10 Thermos Ideas For a Healthy Lunch

Some of you have kids that actually bring home their lunch bags and containers.  You have a great opportunity to send hot or cold items in a thermos, and suddenly there are so many more options for your kids to take a healthy lunch.  Here are some foods we enjoy for lunch, that would be great to take in a thermos:

1. Pasta Salad: This is my favorite lunch time meal!  We use:
2. Yogurt: Who likes warm, soupy yogurt? Not me! Keep some homemade yogurt, or low sugar yogurt in a thermos to keep it cold.
3. Smoothies: Green smoothies don’t need to be just for breakfast.  Pour some in your thermos and keep it cold in an insulated bag.  Just needs a little shaking before lunch and then drink.  We use:
4. Juices: One thing we are going to start doing more of is juicing! We’ve got recipes for all kinds of fruit and vegetable juices that I would love to send to school. It would be a great mid-day pick-me-up to get some quickly absorbable nutrients.  For starters, try a blend of:
5. Hot Cereal: Send oatmeal to school!  Also try other hot cereals like cream of rice, or cream of wheat.
6. Soup : Chicken noodle soup, triple bean soup, tomato soup, broccoli soup, creamy potato soup, black bean soup, chili etc.  For chili we use:
7. Swiss Muesli:   The night before, assemble ingredients for Swiss Muesli inside the thermos.  Place the thermos in the fridge till morning, and you will have the perfect muesli to take to school!  We like:
8. Dips: Consider sending a warm dip like artichoke dip, or a cold dip like hummus
9. Rice dishes: Chicken fried rice or Mexican rice leftover from the night before.  For An easy fried rice, we take
10. Sandwich Fillings: Send some bread or a bun on the side, then fill the thermos with Sloppy Joe (warm), Chicken salad (cold), egg salad(cold).  For a quick chicken salad we combine:

I have a lunch inspired giveaway today, thanks to Annie’s Homegrown , Stonyfield YoKids , Honest Kids , and Seventh Generation . They are encouraging less waste by offering a free Kids Konserve lunch sack with the purchase of participating products today through September 30, 2011.  Check out the Kids Konserve website as they have eco friendly products for taking food to school, including a thermos!   

I have 5 lunch sacks to giveaway that include a free coupon for each of the products pictured.  Leave me a comment on whether you send a thermos to school for your kids and you’ll be entered.  I’ll choose 5 winners on Friday (August 26th)