Working women and Lunch

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  • stephiehampshire
    stephiehampshire Posts: 160
    We are all here for a common goal - to get healthy and stay that way. If we were able to afford me being a stay at home mom, I would in a heartbeat but alas I have to work full time to support my family. I have been trying to make healthier choices but sice my co workers like to eat out several days a week I hav ebeen eaing alone and need more lunch ideas. (I don't mind eating alone it is the only quiet time I get and I spend my lunch hour reading :) ) I am looking for ideas of good healthy lunches I can pack to take with me. I would like to avoid frozen meals that I have to microwave. Any ideas are welcome. I need to expand my taste uds :D

    Sorry if I am repeating I havent read through the other posts!

    My lunches depend on the weather and how much exercise I am planning for that day but here are a few ideas:

    Salad, lots of raw vegitables and salad with grilled chicken and peri peri dressing
    Soup, try to make home made soups out of vegitables
    Rice with chicken or lean meat with raw vegitables and soy sauce
    Noodles with chicken or lean meat with raw veg and soy sauce
    Jacket potatoe without butter, with chicken or tuna and cheese or beans
    Wholemeal Pita bread stuffed with tuna and salad
    Cous Cous with chicken (cooked in garlic and roasted onion and pepper with spices)
    Home made Sushi
  • shelleycolton
    shelleycolton Posts: 400 Member
    Some great ideas here; preparation is key for successful lunch for me; I make my shaker salad.

    150g Cous Cous - any variety
    60g Cooked Chicken - I cook up two breast on sunday with any marinade i fancy for the week, pesto, thai curry, fajita spices etc. Half a breast each day.
    Cherry Toms
    Pickled Beetroot
    Olives (if I have them)
    Feta cheese (if I fancy it)

    Mix together and shake it balsamic vingear. Yum.
  • Confuzzled4ever
    Confuzzled4ever Posts: 2,860 Member
    Today it's either a protein bar or tuna or oatmeal. Depending on a few different things.
  • Carmella9
    Carmella9 Posts: 171 Member
    weight watcher soup :) easy and very low cal!
  • GingerLolita
    GingerLolita Posts: 738 Member
    I also bring lunch everyday as a college student. My school doesn't have a cafeteria (which I'm thankful for, since I lost the Freshman 15 while all my friends eating buffet-style elsewhere gained it) and many students choose to eat lunch out daily, but I know that anything I make myself will be healthier and cheaper. I get some of the best recipes from cookbooks and many of the newer ones have sections devoted to pack-able lunches. I really like the Flat Belly Diet Family Cookbook (which offers great kid-friendly options, although I find the recipes delight for myself) and Cooking Light's Fresh Fast Food 24/7.
  • emergencytennis
    emergencytennis Posts: 864 Member
    What is the difference between being a stay at home mum and a working mum when it comes to lunch? I pack the kids' lunches and then eat much the same myself. Everything is plus a piece of fruit or carrot sticks...

    Edgells four bean mix, a couple of handfuls of bag salad, Red Kelly's salad dressing.

    A couple of cups of cous cous made with diced onion, diced carrot, frozen peas and chicken stock.

    A burrito made with some beef mince, some capsicum, some cheese and some salsa wrapped inside a tortilla, baked the night before.

    A chicken salad and avocado sandwich.

    Chicken mushroom pasta in white sauce.

    A piece of corn microwaved and wrapped in foil, with some naan bread, goat's cheese and olives.

    Tomorrow looks like: left over steak and salad sandwich One kid will take an onion omelette.

    Darn, your kids have it real good. Chicken mushroom pasta for lunch? Yum.

    Not that exciting - it is just leftovers recycled for lunch.

    Edit to add

    As is the cous cous, burrito and the previously fessed-up-to steak and salad sandwich, as well as the samosas the kids are taking tomorrow.
  • MorissaW
    MorissaW Posts: 95 Member
    I try to make enough dinner to take some for lunch the next day.
    Sometimes I repurpose what we have. So if we have fajitas or tacos, I will make it into a salad the next day. That way it doesn't feel like I am eating the same thing over again.

    I have 4 children and a husband. We both work full time and lead pretty busy lives. It takes some time to get into the groove of making your lunch or at least making sure you have the right things at work to make something. Once you get it down, it is a easy peasy. As some others have mentioned I like to do prep work on Sundays. I try to carve out about 2 hours (so that I don't have to spend my whole "off" day in the kitchen!). I make a lot of chicken breasts and then cut them up and seperate into baggies for freezing. In the evenings my husband can get them out, defrost them and use them for dinners (salads, fajitas, chicken pasta, quesadillas, homemade Chinese food (I buy a kit from Aldi and add chicken), BBQ chicken wraps, homemade chicken pizza and more. I usually make myself a few single serve baggies as well just in case there is not leftover dinner I can grab one of those baggies and make a salad for lunch. On Mondays I try to bring in some lettuce, a few tomatoes, a cucumber and a few advocados. I also keep salad dressing here. That way I have NO EXCUSES to eat crap!!!
  • RenshiG
    RenshiG Posts: 71 Member
    I keep it pretty simple. Usually a protein I pre-fix, a vegetable in batch, some fruit. Things I can easily split into 3 meals.

    My lunches are generally small since I eat 5-6 times a day. My 10:30 & 4:30 snacks today are 1/2 avocado w/ lemon juice, 50g chicken breast, 1 banana each. It allows me to use the same "batch" of chicken and the rest are natures pre-packed foods. (I keep a lemon with the avocado so it doesn't get brown by the afternoon after I cut it in the am).

    For actual "lunch" today I am having a chicken breast and 2 cups of spinach. I like herbs and spices so while it might sound gross I actually really like it (hope my co-workers don't mind a bit of garlic.. heh). I also prefer keeping it really low carb. If I want carbs I usually add 2-4 oz. of quinoa (quick to make almost like oatmeal and easy to portion and pre-fix... was just too lazy this am lol) or a fruit to it like the bananas for the snacks.

    Another lunch/snack combo is tuna with avocado (if the avocado is really ripe you can mush it really good and it is an awesome mayo sub!!), sweet potato with cottage cheese (haven't had that in a while.. hmmmm... maybe tomorrow), chicken breast with any veggie of the day (california mix, spinach, kale, green beans), hard boild eggs!

    I am not too keen on warm fish for lunch.. plus co-workers tend to complain about the smell esp since I tend to eat at my desk. I like stuff I can split easily to get snacks out of it too for the day. Makes it a lot easier.
  • mygrl4meee
    mygrl4meee Posts: 943 Member
    To the person who asked what the difference is to staying at home or being a working mom when it comes to lunch there is quite a big difference. Working moms or dads have to plan their meals even more cause we can't just cook something to eat. It needs to be already prepared and then we have to pack it and then there is the issue of needing to keep our food at a safe temp. Its not a lot of work but it is different compared to being at home. There is some advantage to working and packing lunch though. I can't on a whim decide to eat junk that I didn't plan for and no matter what I do I can't pack ice cream. It melts. Darn. Lol
  • climbing_trees
    climbing_trees Posts: 726 Member
    Two handfuls of spinach, half a can of tuna, a scoop of hummus (my favorite is the spicy), a scoop of feta cheese crumbles and top with fresh tomatoes! I could eat this every day :D

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