4 creative ways to help your kid eat a healthy lunch

Anyone with wee ones knows kids can be very choosy eaters.

Sure, it would be a lot easier to stuff anything into kids' lunch boxes. But moms and dads want kids to grow up with a balanced diet, and a willingness to explore all sorts of foods.

So how do parents prepare healthy, interesting lunches kids will eat without making it an exhausting chore? Here are a few suggestions for creative lunch ideas that will help make the lunch-making process smoother for you, and tastier for your kids.

Kids 6 to 9 years
Creative lunch idea #1: It’s a small world after all
Kids love tiny things they can wrap their hands around, and food is no exception. Sandwiches, in their many forms, are perfect for making mini.

• Remove the crusts of a peanut butter and jelly sandwich and cut it into four triangles or soldiers. Or, try using a cookie cutter to give sandwiches playful shapes.

• Tightly roll a tortilla - with egg salad, or cream cheese, lettuce and ham - and cut it into bite-sized pinwheels.

• There are endless sandwich-making options. Buy mini pitas or bagels and stuff them with sprouts, tomato, roast chicken and mayo.  Our Barbecue Chicken Sandwich with Coleslaw (image featured above) can easily translate into smaller, more interesting sandwich bites.

Creative lunch idea #2: Already small? Make it smaller
Raw fruits and vegetables are packed with vitamins and nutrients, but they don’t do any good if your child trades them at recess or throws them away. Six- to 9-year-olds can still have a tough time biting into and chewing crunchy carrots and apples, or get discouraged by celery’s stringy bits.

• Make veggies and fruit more kid-friendly. Peel oranges and segment them, remove the seeds and pack in a container.

• Pick apples such as Ambrosia, Braeburn, or Courtland which don’t brown as quickly when cut and send apple slices or sticks.

• Seedless grapes are a parent’s dream. Make a fruit salad but cut the pieces super small and add a little honey or maple syrup.

• Invest in a specialized knife, such as a Benriner or a Japanese mandolin, which retail for around $30. Several different blade options allow you to julienne veggies and hard fruits into matchsticks, or cut paper-thin strips that are easy and fun to eat in less than half the time it would take you to do it with a knife.

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