Posts Tagged ‘Valentine’s Day’
All you need is love bentos
Posted on: February 4, 2013
- In: allergy friendly | bento | casein free | dairy free | eating local | eco-friendly | egg free | engine 2 diet | Foods | kids | lunchbox | meatless | no waste lunch | nut free | obento | organic | plant based | plant strong | raw food | school lunch | snacks | soy free | toddler food | toddler lunch | Valentine | Vegan | Vegetarian | whole food | yum
- 9 Comments
Oh, brand new Planetbox, how we love thee! Anything that makes my life a little more organized with less thinking is for me!
I decided to start a couple weeks out from Valentine’s Day to get some ideas cooking. I love pastry/cookie cutters for preschool lunches. They make perfect bite sized goodness, and then kids have to fill up on fruits and vegetables. Muhaha! Sneaky mom! The sandwiches are Justin’s Almond Butter with small pieces of fresh strawberries inside. A few raspberries are in with the mini sammies. To the left are orange slices with grape tomatoes stuck in between. In the top left compartment are carrot and celery sticks and the treat in the center is a Hail Merry brand raw vegan vanilla coconut macaroon. The top row of tiny heart silicone cups are filled with blueberries and dried apricot hearts. Yum! This lunch is for my 4 year old packed in her Planetbox stainless lunchbox.
Miss A (3 years old) has her hearts lunch in our new LunchBots Trio. In the left compartment are raspberries and strawberries. At the top are blueberries and carrot sticks and in the bottom compartment are the same mini heart love sandwiches.
Please click on each photo to see what I used to make this lunch:
Q is for Quail
Posted on: February 21, 2012
- In: bento | Foods | kids | Valentine | Vegan | Vegitarian
- 11 Comments
I had all the right intentions. Last week was “P” week at the kids’ school. I thought I’d be proactive and ask Miss G what she wanted for her “Q” lunch. The only thing she could come up with was quail so it was decided. All good if NEXT week wasn’t “Q” week, and this week is a review. So much for planning!
So a quail it is on whole grain flat bread with a carrot leg, almond butter & jam inside in a stainless LunchBots container. The 3 baby quails following behind are watermelon chunks. The pink bunny container has mini carrots, the orange sauce container has dip for the carrots and the pink muffin cup has raspberries, blueberries and a big strawberry.
Miss A has a heart shaped flatbread sandwich with almond butter and jam. Underneath it in the squirrel cup are cashews. On the left side are watermelon flowers and heart shaped strawberries below. Both girls have ice water in their kids CamelBak water bottles.
Hummus and fruit lunch
Posted on: February 16, 2012
- In: bento | Foods | Holidays | kids | Valentine | Vegan | Vegitarian
- 6 Comments
After a week or so of elaborate lunches, the girls get something simple. Mom is just plain tired! They both had hummus cups with heart sprinkles in them for fun with braided whole grain pretzel sticks. Miss G’s Easy Lunch Box has mango and plum skewers on the left, heart shaped strawberries and a clementine orange with a bunny pick.
Little Miss A had the same hummus cup with sliced strawberries in the pink cup and in the pink heart container are small plum and mango chunks. Her lunch is in a Crocodile Creek sandwich container. Both girls had ice water with their lunch.
- In: bento | Foods | Holidays | kids | Valentine | Vegan | Vegitarian
- 6 Comments
Happy Valentine’s Day! It was a very long night in the kitchen last night for me. I decided to make a special dinner for the family…which the kids hated and wouldn’t eat. Sound familiar? I wanted to make red pasta for them. I bought a bunch of beets at the local market. I washed, peeled and grated them. Then I cooked them in a small amount of coconut oil and minced garlic. I added them to cooked pasta with some of the pasta water & stirred until the color bled into all the pasta. I left the shredded beets in the pasta. Next time for the kids, I’ll probably remove them & eat separately. I also made a cream sauce with coconut milk, Daiya “cheese” and garlic that was easy & tasty.
I also made purple cauliflower sauteed and carmelized which the kids also didn’t like. At least my husband and I liked it and the kids did try it!
The next project was rice krispie treats for Miss G’s class.
And last and certainly not least were the lunches. My husband even got a special lunch today in his new Easy Lunch Box container. A spinach salad with cherry tomatoes and cucumbers. Raspberries and heart shaped strawberries are in the top right and the bottom right was the leftover beet pasta with garlic.
Little G had to have Cupid explained to her. It is sort of funny to tell her why a fat baby shoots arrows at people. She thought it was silly. Cupid is on whole grain bread with Biscoff spread (thanks Keeley McGuire Blog for the tip) and jam. I used the leftover beet pasta for the hair even though she won’t eat it. Above is a heart container with a tiny bit of dip in it for the carrots. The bow is made of fruit leather and the pick is the arrow. On the top right are picks of raspberries and a strawberry. On the bottom right at the bottom are mini carrots, a heart shaped plum, kissing strawberry birds, a strawberry heart and a heart shaped mango in her Easy Lunch Box.
Little A had her mini version of cupid. She barely ever gets picks. She just turned 2 so very often I find objects in her mouth just for fun. Cupid has a bow and no hair on her version with a fruit leather bow and carrot arrow. Above in her LunchBots container are strawberries, a plum and a mango heart. Both girls have ice water with their lunches.
Peekaboo Hearts
Posted on: February 13, 2012
- In: bento | Foods | Holidays | kids | Valentine | Vegan | Vegitarian
- 2 Comments
Late last week I ordered some new lunchboxes. Many of my friends and the majority of my bento blogger friends use Easy Lunch Boxes. I wanted to see what all the raves were about. They are already compartmentalized which is nice. I didn’t have to use an additional container to keep fruits and veggies from making bread or other dry foods soggy. I was also surprised at the thickness of the plastic. Most of us have those Ziploc throw away containers which get banged up pretty easily and dented, and these are much higher quality and incredibly durable. The best part for me as a mom is that they are super affordable and made of the type of plastic that doesn’t leach chemicals into our little ones’ foods. They are BPA free, reusable and have different fun colored lids. They are the perfect size for about 3 years old and up. I will still use my other containers, but I think these will become a bento/lunch staple in our house! Check them out on Amazon or click here on Kelly’s website to see what they’re about: Easy Lunch Boxes
On that note, Miss G said she liked her new lunch box. She had her usual almond butter & jam on whole grain bread with the jam peeking through surrounded by small apple hearts. The purple container above had Kashi brand heart cereal and a heart shaped dried apricot. The top right compartment has a heart shaped plum, 2 strawberry hearts and a small kiwi heart. Below on the right is an apple with a smaller apple cut out and a heart shaped apricot stuff in the middle.
Miss A had the mini version of the same peekaboo hearts. In the pink container is a heart shaped plum. To the sides are heart shaped strawberries halved with heart apple pieces on top. The bottom corners have halved strawberries with heart shaped apricots on top. Both girls had ice waters with their lunches.
Arrow of Love
Posted on: February 8, 2012
- In: bento | Foods | Holidays | kids | Valentine | Vegan | Vegitarian
- 2 Comments
It’s still O week at school, but this morning was more like Uh Oh, Mommy woke up late! I guess I overdid it the day before so I’m entitled to slack, right? On the left side of the LunchBots container are 2 mango hearts and below it 2 juicy strawberries sliced in half with a dab of Nutella inbetween them. One the right are blueberry picks and a whole grain heart with jam & almond butter with a heart pick piercing it.
Miss A had the same sandwich with a mango heart, sliced strawberry and a clementine orange peeled for her.
I heart lunch!
Posted on: January 30, 2012
- In: bento | Foods | Holidays | kids | Valentine | Vegan | Vegitarian | winter
- 2 Comments
I disappeared again for a bit, I know. I had to leave town for a week or so, but I’m back again and back at the lunches too. Our family is 30 days in today to our new vegan/plant-based diet. It has taken a lot of new learning, information and recipes to get informed. I still have plenty to learn, but we feel a lot healthier already. The biggest change at home for the girls has been getting rid of cow’s milk. After taste testing many alternatives, they decided that they like almond milk the best. It has more calcium than cow’s milk and less calories which makes it an easy decision for the parents too. One in every 6 children today in the U.S. is obese, and that does not include the children who are in the overweight category. I am rededicating myself to make better choices for my family, and I hope that I can help to pass on the information to other families at the same time.
If you haven’t yet checked the brand of bread you buy, it’s an important thing to do for you and your family. Make sure that the first ingredient has the word WHOLE followed by the grain. If it says wheat, oat, enriched, unbleached, etc. it is NOT a whole grain product and has been processed and refined first. Many of the breads that I have found on sale at my local store ARE whole grain breads and affordable. Just be sure to read the label before you buy.
The girls had heart themed sandwiches and fruits today. Miss G had a heart shaped sandwich on whole wheat bread with almond butter and jam. The heart on top of the sandwich is cut out of a piece of organic raspberry fruit leather. Above the sandwich are 2 picks of blueberries, and to the bottom left of the sandwich is a “snow ball” cookie made of raw dates, almonds, raisins, walnuts and rolled in dried coconut. On the left side from top to bottom are heart shaped strawberries, heart shaped apples and a kiwi sliced in a LunchBots stainless container.
Miss A had a smaller version of the same lunch. She had a double heart sandwich on whole wheat bread with small raspberry fruit leather hearts on top.
In a separate container, she had leftover macaroni shells on the right and on the left were heart shaped strawberries and heart shaped kiwi slices. Both girls had ice water with their lunches.
