The Bento Box
I’m doing more to reduce waste while promoting better health! I ordered a Bento Box from Pottery Barn Kids to put in my daughter’s canvas lunch box. The Bento Box has segregated cubicles to separate food with a self-sealing lid, eliminating the need for lunch bags that go to the landfill after one use. Small tubberware is also an option, but it may be challenging to find small plastic containers that don’t contain BPA; a chemical that leaches into food. The Bento Box is BPA free.
The Bento Box may help parents to plan healthier lunches. There are 5 wells for dairy, protein, grains, fruit and vegetables. After filling the Bento, you can do a visual check to make sure you got it right. Consistently seeing the food groups together teaches children how to choose balanced meals without even noticing it. Contrary to popular belief, dessert is not part of a balanced lunch. It is a bad habit to serve dessert with meals, or even after. Three pm, or whatever time a child gets home from school is a more appropriate time for treats. These should be served after a health snack, not instead of a snack. (I digress… over consumption of dessert will be a topic for a future blog; back to lunch…). If you are thinking that a Bento is not really necessary because most of the food in your child’s school lunch comes individually wrapped, then you are probably serving a large helping of sugar, salt, hydrogenated oils and artificial colors. Pre-packaged foods are generally the lowest quality foods even if they have health advertisements all over them. I ask my daughter to help pack her lunch. The Bento Box pictured is typical of what we pack for preschool (honeydew melon cubes, garbanzo beans, corn, whole wheat bagel and gouda cheese slices). The other day she looked in the box before we left and noticed there where 2 wells with fruit and the vegetables were missing. It works!
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kay, I can’t help but make a few more comments on school lunch dessert. Dessert is not a food group. No child should open their lunchbox and say, ‘my parent’s forgot the candy.’ Asking your child to eat the dessert last is not a great lesson. You are basically segregating all food into desirable and requirement, only there is no incentive to eat growing food first because they already have the dessert. It also turns sugar into a bribe or reward. Using food is a dysfunctional eating habit. You are teaching life sessions, even when packing food and you don’t want to be sending the wrong messages in their lunchbox.
