Growing Snowflowers

my kids will never not ever eat a school lunch - part deuxI know I KNOW...I'm like an old record player with the same message on repeat...blah blah blah...my kids will NOT be eating that! blah blah...do you KNOW what that is made from?...yadda yadda yadda...if you treat animals like s*#t you'll eventually end up eating s*#t!(case and point - Iowa egg recall)

you get the drift? I'm somewhat of a crunchy mumma, but in all honesty I'm just

being an educated consumer albeit a rather outspoken one with a foreign accent(yeah, that's sure to go down well!)

So...as my 5 year old gets ready to enter Kindergarten, I am readying myself to enter the world of preparing a daily lunch for her, and unless I can completely revolutionize the school lunch system in our district it's pretty bloody likely that I will be doing this for quite some years!

Where's my lovely lad Jamie Oliver when I need him!?

I've just found a cool lunch blog that is doing a survey-ey, contest-ey thing-y and here are the questions I need to answer...

1. How is back to school going for your family?

We'll we don't start until the 9th, but I'm getting hives thinking about it.

2. Is school lunch an important part of your childs day?

Even though school hasn't started, I can without reservation say that lunch, snack, even the though of food excites my child...she has the culinery passion of Nigella Lawson, the gastonomic sense of adventure of Andrew Zimmern and the attitude of Anthony Bourdain! Oh, and she LOVES LOVES LOVES Jamie Oliver. So yes, lunch is/will be important!

3.What is school lunch like at your childs school?

hmmm, I've seen the menu and it's pretty typical, but there is 'sunbutter' (almond or sunflower) offered as an alternative to the meals...but the 'meals' are pretty gross.

4.Does school lunch need to be reformed?

two words - Jamie Oliver!

5.Do you pack lunch for your kids and what do you pack?

Like I said, school has not started here yet, but I'll be sending my girls to school with Bento lunches! Lots of yummy stuff yet to be decided!

6. Do you write notes in your school lunches and what do you write?

I will, thanks for the idea!

7. What are some of your favorite lunch recipies?

Well, the girls love any kind of ASian food, even cold pad thai, so I'm hoping that some of my bentos can include 'leftovers' from the wok!

8. what are some great beverages for kids/adults?

well, water, shui, agua...thats the first choice...but for a little treat, I like the elerberry juice syrup and the blackcurrent juice syrup(Swedish Ribena) from Ikea.

9.What is a trditional food item you made even more healthy and how did you do it?

My kids do like a good PB&J sandwich, but we make ours with organic whole grain bread, almond butter and organic strawberry spread. I use sandwich cutters from 'lunchpunch' to 'cute' them up.

10. How much time should kids get to eat lunch?

I think 25-30 minutes is enough time to eat lunch, I have no idea how long they actually give??

11. What are some products you use when you pack lunch?

I want to create a waste free lunch for my kids, so having reusable utesils and not using plastic baggies will be high on my list, as well as using sandwich cutters, rice molds and nori punches for my 'bento' style lunches.

If you want to participate in this here's the link

Fed up with Lunch