56 // Picky Eating Hack for Packed Lunches
Picky Eating Hack for Packed Lunches:
THIS small mindset shift will save your sanity, extend your food budget, and reverse picky eating!
Feeling in a rut and in need of new ideas for school lunches?
Whether it is your first-time packing school lunches or you are a few weeks in and already feeling stuck, this episodes offers a simple mindset shift EVERY parent needs (myself included!). It is an easy concept to forget but also, one of the easiest shifts you can make to save your sanity, extend your food budget a bit further, and reverse picky eating tendencies that can easily occur.
Listen in to how this ONE THING can perpetuate so many solutions to other common feeding issues with kids.
Listen to this episode of The Veggies & Virtue Podcast now!
Full Episode Transcription
Please note this a raw transcription. If something doesn’t read correctly, toggle to that timestamp in the show so that you can listen in on what was actually being said!
[00:00:00] This is something I found myself doing the other day when I was packing my own kids' lunches. I shared it all my Instagram stories. And maybe you caught it, maybe you didn't, but if you didn't, I definitely wanted to take time to share it here on this episode today, because I think it can make such a huge difference.
[00:00:15] And it came up to me also because as I've been getting people signed up for the back to school bootcamp, which if you're not a part of yet, and. Wanting to make sure you sign up@veggiesandvirtue.com slash bootcamp. And it's a free three day workshop, and I'm gonna go into all the different things you need to know for back to school, coming up with different new ideas, adding in some variety, making it as low effort and minimal energy expended from you as possible.
[00:00:41] But I'm also gonna help you figure out how to. Save time and money and reduce food waste, which we'll get into in this episode specifically. But that's part of reason, the reason why the content for this episode came up to me because outside of doing it in my own life, something I heard from a lot of you who have joined the private Facebook group for the back to school bootcamp was hearing about the pickiness of your kids at lunch and how you wanna add in variety and how you want to improve pickiness.
[00:01:08] But we're kind of in this like purgatory right now, where. We want our kids to eat a certain way, but they're also out of our care during the day to eat these lunches we send. So we can send the, you know, the fresh fruits and the veggies which we talked about on Monday's episode, how to make sure that those don't go to waste with how you go about the prep step for 'em, but also how do we not elevate these other foods?
[00:01:30] How do we get them as excited about, you know, the grapes and the carrots in their bento box, as we do the. Cheese avocado sandwich or the, you know, chips or how do we keep all these foods neutral and not have one thing, obviously more exciting to them than another. And so while I talk about this a lot, I was thinking I just wanna spell out.
[00:01:53] So simply what this picky eating hack is when it comes to pack lunches, because it's something that takes such a small amount of effort. And yet it's going to save you both money and sanity, because you're going to see your kids. I. Eat better from doing this one little thing. Hey mama, I'm Ashley, and welcome to the veggies and virtue podcast.
[00:02:16] In this podcast, you will find simple menu ideas, kitchen, organizational systems, spelled out for mom life and feeding tips and tricks that are both evidence based. And grace lace. I believe that you can find flexibility when it comes to feeding your family so that you can feel calm, capable, and connected in the kitchen.
[00:02:31] As a registered dietician and Christian mom of three myself, I want you to break free from the mealtime battles and to feel equipped while feeding your kids all day long, pull up a stool at my kitchen counter. And let me pour you a cup of coffee and say a quick prayer for you. It's time to chat about the meal times messes moments and ministry of motherhood.
[00:02:52] As we kick off the back to school bootcamp next week, because this is one. Many strategies that I'm gonna be telling families who are in the back to school bootcamp. So again, make sure you're signed up www.veggiesandvirtue.com/bootcamp. It's free. It's a three day thing. We're gonna have 45 minutes of me just kind of teaching you and giving you guys three simple strategies each day.
[00:03:12] And then we'll have 15 minutes for Q and a, which people who have already preregistered in our, in the Facebook group. They'll have time to ask their questions. I'll go over those in any extra time we have at the end of the session, if people are still hanging around and have questions, I'll be happy to answer them.
[00:03:27] So we should be all in wrapped up within an hour. But I know some of you may either have to hop off prematurely because of kids or work or life. And so you will get the replay, but you just have to make sure that you are registered in order to get the live recording, but also the recordings afterwards, if you miss any portion, so that all to say the picky eating hack that I want you to really focus on for this upcoming week, as you pack school lunches, is this remove from packaging?
[00:04:00] This is something you might have heard me say before, because I feel like a broken record. How many times I've said it. And yet I think as we get back to school, we all need the reminder because I catch myself daily doing this as well. Where if you send, say like a brown bag lunch, where you're sending a lot of different individually packed items, it's a really obvious step to just include each of those items.
[00:04:21] And oftentimes they are either individually packaged or you are individually packaging them into say like a zip block or something like that. And so there's no shame in that game. If that's your family's style for packing lunches, it's going to be harder for you to remove the packaging, though. If these are the items you tend to buy, however, as I go through this, you're going to understand how you still can do it.
[00:04:43] Even if you're transitioning. To a zip lock and how it'll still save you money in doing so. But if you pack your lunch, your child's lunch in something like a bento box, it literally makes no sense to need to buy these individually packaged things. I still do. I'm not, I'm not hating on it as if it's like don't ever do this.
[00:05:02] I still do because there's plenty of foods. My family's like my family likes, I should say that. That's just how they come. And so that's how we buy. However, if I had the option to not buy the single use plastic containers for certain things that I'm just gonna put into a bento box that already has sections portioned out that, you know, have either a leakproof nature or they just have compartments in and of themselves.
[00:05:26] So they don't need packaging. I totally would. That would be my preference. And that is what I tend to try and do as much as possible. And the reason for that is a few things I want to walk you through. Why this becomes such a picky eating hack and not just like a saving money hack first and foremost, the picky eating hack to this aspect of removing foods from the packaging is the brand awareness.
[00:05:53] Any of us know if we buy literally anything, cereal, granola, bars, yogurt, fruit, snacks, crackers, anything we buy as our kids get older. If we continue to buy the same items. On repeat, which is where a lot of that, you know, what to pack rut comes from that has inspired this back to school bootcamp. We get in that rut because we buy the same things.
[00:06:16] We have a, a loyalty to a lot of these items. We know what our kids like. And so we just press reorder cart on our AGB curb side. And next thing we know, we have the exact same items restocked in our house that we had last week. And. There's an element of familiarity that is good. And it just keeps us all sane and it takes some of the guesswork out of feeding our families.
[00:06:35] And so that's okay. But my point is with the packaging is that it gives children an added layer of security. That's a false security in a way, because they're seeing the package as proof of whether or not they're familiar with the food. They're looking at the package as this is this. I know exactly what to expect in that.
[00:06:53] And there's comfort in that for kids and that's okay. However, when they learn. To only identify and accept one package of a given food. They're much less likely to want to shift or pivot or add any variety to that given item. So let me walk you through just a few examples. These are real life ones that have come up in my house.
[00:07:14] It might be something like alar bar. If my kids like the chocolate chip LA bar, which they do, and I give them the apple pie. if you are a Laura bar fan, like my family, you know, there's an obvious package. Difference. One is green. One is like beige. So if I hand my kids, the bar, they automatically know I didn't give them the one that they like.
[00:07:33] So what's their automatic reaction. Their automatic reaction is I don't like that one. I don't want that one. My kids know better. And to say, I don't like that. And they know that it'll be corrected on that, but you get my point. They're automatically going to react and. With indifference to something because it's different.
[00:07:47] It's not what they visually recognize. So when we look at the steps to eating and we look at the tolerance levels of getting a child to actually eat something, the first step to eating is visual tolerance. So if we are automatically triggering our child by showing them visually, this is different. Now we have so many more hurdles to overcome to say no, but it's just like this other one.
[00:08:09] And then we get into all this like bartering and bribing and convincing, and it becomes this whole S. That we could totally eliminate if we just removed it from the package. So shifting from the Lara bar example, because I can't send nuts to school, but something else let's say very similar. If I were going to include a certain type of peanut butter and jelly in my kids' in my kids' lunch here I am with a nut butter example again.
[00:08:34] Okay. We'll use another example. We'll say if I was going to give my kids string cheese, I'll stick with this. and we offer the exact same string cheese every time. And they know the package this has happened. This really has, if my kids know which package of string cheese we buy and I only ever offer it within the packaging.
[00:08:54] And that's like an obvious one, right? Like we don't even think to remove things from the package, but I would be curious, this would be like low hanging fruit entry to concept that you could try. If you buy string shoes in your house, you probably buy similar kinds every time. And it's like the obvious one to serve in the package.
[00:09:10] if you buy a different brand, does your child care? Because something, I work with families a lot on is what number of qualifiers does your kid have for given love at food for cheese sticks, maybe they literally don't care. They will eat any cheese stick put in front of 'em does not matter. I know for my kids, they liked one cheese stick.
[00:09:28] And as soon as I bought these other ones that were like the organic ones on sale at Costco, they're like these aren't the ones you normally. and I'm like, wow. Even that amount of packaging, like literally almost transparent packaging, something that looks the exact same. It's not even like, you know, something that is as visibly different or smells different, like a Laura bar Harrison or something that you could visibly see was different.
[00:09:50] Like they're both white cylinder, cheese sticks. And so something like, as simple as that, if you remove it from the package, it doesn't give picky eaters a chance to say that's different before they even. Then they get the opportunity to be a food Explorer and to be a scientist and to see with their other senses outside of just their eyes.
[00:10:11] If they have visually tolerated it because cheese stick to cheese stick, there's no visual difference. Glaring out of them, the way that two different packages would now they look at, does this smell the same? Does this feel the same? Does this taste the. And when they work through those steps to eating, they're more inclined to be willing to add variety to the given things that they're willing to eat.
[00:10:36] And so the reason I want you to think about this in the context of packed lunches is when it comes to even something as basic as I'm gonna say, Ritz crackers, goldfish crackers are obviously a goldfish shape. So there's kind of some brand insinuation there, whether they're. The bigger package or not, but I'll get into some other benefits, even for that example.
[00:10:57] But let's just say, we'll go with a Ritz cracker. If you buy Ritz brand, you buy store brand, you buy the back to nature brand, whatever brand you buy. They're like a little circle buttery cracker. Okay. And if your child knows them only by the Ritz box, if you buy a different box, your child may or may not care that it's, they couldn't go different cracker.
[00:11:17] However, if we are sending these Ritz crackers in a bento box, and you're just putting the circular crackers in the lunch box, they're just circle crackers now. So whatever brand you buy, your child is going to become more flexible towards the natural variations of brands and tastes and textures that come with this cracker.
[00:11:37] So now when you say my child likes sorts crackers, what you're saying, isn't just, they like only the red box of Ritz cracker that comes in the brown. Now, what you're saying is they like butter crackers. They like this type of cracker. So whether they see it on a security board, this coming Christmas at grandma's house, or they have it at their friend's house as an afternoon snack or whatever, kind of cracker it.
[00:11:57] They're more likely to accept it. They're naturally, they've already worked through some of those levels of tolerance with not just visually tolerating these things, because they're not hooked on the package, but now they tolerate so many more layers to, well, I've actually felt it I've tasted it. I've seen that there's some slight variation.
[00:12:14] So taking this a step further and talking about it from a cost saving perspective, I want you to think about it. Like. If you pack lunches again, I used the example before on a brown bag versus like a bento. If you do a brown bag and I'm gonna go back to the goldfish example, you throw the little prepackaged goldfish bag in there or in the bento box, so that it's already kind of separated and the crackers don't get soggy.
[00:12:38] You just go ahead and let's say tuck a little prepackaged bag of goldfish next to say a sandwich in the bento it's in there either way. Okay. So either way, the little bag of crackers is. And honestly, even if you take them out of the bag, they still know it's the goldfish because of the shape. Right? So there is the brand awareness there that's just implied, even if the packaging isn't there.
[00:13:00] However, another advantage I want you to think about and why this picky eating hack for pack lunches will not only help save your sanity, but also save you money is because there is no need to pay a premium for these little pre-packaged. they are convenient. Don't get me wrong. Like I said, we buy some of these too.
[00:13:18] And I do think there's a place to have some of these on hand. What I don't wanna see families do is rely on these for every item. Every day. That's included in a lunch because not only are you perpetuating some of this like brand loyalty in kids where they're so specific that they will only eat this package of this or this brand of this or this flavor of this, because they're so stuck on the packaging, but you're also paying for these foods to be perceived as more.
[00:13:44] There is a novelty aspect. And I even in like a product of this, because my kids would, or excuse me, my kids, my parents would never buy prepackaged items when I was growing up. It was always like, we put it in like a little fold over bag and I thought it was super lame and now I'm super thankful my parents did it, but at the time I remember thinking, like, I just want the thing that's wrapped in its own little package, or like even Ziplocs felt big, you know, like I just have the fold over bags, but that all to.
[00:14:10] We are paying a premium for these foods to be more novel than everything else we offer. And so what I want you to think through here is there is a convenience aspect and you have to value that for whatever it's worth to your family. However, if you can buy a larger mystic with goldfish for a minute, if you can buy the larger bag of goldfish.
[00:14:29] And baggy him up or give that to your kid as a job that is an easy way to get a kid in the kitchen at an early age. That is a pretty entry level task for a child. Who's, let's say pre-K kindergarten, first grade. Those are great tasks for them to be able to do, even if they're maybe not to the level of like prepping their own fruit or making their own sandwich or things like that, they can put some crackers in a bag and that can be like their weekly job where you take the sleeve or the carton of gold.
[00:14:53] Bagging it up into a whole bunch of values for the whole family or whatever siblings are gonna have 'em for the week, put 'em in the snack basket, but now they're in a clear zip block, just like the grapes, just like the carrot sticks, just like everything else. So when goldfish brand rolls out some promo for the latest and greatest kids movie, and it has all sorts of cute characters on it and it is like so cute and fun and way more fun than say those said grapes or carrot.
[00:15:20] Year, how to look. You just paid a premium for a package that is now advertising to your kid. That that is a more fun food than the other foods in the other. So if you're brown bagging, it make 'em all neutral. This is an easy way to promote food neutrality across all the foods and to not be paying a premium for not bad foods, just foods that we want to make even less exciting to our kids, because our kids already love them.
[00:15:44] We don't have to pay a premium to make our kids love goldfish more. They, most of them at least already do. So. I want you to think about that when it comes to the bento, there is a little bit more just natural. Neutrality with the items offered because they each have their own little compartment. And so there's much less likelihood that there's a package.
[00:16:03] But with the example of including a goldfish in that bento, I want you to think about taking 'em outta that package, because again, you're just paid a premium, you're paying more per unit price, which that's another episode for another day. I would love to talk about unit price, one of my favorite things on a nerdy subject, but you're paying more for that unit price that individually packaged gold.
[00:16:26] To put it in a box. Then you would, if you just had that big container of goldfish that you were then pouring into a compartment, because then you can also dictate the portion that you want to send. It's not a preset amount that, you know, the manufacturer has decided, this is how many goldfish we're putting in this package.
[00:16:43] Because if you saw an example, I did last week on my Instagram stories, I had one package of fruit snacks and I split it amongst three kids. They didn't know, they didn't care. They each got five fruit snacks. They didn't care. But the expectation from the manufacturer is that each child gets 15 fruit snacks.
[00:16:59] I'm not anti-free 15 fruit snacks. I just, it was an easy way to spread it across. And then our food dollar can stretch further and it can be something that's fun and enjoyable in their bento box, but it doesn't dominate it and consume one their attention and their. Because of the interest and the novelty that we already talked about, but it also maybe not take them as long to eat.
[00:17:21] I'm hugely conscious on how long will a given food take my kids to eat. And if it's gonna take 'em too long, I don't wanna send it because it's gonna displace the amount of time that they have to spend eating something else. So I know I word vomited a ton of information here, but really the main takeaway is very, very, very.
[00:17:39] as much as possible remove from the package, the original package that it comes in and try and neutralize it. It's okay. I do it too. I put certain things in, in a package probably on the daily, but I'm not gonna do it with each and every item because I do want to reduce pickiness. I do want to eliminate some of the appeal of those foods that tend to come in like the QC fund package.
[00:18:02] And three, I wanna be as cost effective as possible with the food that we're buying so I can buy as high quality of. As possible I can spend my food B budget dollars on really nourishing options. And I'm not spending a premium just for a package that really is not serving my family. Well, now, if you have not signed up for my back to school bootcamp, what are you waiting for?
[00:18:25] Come and join me. It's free. It's a three day workshop we're gonna meet for. One hour live, but if you miss the live recording, you can totally catch the replay later on, but you have to be registered to get this information. I'm really excited to walk each of you through how I would suggest that you set yourself up for success this school year.
[00:18:45] So that packing lunches and figuring out healthy snack options is not such pain point each and every day of the school year to join me, go over to www dot veggies and virtue dot. Back slash bootcamp and meet me September 12th, 13th, and 14th for our back to school bootcamp, I promise I will make it worth your time and I will make it help you save time, money, and energy the whole school year long.
[00:19:10] Can't wait to see you there.
