They won’t miss hot lunch with pizza wraps
My kids bring their lunch to school, but occasionally we peruse the hot lunch offerings to see if they are missing anything.
The menu is surprisingly similar to what I remember from my elementary school days: pizza, burgers, corn dogs, tacos. And yes, the kids think they’re missing out.
Despite my best efforts to expose my family to an array of foods with different textures from multiple cultures, they still think macaroni and cheese is the bomb.
To make it worse, the kids get only about 20 minutes to eat. My children don’t always have time to finish their food, and those buying hot lunch have to use part of that 20 minutes waiting in line.
In France, schoolchildren get up to an hour to eat. They also get several courses, and lunch is considered part of their education. Maybe if I had some backup in my “food training” efforts they wouldn’t get so excited about anything breaded.
So we’re sticking to cold lunch, but it isn’t easy as a parent. Lunches need to be made during the morning hustle or the evening before when, let’s be real, you’re so thankful they’re all asleep you just want to drink wine and watch Netflix, not make a meal for a day that hasn’t even happened yet.
So we have our defaults: carrot sticks, apple slices and lots of PB&J.
When I can, I mix it up with whole-grain muffins, different trail mixes, mini frittatas and lunchbox cookies.
Despite my best efforts, they still rave about little Johnny’s pizza Lunchables — which is really just little bread circles, shredded cheese, cold tomato sauce and pepperoni. Apparently, anything even moderately pizza-related earns high marks.
So I created this pizza wrap. Besides mixing up the spread, which you can do ahead of time in bigger quantities, the rest of the wrap is as easy as a sandwich.
But when sliced into cute pinwheels, they’re more fun.
The idea here is to make something that is calorie-dense (you can chew only so much in 20 minutes) and quick to eat, and if you can sneak in some extra veggies, more power to you.
Other combinations to consider, if your little ones aren’t as enraptured by pizza as mine: turkey, cheddar and guacamole; or fresh mozzarella, cucumbers, tomatoes and hummus for a vegetarian version. Customize for your family — the key is some sort of spread, veggies and protein.