TIPical Mary Ellen host Mary Ellen Pinkham provides ideas for making brown-bag lunches more appealing.
- Bring your own beverage, rather than purchasing one out of a vending machine. Delicious and more nutritious bottled drinks are available at grocery stores for the same price or less.
- Carry condiments in a film canister or pill box to prevent a soggy sandwich. Add them to the sandwich when it is time to eat. Experiment with various condiments for unique sandwich flavors. Try horseradish, Ranch dressing, Caesar dressing or hummus.
- Purchase bulk items from the grocery store or co-op, and create trail or snack mixes. It's less expensive than buying the prepackaged, single-serving chips, and it's more interesting as well.
- Leftovers make great lunches, especially when warmed up in the microwave. For instance, grilled vegetables make a wonderful addition to any sandwich.
- Pack fresh vegetables. They are healthy and add variety. Try cooking them al dente beforehand for added flavor and texture.
- Buy exotic breads for sandwiches to make them more appetizing. For example, a tuna-salad sandwich on white bread seems boring compared with tuna salad on a hearty, whole-grain bread.
- Presentation is as important in brown-bag lunches as it is when eating out. Include a cloth napkin in the bag, and keep a plate and silverware at work to make lunch seem less generic.
- Pasta salads make great lunches and they are easy to prepare. Make a large batch of pasta, and add various vegetables, meats and salad dressings each day. Fill a thermos with the pasta salad to keep it chilled until lunchtime.
- Carry lunch to work in something other than a brown bag to make the lunch more appealing. There are plenty of interesting lunchboxes on the market. Another idea is to decorate an old ice-cream bucket and use that as a lunchpail.
- Send along newspaper articles, comic strips, puzzles or little love notes in homemade lunches for family members to give lunch a personal touch.
- Collect unique plastic containers and use them when brown-bag lunching. Not only will the plasticware be fun to use, but you will also be throwing one less brown bag away each day.
- Carry lunch in recycled bread bags or other types of plastic bags. These are usually durable enough to use more than once.
