The Green Lunch Bag

Hot Dog Buns to The Rescue

Lazy eco Mom helpful hint. Next time you have a drink spill at the park, reach for the omnipresent discarded hot dog bun. These scrappy little blobs of bread really do the trick and no need to use a fresh paper towel?! Crisis averted, trees saved.

 

'Hungry Like The Wolf' - Spanakopita Triangles

Sure these spanakopita triangles were designed as the classic 80's cocktail party finger food but why let adults steal all the fun?

These tasty little spinach & feta treats are fun to make with your kids and their little triangle shapes pack well for lunch.  Kids love the crisp buttery crunch of the phyllo dough so much that they forget they are eating spinach & feta.

I used this recipe from epicurious but added a sauteed leek to the spinach feta mixture for flavor and texture. Since I was packing these spanakopita for lunch I baked mine extra crispy and used a minimal amount of butter so that they were not oily. I made a quick dipping sauce of yogurt, chopped dill, lemon and honey. I think my son would have rather I left the dill out, maybe just honey & lemon for the kids.

So when your kids are 'hungry like the wolf' let them party on at the playground with the classic spinach triangle.

When Life Deals You Black Bananas. Make Banana Bread.

Yumm. Who doesn't love a tasty moist slice of banana bread?! Banana bread is a quick yummy homemade treat for the kids lunch box and a wonderful way to recycle those over-ripe black bananas that I always seem to have in my fruit basket.

I've made this recipe many times and it's pretty forgiving if you're up to making it with your kids. Always moist and always a hit.

Banana Bread - makes 1 large loaf

1 stick of unsalted butter at room temperature
1 cup of sugar
2 eggs

1 and 1/2 cups of unbleached all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon of baking soda
1 teaspoon of salt

1 cup of mashed over-ripe bananas
1/2 cup of plain or vanilla yougurt (non fat works fine as well)
1 teaspoon of vanilla extract

1/2 cup of chopped nuts (walnuts or pecans)

Preheat oven to 350ºF
Butter 9"X5"X3" loaf pan
Using electric mixer, cream butter & sugar well. Add the eggs and beat well.
In a seperate bowl combine all of the dry ingredients and then combine with the butter mixture and blend well. Add the bananas, yogurt and vanilla stir well. Stir in the chopped nuts and pour into loaf pan.
Bake for 1 hour, until a cake tester comes out clean. Wait until cooled to slice.

 

Help Hungry Local Kids

  
Happy Thanksgiving! Please help local families put food on their table this Holiday Season.

• Did you know that 1 in 4 children in San Francisco do not have access to enough food to meet their nutritional needs on a regular basis?
• In San Francisco, 150,000 people struggle each day to feed themselves and their families.
• $22,880 is the income cutoff for Food Stamps for a family of three. That’s not even half of what it actually costs in San Francisco to raise a family.

Please donate to your local Food Bank this holiday season. Visit Feeding America to find a local food bank near you.

The Feel Better Blueberry Smoothie

Help! Everyone around me is sick. Including my two year old who has a cold and has lost his appetite. I challenge that lost appetite to a berry smoothie!

Smoothies are a great way to get food into a kid that needs to eat but isn't eating. High in nutrients, cool on the throat, easy on the stomach and disguised as a sweet treat - smoothies are the perfect meal for a sick kid.

Whipping up a smoothie in the blender is easy. For me, the hardest part is hoisting the blender off the top shelf in my kitchen. To make the pictured blueberry smoothie I combined equal parts: Frozen organic blueberries, organic vanilla yogurt and 1/2 a banana. Of course it's a smoothie so you can add whatever combination of fruit or fruit juice plus yogurt that you like.

For the stomach flu, aka the runs, our pediatrician recommends a smoothie made of rice milk, banana and a spoonful of peanut butter. Sounds pretty tasty to me.

Trader Joe's: Top 10 List for Kids

Trader Joe's. It's a great place to buy affordable, tasty and healthy foods, and in today's economic climate TJ's is a destination for the green lunch bag shopper.

Trader Joe's is a funny store. It's the party shoppers trifecta -  low cost booze, cheeses galore and more dips than the Dow. But if you're feeding  kids you might find yourself wandering the aisles with a cart full of Trader Jose's habanero salsa and 'two buck chuck' wondering what to throw in for anyone under 12 years old. So here's my shopping list of Top 10 favorite Trader Joe's kids items.

1. Whole wheat mini bagels -  No preservatives or added sugar and it's a great snack size.
2. Hummus - Mild flavor & consistency, perfect for kids.
3. Bratwurst  - Tasty and a great alternative to hot dogs.
4. Almond, pistachio & tart cherry trek mix -  A trek mix without chocolate!
5. Frozen lemonade - Winner of uncle Lee's taste test and it sells out fast.
6. Frozen thin crust pizza (3 or 4 cheese) - This pizza is made in Italy, need I say more.
7. Frozen jasmine rice - Fluffy, microwavable rice for when you just don't have the time.
8. Frozen mahi-mahi - Grill it, steam it, bake it. A great fish for kids and always a bargain at TJ's.
9. Frozen cod sticks - Zero trans fat, no preservatives.
10. Frozen pork pot stickers - Steamed pot stickers are a great lunch item for the thermos container.

I'm sure there are more great Trader Joe's finds. Please feel free to post your favorites

Kids Love Pumpkin Pie... Ravioli!

Halloween may be over but pumpkins are still in season... in ravioli that is!  If you're a local San Franciscan, swing by Lucca Ravioli Company on Valencia street for a box of delicious house made pumpkin ravioli. Lucca has been making ravioli at their Valencia street location for over 80 years plus they have their own parking lot which is an added bonus for busy Moms. For my friends and family in Philadelphia, Di Bruno Bros. near Rittenhouse Square carries pumpkin ravioli.

Pumpkin ravioli sounds exotic but don't be fooled, it's a great dish for kids! It's easy to prepare, they love it and it's chock full of vitamins  A, C and K.

I told my sons they were eating pumpkin pie pasta for dinner and they gobbled it up. Pumpkin ravioli is extremely easy to prepare - toss cooked ravioli with a simple butter sauce. I suggest a melted browned butter with sage leaves that have been cooked to a crisp in the hot butter with salt to taste.
 

Get a Grip on Mealtime

Teaching little barbarians the art and skill of civilized eating is a tiring, messy and sometimes dangerous process - a skill so hard to grasp that it may take years and in some known cases, decades to perfect. Luckily, the folks at SkipHop have just released "Mate", a stay-put mat & plate system that brings civility and perhaps a bit of safety to family mealtime with a toddler.

The SkipHop Mate is a fork, spoon and plate that attach to a skid resistant rubber place mat. Mate is painfully adorable and thoughtfully designed by top designer Scott Henderson, a classmate and friend of mine from Philadelphia's UArts '88.

I put SkipHop's Mate to the test with my two year old Zane, a novice eater that currently enjoys throwing food and plates.  First off - the large rubber place mat with the hidden smiley face really is skid-resistant – no flying plates! Secondly, the interior food plate is manufactured out of polypropylene, a food safe material and is divided into 3 sections so fussy eaters won't freak if their peas touch their cheese chunks. Lastly - Zane's favorite feature - the little fork & spoon each have their own docking stations! While using the Mate at mealtime Zane used his utensils, sat still longer, ate more food and minimized the need for air traffic control. Little barbarians - your days are numbered.

Con-Vanka... Maybe Not Fresh?

Overworked cash strapped office workers prepare yourselves! Ivanka Trump has got a plastic tub of cheap highly processed lunch grub just for you! That's right folks - businesswoman and reality TV hostess Ivanka Trump has teamed up with Conagra, the titan of processed foods, to bring us the gift of not having to not leave our work stations for a 'healthy fresh lunch'.

Who wants to eat a home made fresh veggie salad for lunch or a freshly made sandwich with a bowl of fresh fruit? No. Not office workers?! Now you can reach into your filing cabinet and pull out last year's P&L statement along with a $3.49 plastic tub of Szechwan Beef "Fresh Mixers by Healthy Choice" shuffle over to the microwave and voila. You've got yourself a steaming bowl of highly processed foodstuffs to chow down on at your desk. 

Wow. High-fives to Conagra and Ivanka for redefining the word "fresh" in the food industry. Because to most folks any fresh food kept in your desk drawer for over a year would be called... ROTTEN but these guys have figured out how to engineer enough chemicals and preservatives into factory farmed meat and GMO filled veggies that "fresh" has a whole new meaning as does healthy. Again. Kudos 'Con-Vanka' for bringing Americans more cheap processed food labeled fresh and healthy. That's just what Americans need right now.  Oh and great job on adding more single use disposable plastic tubs into the food chain. More landfill. You guys are genius!

Kids' Vote Declares Best Apple of 2008

A first graders lesson on apples - from seed to taste test. Part biology, part cooking, part food critique and a little math. 

My son's teacher, Ms. Smith, gave a wonderful lesson to her first grade class on apples. The children learned about the biology of a fruit tree, the path from harvest to market, varietal differences, cooking (they made applesauce) and my favorite, the blind taste test. Ms Smith's class favorite... the Golden Delicious by a landslide!