Good foods while travelling?

tamarama72

Next week, my hubby and I (and our 5 and 3 year old) are going to be taking a 12 hour car trip to see our new granddaughter (yay!). We want to keep to our eating plan and also save money, so we are going to prepare food to eat in the car. We try to limit stops as much as we can, so we will want most of our meals to be something that does not need to be heated.

For our eating plan, we need to eat about every 3 hours, give or take 30 minutes. We also have some sort of protein with each meal. Drinks are no problem - we will stick to water. We'll bring some milk for the kids at "meal" times, but will limit them to water other than that (less bathroom breaks!). The kids will want to eat when we do. We'd like healthy options for them, but they have a little more flexibility, but we have to watch out for choking hazards and also stick to less messy things for them.

So far, I have for the grownups:
one meal replacement shake
hard boiled eggs for me, nuts for hubby, with a banana
cheese sticks with an apple
and one meal we can warm up while stopping for gas: turkey burgers with rice and some steamed veggies.

So, I need one more meal, and some tips on what to do when we are having the "drive time munchies."

For the kids, they can have cheese sticks, PBJ, bananas, rice cakes, crackers... I want to avoid apples for them, as well as any raw veggies because of the choking hazard. They only like the whites of hard boiled eggs, so they make a mess with them, so that is out.

Any tips?

Zainia

Fruit, nuts, granola bars, dry cereal, dried fruit, cold pancakes, granola, soymilk, wheat thins w/ almond butter and all-natural preserves.
Target also sells prepackaged ready-to-eat healthy meals. They are a bit pricey and have never had them but they sound pretty good. They are called Go-picnic and have things like crackers, tuna, black beans, plantains.

babeinthemoon

turkey jerky, nuts, baby carrots, and other finger type foods. Make sure you pre-package them in appropriate portion sizes with snack bags and you'll be all set for the munchies!

acrynne

hummus with carrots or crackers. yogurt.

kcoftx

Oscar Mayer has some precooked deli chicken (sold with lunch meat). It looks like the precooked frozen fajita meat except you don't have to heat it up.

aschaldecker

Fruit Options::
*grapes (you can cut them in half for the kids if you feel that would be safer)
* clemantine (Cuties) oranges
*Apple/banana chips (dried apples/bananas)
*craisins / raisins / etc.

Protein Options:
*imitation crab sticks
*pinwheel type wraps with lowfat ham/turkey/etc.....carb balance tortillas....fat free cream cheese...etc
*turkey pepperoni
*pre-cut cheese

Miscellaneous Options:
*some of the 100 calorie packages of snacks --- snackwells, special k, etc.....

MzStarrQueenB

Fresh fruit and veggies and when you run out stop at Walmart and buy more.

tamarama72

thanks guys!

cruzcrzyMarie

Lots of good replies here as we just did this. Just a word of caution with the nuts, the calories add up fast, so be sure to measure. I have very little self control with nuts so it is not something I consume regularly, unfortunately. Meat/cheese roll ups, tuna packets are also good ideas. It was also handy for us to pack paper plates. It made it much easier to prepare while in the car, if we were not stopped. For fruits, the apple corer really came in handy for apples. I also had a container of strawberries/grapes cut up...not TOO many grapes because of the sugar content. I rarely eat bananas due to the sugar content. Have a wonderful trip.

buzzcockgirl

I'd cook up some chicken breast and then cut it in strips/chunks... if you don't mind cold chicken. Most people like it cold. Also- you can get those Starkist Tuna pouches or kits-- the kit has a few crackers so you can eat the tuna on a cracker...

These are all great ideas for my kids lunch s well- as his school is peanut free so I cant pack the standard PBJ in his lunch! Always looking for 'main course' items for him! Thanks!