school for the perfect, filling meal.

 

For snack they both have an applesauce squeezer and a caramel rice cake.

Something's Fishy

I've got a couple sushi lovers in this house.  One would eat it every single day if I let her, and she likes the cheap sushi train sort of places, not the yummy high end restaurants.    I'm not complaining, I love sushi too.  Last nights dinner was a great combo of spaghetti and sushi (Daddy surprised us by bringing the sushi home), it was actually a really gross combination, I don't recommend it.  Ever.  Really.  I just had a shiver thinking about it.

But it makes for a great lunch!  This lunch has California Rolls, snap peas (we were out of edamame), a Little Cutie, and dessert sushi.  This stuff is really fun to make and your kids will get a kick out of it! I was out of Swedish Fish, because those things are amazing and I eat them.  All.  Normally, I would stick a swedish fish in the center of a very flat slice of rice crispy treat, then I roll it up, sushi roll style and finally roll a layer of fruit leather on the outside of all that.  These just have rice crispy treats and fruit leather, still a fun treat, minus the fish.



They both have lemonade to drink and a package of dried seaweed to round out the meal. 
For snack they have homemade granola bars and dried cherries.

Rainy Day Picnic

Lili requested pasta salad; something she never tires of; for lunch and dinner and breakfast.  (I'm not even sort of kidding.)  Which got me thinking about when I make pasta salads for other people; usually potlucks, picnics and family reunions.  I load it up with veggies and feta and it's really yummy and filling.
It didn't hurt that we had left over fried chicken, because what's a picnic without some cold, fried chicken?!  The only thing really missing was a three layer chocolate cake and I wasn't about to whip one of those up;)  And maybe deviled eggs.   Oh Yum! Now I want some.

Both girls got a couple pieces of chicken (they can heat it up at school if they want or just eat it cold), pasta salad with tomatoes, carrots, bell pepper, cucumber and feta, orange slices, string cheese and some crackers.  They both have lemonade to drink and some oatmeal cookies for dessert.

For snack they have dried mango and caramel rice cakes.

Finger Foods for Lunch

I know, I promised awesome lunches...they're coming, honestly.  I gotta ease myself back into the swing of things.   The girls were actually pretty excited about these lunches when they saw me packing them, they both said, "These look like normal kid lunches!"   You'd think I was packing them carob and gorp for lunch.

Both girls have the same lunch today!  Score one for Mom.  They each have mini corndogs; with mustard to dip in; dried blueberries, carrot sticks, a mandarin orange and a little pack of redvines (I love getting peanut free treats when Halloween and Valentines Day roll around, they're just the right size for a lunch treat.)   They also have organic milk, a homemade granola bar and some dried mango for snack.   It's not my most exciting lunch, but it'll do the trick!

As always, this lunch is packed in our easylunchbox containers.

Basic Lunches

Holy Smokes, bring back Thanksgiving Break!  I need a break from our week off...boy, did I let things slide.  Including all planning, routine and practical stuff.  I went to the grocery store this morning and I swear I walked around for an hour and left with 2 mangos, some berries, milk, a reading light, some flavored seltzer water and a pack of gum.    It never even occurred to me that I should be thinking about dinner or getting some real food to feed the people that call me Mom.

So dinner was blah and lunches tomorrow will be a little bit too.  But thank goodness I got those berries!  ;)

Gigi has a mixture of fresh berries (I knew those would come in handy), baby carrots, a cup of cream cheese and a bagel (because she only likes it if she can spread the cream cheese herself) some yellow tomatoes, a nutrigrain bar and some Junior Mints (totally Peanut Free! They rock!)...Lili has an orange instead of berries because she'll only eat berries from our garden (I have no idea why, it's the strangest food rule ever!)

They both have organic apple juice too!

For snack they have a bag of popcorn and some Stretch Island fruit leather.

But I Don't Wanna Go To School...

Anyone else have to pry kids out of bed and get them off to school this morning?  Hope they weren't as full of "I don't wanna get up" and "I wish it was still break" and "why can't we just homeschool again?"....truth be told, it was hard for me to get going this morning too. 

That included packing lunches.  I'm sure your burned out with all the cooking and cleaning and shopping from this last week and the grocery store was the last place I wanted to go.  Thank Heavens for leftover veggie trays and fruit trays or my kiddos would be living off of canned fruit and veg for the next day or two!

This lunch is a mix up of all the appetizers present at Thanksgiving dinner...I love a fridge full of appies.  In fact, I could eat nothing but bite size snacks for the rest of my life and be totally content.  Hmmm...this is giving me ideas for dinner tonight;)

This lunch has baby carrots, watermelon, slices of cheddar cheese and summer sausage, a selection of crackers and a couple gingerbread cookies.   They both have organic chocolate milk to go with lunch.

 

For snack they have homemade blueberry muffins and string cheese.

Ladies Who Lunch

Today's lunches are not for my girls, they are for "my girls".  A group of us Mom's are abandoning our motherly duties today in favor of watching 12 hours of vampires and wolves....that's right, our little town is showing all 5 Twilight movies today and we have tickets! 

I can't even believe I have signed up to watch 5 movies, in a row, from noon to midnight (really 2ish), but I am totally excited.   However, the cost of movie theatre food and the just plain grossness of it (who needs a nacho with neon orange cheese?!) make me a little queasy.  What's a girl to do?

Well, we get breaks between the movies.  And we get a lanyard (collectible I imagine), I'm hoping mine has the lovely Doctor on it or Edward.  Being on Team Jacob would just be creepy, I could be his mother!   We can also come and go as we please, so I have packed us lunch!  At least one meal will be relatively good for us.

Secelia doesn't like veggies (it's hard to believe we're friends...just kidding) so she has dry Italian salami and homemade summer sausage, 3 kinds of cheeses, little pickles and whole wheat crackers, some strawberries and pineapple and a slice of Sugar Cookie Bar.  (Y'all have no idea, NO IDEA, how hard it was for me not to just pack an entire lunch of sugar bookie bars!)
Heather and I have loaded salads, strawberries and pineapples and SCB's...again, the fact that we just have a little bit is a testament to my commitment to healthyish eating!

Did you notice the little bat picks?  ;)

I've got to run to the store to buy some fancy smanshy drinks for us and some cheap candy (who are we kidding, I'm totally sneaking it in!)

Did You Vote?

I'm a day late on this lunch, but all of America has the beautiful right to vote, so today we are celebrating Democracy and hoping it worked out the way you wanted it to.   The girls' school voted and Romney won by a landslide (which is a surprise being we're in Oregon), but they've been learning all about the 6 main political parties so I'm pleased with their turnout;)  Apparently there was a vote for Mommy, one for Daddy and one for Lauren?  Guess those kindergartners didn't understand exactly what this voting was about, or they weren't happy with their two choices...who could blame them!

This lunch is red and blue, I wish I'd thought about it before tonight and found an elephant and donkey cutter...that would have put this lunch over the top! 
 Both girls have white cheddar stars, salami stars, cucumber stars and carrot strips, cheese it like crackers, organic cut pear cups, and a couple of chocolate chip cookies.  Both girls are taking an organic chocolate milk.

Snack is freeze dried pineapple (this stuff is amazing!) and a homemade granola bar.

A True Bento

This lunch looks a lot more like a traditional bento lunch would look, if GiGi and LiLi were little school girls in Japan;)   They both love fish, so when I make it for dinner I always make extras...my girls can't get enough of this good for you, brain food!

Lunch today has some baked salmon, white rice with sesame seeds, dried seaweed sheets, cucumber slices (I wanted to make cucumber salad but ran out of time), sliced permission and juice.   If you haven't tried dried seaweed you should check it out...it has a crunchy, salty taste and it's full of nutrients!

Field Trip Lunches

LiLi and I are headed to The Rice Rock Museum for a field trip and I was at a huge loss when it came time for packing a lunch I'd want to eat too!  (I might be the pickiest eater in our house.)  Lucky for me LiLi is game for just about anything, so I decided on a trio of salads.

1.  A nice big green salad topped with turkey, swiss, tomatoes, bell peppers, cucumbers, radishes, topped with a little green goddess dressing! Yum!  
2.  Pasta salad filled with loads of veggies and topped with cheddar cheese and Italian dressing.  Enjoy!
2.  Fruit salad; grapes, cantaloupe and strawberries....Delish!  (I got the fruit salad, LiLi got plain grapes)

I've thrown in tons of extras too, because who knows what we'll feel like eating.  We have fruit leather, granola bars, kettle corn, freeze dried strawberries, cheese crackers and some corn candy as a treat.  We both get a bottle of water for the day.

Grace is taking a similar lunch, but she doesn't like pasta salad so she has some fresh mushrooms instead.

Lunch for Mom

I'm going to be at school all day today and a Mom's got to eat too! It got me thinking about all of you who work outside the home too, what do you do every day for lunch?  Every once in a while I'll be featuring some lunches for the older set.

Lunch for this Mom almost always includes a salad. I LOVE salads!  It's a sickness, sort of, because it's sort of healthy. 
My salad today is piled high with all sorts of goodies.  Swiss cheese, tomatoes, cucumber, turkey, orange bell pepper.  I have a little container of vinigrette to top it with.  I threw in a couple of whole wheat crackers, a few starburst (because I like a little sweet too) and some freeze dried strawberries. 

I'm having a hard time waiting till lunch to eat this!  Just knowing it's in the fridge waiting for me is making me a little bit crazy and hungry!

Black Cat and Pumpkins

It's official, we go to school in the dark and come home just in time for sunset.  I'm tired.  All of the time.  I forgot how Fall in the North West takes some adjusting too.  (Every year)   I'm loving the Autumn colors, the cozy sweaters and the warm roasts (I seem to be roasting something every day).  
Being cozy seems to also be making me forgetful...I need to remember to see if there is some study about the correlation.   I forgot lunches, until I was in bed and just about to fall asleep.   I knew my brain would never shut off so out of bed I climbed, down to the kitchen...I made lunch by the light of the fridge, it was sort of romantic. 

Both girls got ham roll ups, scary cat carrots, a mandarin orange, school days apple granola bar (these are made in a peanut free facility!), Stretch Island apple fruit leather, whole wheat crackers, scary cat colby jack cheese slices, and some Halloween marshmallows.  They both have organic vanilla milk.

For snack they have dried strawberries and a caramel rice cake.

Make Dinner Work Twice as Hard

I'll admit it.  This might have been the easiest (laziest) lunch I've ever packed!  It took me roughly 1 minute (and that's only because I had to cut the pizza so it would fit in the container).   Oh. My. Goodness.  I live for days like this. 
We're all busy, we all have lists that never stop growing.  Why not make dinner do double duty?  Especially when it's a dinner your kiddos really dig!  (I know, this is the second appearance of pizzaish stuff this week)  My kids would eat loads of stuff left over.  Spaghetti, chicken, pizza, stir fry, salmon...the list goes on and on and it makes your life a lot easier!

Left over pizza, salad (I literally used my hands and grabbed a handful, no shame.), a pear, apple juice and a couple chocolate chip cookies. 

For snack they have apple slices and 2 raspberry Newtons.   It's 6:30 and my list is basically done (well the stuff that I can't put off at least)...looks like I get to sit on the couch and catch up on the DVR! 

A Lunch so Easy It's Scary

The girls lunch was packed in a rush last night, total surprise, right?!  Thank Heavens I keep loads of healthy options in the fridge.  The girls have a hard boiled egg; I made the spooky faces with food safe pens; a little mandarin orange, some veggie crackers, sharp cheddar pumpkins, carrot pumpkins and some grape tomatoes, and a few pumpkin peeps.  They also have a frozen yogurt tube that I threw in at the last minute (I'm obsessed with them having enough protein, but it's truly what fuels their bodies) and a box of apple juice.

 

I packed it all in my very favorite easylunchbox containers. 

For snack they both have kettle corn and fruit leather.

 

Tuesday's Lunch...Homemade Pizza Rolls

People in marketing really know how to appeal to kids, and their taste buds.  It's never made sense why kids (or adults for that matter) enjoy food filled with stuff I can't pronounce.   One thing my girls always ask to try are those little pizza rolls, the ones with the funny commercial with the kids so hungry they're delirious.  And pop tarts.  Luckily I've got a good recipe for both.

Well not so much a recipe, as a quick and easy cheat that taste great and is like a billion times better for them.  I'm a firm believer in having a good pie crust recipe because you can make all sorts of yummy things with it!  I was making an apple pie for dessert and decided to double the pie crust recipe and make some pizza rolls.  They turned out perfectly, in fact LiLi was totally fooled.  Gigi is a little less likely to just trust me when I say, "Oh yeah, it's the stuff from the commercial", apparently I've used that line too much.

Anyhoo, pizza rolls, super easy and I'm thinking they'll freeze well too!  I rolled pie crust really thin (and I used half whole wheat flour, because all really does change the flavor) and then topped it with pizza sauce, chopped pepperoni, chopped olives and cheese.  Then I used a pastry cutter to cut them into rectangles and it crimped it at the same time! 

I baked mine for about 10 minutes at 425, and then the girls can zap them in the microwave to reheat them at school.

The girls each have some pizza rolls, cucumber slices, carrot sticks, pomegranate seeds and some cookies...they also have a pear and a apple juice. 
For snack they each have a homemade granola bar and Stretch Island Fruit Leather.

The Leaves Are Turning

Bittersweet October. The mellow, messy, leaf-kicking, perfect pause between the opposing miseries of summer and winter. ~Carol Bishop Hipps

Each season is my favorite.  Really, I can see the virtues of each one.  While many joke that Oregon has two seasons; rainy and summer; I fully disagree.  I base most memories on holidays, and I celebrate them all with wild abandon.  I can tell you exactly what the weather is like on the 4th of July (It's been sunny for the last 10 years, I know because I have pictures of GiGi in sundresses every single year!), and that it usually doesn't start really raining until October 30th (again, loads of costume pictures covered up with raincoats!).  

Here, in Oregon, or in my imagination, we get 4 beautiful seasons...and for now Fall is my favorite.  Cool mornings, blue skies, orange and red leaves, raucous sunsets...that cozy smell in the air from wood stoves and warm pumpkin lattes.  What's not to love?

Anyhow, the weather has very little to do with lunches, other then when I saw this darling leaf pasta it made me think of the blanket of red, yellow, orange and brown on our lawn...and a salad loaded with veggies. 

The girls have a large serving of pasta salad, full of tomatoes, cucumbers, bell peppers, carrots, onion and broccoli...plus a healthy amount of feta.  They have watermelon cut into leaf shapes, and a side dish with some salami and organic chocolate milk...for a treat they have Halloween Pop Rocks and some marshmallows.  (I'm going for Mom of the year with the pop rocks!)

 

For snack they both have Stretch Island Fruit Leather and a homemade granola bar.

Hearty Lunch for a Cool Day

We've had a ridiculously beautiful summer and start of fall in Oregon.  I have said before (and I'll say again) "Oregon is proof that God loves us!"  If your not from here, I'm sorry and you really must visit.   The start of fall brings sunshine, red leaves, blue skies, cool nights, and lovely autumn produce.  
Today, when we left for school my car said, "Low temps"...we hadn't left the garage yet so I had no idea that it wasn't joking.  It was 36 degrees and I had sent the girls to school in nothing but a sweater and a good hearty lunch! Thank Heavens we're all in the mood for comfort foods, my lunch worked out wonderfully with this new chilly weather were having; the promise of rain by the end of the week couldn't dampen my spirits one bit!

Today's lunch has chili and cheese (they can microwave it at lunch to heat it up again), mini bell peppers, snap peas, a pear, and some oatmeal cookies. They both have organic vanilla milk to drink.

 

For snack they have homemade trail mix.  Lili may or may not be happy with this choice.

Picnic Style Lunch

It seems like I've been having "one of those days" for the last two weeks...the hustle and bustle of school, dance, piano, choir and girl scouts have caught up with me.  Then throw in my Mom needing to be picked up at the airport, lunch suffers, or does it?!

All of my normal nightly chores were packed into the 20 minutes between scouts and the airport. Lunch was the quickest and easiest of all of the tasks I had to do.  I swear, this couldn't have taken more then 2 minutes. 

This doesn't look like much, but it has protein, some carbs and a fruit and veggies...my kiddos like V8, so they have a little can of that to boost this lunch even more.  We have a great recourse for local meat, and they make this yummy pepperoni that the girls love.  It's not a traditional protein but it works and it's a fun surprise every once in a while. 

 

Both girls have pepperoni, Babybel white cheddar, crackers, orange wedges, cucumber slices and tomatoes, some chocolate wafer cookies, stretch island 100% fruit leather and a V8.  For snack they have a homemade granola bar and a little apple.

Lili's Turn

LiLi's turn.  She was a little jealous that GiGi is big enough to pack lunches (use a knife), so with some help she made these healthy little meals.   We worked on packing a lunch for a kiddo with some food allergies, hope this fits the bill. 

 

 

 

 

Lili packed some "Mystery Meat" Ghosts (Chicken breast sliced thin and puckered up a little to look like little ghosts, she added the mystery meat part, but there is absolutely no mystery!)  Mwahahaha Mushrooms (no idea how to spell her maniacal laugh), Toad Eye tomatoes, Snake Scale snap peas, Goblin Smiles (orange slices) and some candy corn and creme pumpkins made in a totally peanut free/nut free facility.  (Our little food allergy friend may not be able to have those, but his Mom can switch those out for another sweet treat.)

 

Not pictured but included are a box of organic chocolate milk and a little bag of pirates booty.

 

For snack they both have some banana bread and a little pear.

 

 

 

 

Taste Like Desperation

Last night I sat down on the couch to rest my eyes and watch "Ghost Hunters" (my other guilty pleasure) and when I stopped resting my eyes it was about 3 in the morning.  Ugh.  So I crawled into bed, never once thinking, "I haven't packed lunches, laid out clothes, added snacks, checked homework...". 
I actually didn't think about it until 7ish, when we finally headed downstairs to grab breakfast and I noticed the absence of lunches in the fridge.  That's when the sheer panic hit.  I mean, it seemed strange that I hadn't laid out clothes, but they wear uniforms so getting dressed is easy, I just overlooked it.  I started barking orders, "GiGi, your in charge of breakfast", "LiLi grab snacks for you and sis", "Brush your teeth, get shoes, grab jackets...Go, Go, Go!".  I swear that strange mix of adrenaline and stress really takes it out of a person.  We just started car pool this week, and I refuse to be the Mom who's late.  It's a problem I have, the need to always be on time (my Husband would argue that I need to be 15 minutes early), but clearly I am a person who plans (including for any traffic issues that might arise).

Thank goodness I cook for an army, and I have lunch plans for today; otherwise I'd be bummed to be sharing my lunch; so I threw left over beef stir fry into containers.  Also thankfully I keep some shelf stable snacks on hand for these sorts of emergencies so they both got premade rice krispie treats (we ate all the homemade ones last night!).  I grabbed a mandarin orange and some mini bell peppers and a bag of pretzels.  It's not really a cohesive lunch, but they love stir fry, and they love bell peppers...so hopefully they'll be happy come lunch time.

Even the picture was taken in a rush, on my cell phone....just before I tossed it into lunch bags.  Don't ask what they have for snacks, I have no idea.  Probably candy and cookies.  Where's my coffee?!