momstown Calgary

Yes, You CAN Pack Cheap & Healthy School Lunches!

Written on August 16, 2013 by Jennifer House from First Step Nutrition

Healthy school lunches don’t need to be expensive!

As we start gearing up for back-to-school, I’m finally responding to the conversation from my earlier blog:“Ichiban for School Lunch?!” While most of you agreed that packaged processed food is not appropriate on a regular basis for their child’s school lunch, others wanted me to know that some parents buy Ichiban and Wonderbread for economic reasons – it’s cheaper. But I disagree.

I can understand that there may be other factors holding back a parent from making their child a sandwich instead of a bag of Ichiban. Time management being a main one. In that case, it’s worth prioritizing 5 minutes for you child’s health. If you hate making school lunches,  a life coach once told me how you need to refrain your thinking so that you feel it is an act of love rather than a pain in the ass. Of if your child is capable, get them to make their own lunch!

But I need to bust this misperception that convenience foods are cheaper that healthier “real” foods. So I went to Superstore and priced out individual servings of both packaged and fresh foods (in late June 2013). Turns out that a slice of Wonderbread is exactly $0.06 more expensive than a slice of in-store made whole wheat bread. And that $0.73 pack of Ichiban is $0.23 more expensive than a Wow-Butter whole wheat sandwich (and that’s not considering the health effects – purely cost!). Check out my two sample lunches below. Lunch #1 includes simple healthier options and Lunch #2 includes more packaged junk marketed to kids. In both cases, the first homemade option is cheaper.

Lunch #1	Cost	Lunch #2	Cost
WW bread sandwich with tuna/mayo	$0.91	Kraft Dinner Cup	$1.49
AJ box	$0.30	Kool Aid Jammer	$0.38
Strawberries	$0.35	Fruit by the Foot	$0.55
Yogurt ½ cup	$0.50	Dunkaroos	$0.63
TOTAL	$2.06	TOTAL	$3.05

Lunch #1	Cost	Lunch #2	Cost
WW bread sandwich with Wow butter	$0.50	Ichiban	$0.73
Banana	$0.25	Dora Snack	$0.37
Homemade Apricot Bran Muffin	$0.44	Bearspaw Cookie	$0.58
Yogurt ½ cup	$0.50	Fruit in Jell-O Cup	$0.50
TOTAL	$1.69		$2.18

I would love to keep this conversation going. Do you agree??

Thank you to Jennifer House for being our guest blogger, you can find all her great nutritional tips at: First Step Nutrition