Kids’ FUNctional Lunch Guide

By Nadene Neale | | Heal with Dr. Neale

We want to make preparing healthy, functional, clean kids’ lunches as easy as throwing a Hot Pocket in the microwave and ripping open a bag of chips. Now’s the time to start getting our children on a clean, functional-eating habit!

It’s totally do-able. Take a deep breath. Seriously. You CAN DO THIS. It just requires some planning and prep. Then boom. You have a bunch of meals.

We LOVE this blog, we found some great tips on bread-free solutions and great back to school ideas: ThePaleoMom.com. Including a tip on how to talk to your kids’ teachers about eating restrictions. Go check that out!

Anything you can pick, gather, hunt in NATURE, you are good to use. PS: there are no cracker trees in existence.

Veggies ideas:

Put some hummus in bottom of empty salsa jar and place cut up carrots, celery and cucumber in there vertically on top of it.

Cut up celery and spread with ground nut butter. Place a few pieces of dried fruit (currants, raisins, cherries) on top of nut butter. (Ants on a log.)

Meal ideas:

Take a PURE WRAP and spread nut butter and fruit spread over it. Place a whole, peeled banana at top of wrap. Roll banana into the wrap and you have your meal. Cut in half or in smaller bite-size pieces and stack in lunch box.

Make a turkey wrap by spreading some hummus on a slice of turkey and add cucumber. You can add lettuce and/or tomato, too if you want!

Make bread-free sandwich with zucchini slice, hummus, meat and shredded carrots. Cut the sandwich with cookie cutter (e.g., star or circle?) to make it fun!

Snack ideas:

Make your own trail mix with raw nuts and dried fruit. No sugar or salt added, score!

Put in-season fruit together for a sweet treat!

Cut up apple and squeeze lemon over it to keep it from turning brown. Serve with nut butter for dipping.

RX bars are a treat. They’re high protein and tasty. Kids especially love the peanut butter and berries one.

Jerky has come a long way. Including, kid-focused products like The New Primal Snack Mates and Epic Meat Bites. Great go-to snack in a pinch.

Head to your local Farmer’s Market, Natural Grocers and/or Trader Joe’s.

  • Carrots
  • Celery
  • Cucumber
  • Peppers (red, yellow)
  • Hummus
  • Dried fruit
  • Raw nuts
  • In-season fruit (berries, apples)
  • RX bars
  • Nut butter (refrigerated, raw, no added sugar or salt)
  • Super-fruit spread (no sugar added at Trader Joe’s)
  • Organic sliced turkey or chicken (Natural Grocer’s)

nuhealth fruitMake your brown bag “Green” by using re-usable containers. Get a Glass bento box or get kid’s bento boxes from Amazon and they have matching bags.

Don’t forget during high-virus season: A great recipe to make is our cold/flu-busting soup. Make in a crockpot overnight and put in a thermos in the morning. Get recipe here.[/cs_text][/cs_column][/cs_row][/cs_section][/cs_content]