Packed lunches

[ghoti_mhic_uait]

Do you take lunch into work? What do you take? I'm finding my lunches rather under-satisfying. Yesterday, I had a (co-op bought, because I forgot to ensure that we had bread) ham sandwich, a yoghurt and an apple, and this was clearly not enough. Today I had a cupasoup (of the thicker variety), a steak slice and a 250g fruit salad, and this was still not very satisfying.

Clearly, I need more carbohydrate, but I also want things slightly more interesting than sandwiches every day. I had been thinking of scrambled eggs and bread and butter tomorrow...

We have a hot water machine (no, not quite a kettle), a toaster, a toasted sandwich maker, a microwave, a fridge and a freezer.

Comments

[beckyc.livejournal.com]

Sometimes what I do is get a big tub and put in a load of random frozen veggies, then microwave the contents for lunch/a snack etc.

[emperor]

I take sandwiches most days - blue cheese or salami or something else we've got in the fridge. I usually eat 3 rounds, which is quite a lot.

[gnimmel.livejournal.com]

I don't often do so, but when I have taken packed lunches to work it's been because I've made too much dinner the night before and stored some for later. This seems to be relatively satisfying, but I guess would have to be done quite a lot in advance and frozen (if suitable for freezing) if you didn't want to have the same thing for lunch every day as dinner the night before!

[deborah_c]

I mostly work from home, but lunches are sort of packed-lunch-ish anyway. Generally, I tend to have one or two pieces of pita bread, toasted and then filled with cheddar, (boring supermarket-variety) sliced ham and apple chutney, and then some fruit. (Any chocolate that anyone may imagine me eating as well is an illusion, though, of course!)

Occasionally when I've been feeling more weight conscious than normal, I try having either ham or cheese. I don't seem to get on well with the lack of protein, though, and invariably end up making another one at some later point, which rather defeats the object of the exercise.

[atreic.livejournal.com]

I take three slices of bread made into sandwitches, with a very generous amount of mushroom pate. It's nice, but gets very samey. But I'm basically messed up by not liking cold food, and not having the time or effort to cook at lunch. Maybe I should bring a saucepan into work and do soup? Soup is nice.

[ghoti.livejournal.com]

Premade soup, ither at home or in tins, probably works too, and is less time-consuming (I only get half an hour, I don't know about you)

[bfo.livejournal.com]

I used to bring tins of soup into work as we had a microwave, also baked potatoes are also another good thing if you have a micro, you can probably also half cook them at home so they don't take as long.

[rmc28]

I've been making lots of vegetable-filled lunches recently. When I have a couple of spare hours, I chop up a big pile of vegetables into my trusty casserole pan, add stock, cook for a while, allow to cool, and then divide into multiple reused chinese plastic boxes, most of which go in the freezer and maybe one or two into the fridge (if I think I'll eat it fairly fast). These get microwaved at work when I get hungry.

A recently-discovered trick (thanks to antinomy making risotto and reminding me) is to add risotto rice to the stew and leave the panful to cool overnight, during which time the rice expands gorgeously.

Or just pile fresh veg together and cook through at work using the microwave and some hot water half-covering the veg with a loose lid over the top of the container (again, I reuse chinese containers) - 10 minutes from raw is usually enough to cook things through and make them edible (by my standards). I usually try to include potatoes in the veg pile as they're very filling, and I like adding things like cottage cheese to it once cooked.

Hard-boiled eggs are quite fun snacks, especially peeling off the shell, and surprisingly filling.

[hatter.livejournal.com]

What you require is obviously more bready snackage throughout the day. I've got hoy cross buns that I butter and nuke, sometimes have crumpets, which handily toast. Or investigate the toastie maker, if it's got waffle plates, you can bring in a bottle of batter plus assorted tasty goo to eat them with; if not, you could upgrade it for them to one that does. In the "real lunch" category, the sandwich wench does a fair range of baguettes, and also wraps. Several other people bring in boxes of left over pastaish or ricey things with saucey, oriental stuff, which microwaves up quite well.


the hatter

[velvetfox.livejournal.com]

Pot noodles. heh.

[mooism.livejournal.com]

Egg sandwiches, when I’m not working at home.

[ruhe.livejournal.com]

I freeze serving-size containers of homemade soup and homemade lasagna to grab for my entree and then a slice of bread or crackers, a piece of fruit or some veggies like carrots in a baggie, yogurt, and sometimes something for dessert too.

[theinquisitor.livejournal.com]

I occasionally go for a baton (half-length french stick) of some variety, and 100-150g of whatever cheese takes my fancy. Not for every day, but beats Tescos' sandwich selection if I'm running late.

[feanelwa.livejournal.com]

Tubs of pasta or rice with goo. Very filling.

[robert-jones.livejournal.com]

I don't take a packed lunch in with me, but if I did, it would contain two sandwiches, each whole slices of bread, made with processed ham (cooked ham, not smoked ham or honey roast ham), and mayonaise (from Sainsbury's for preference) and cucumber. It might also contain an apple or a small bunch of grapes and a packet of crisps or a biscuit.

A packed lunch without sandwiches is not a packed lunch. Your packed lunch must include sandwiches, but it may include other things too. Perhaps you would like a pork-pie?

[ghoti.livejournal.com]

Crisps! That's a good idea.

Otherwise, no, thankyou, I would not like a pork pie.

(I get sort of the same feeling about packed lunches, except that I dont know what to call it when one carries one's lunch with you, but doesn't have sandwiches)

[chess]

You actually *put* mayo in your sandwiches? I thought it was just something shops did.

[robert-jones.livejournal.com]

It is a custom of mine which dates from when I was very young and disliked butter.

[feanelwa.livejournal.com]

I do it too. Mind you I eat it with chips, avocado and out of the jar also.

[ptc24.livejournal.com]

When I'm on form, I take sarnies (cheese, or mushroom pate), and a piece of fruit, maybe an Empire apple (regrettably American, but otherwise close to apple perfection). Back in the old days, the sarnies had ham or pastrami or low-fat Ardennes pate in.

Sometimes I took in bought pots of pasta salad or couscous or whatever - some sort of starch salad at any rate, but they cost too much and I'm forgetful. OTOH I've been thinking about making some pasta pesto up the night before, and taking a tub in to eat cold.

Really ages back things such as crisps and pork pies and sausage rolls and cereal bars and small cartons of california raisins etc. etc. etc. also found their ways into lunches.

Slimming World dieter - LOADSAFOOD

[badriya.livejournal.com]

If I use my bread allowance for a sandwich it is 2 slices wholemeal bread and scraped with butter and mashed hard-boiled egg and tomato, but I have a bag of fruit with me every day, apple, pear, plum, peach, grapes, satsuma etc. Mostly I take a huge box of salad with fat free dressing and chicken, salmon or ham.

On green plan days I could have a jacket and baked beans from the canteen, which you could do in the microwave. Or I took Batchlors Savoury Rice, cooked at home with added corn or peas in various flavours cold as a rice salad.

[surje.livejournal.com]

i make a sandwich often including salad, maybe some humous or beetroot/rice/pasta salad type stuff, and some leftovers from previous night's cooking. then i shove a couple of tomatoes into the lunchbox as it saves cutting them up, and also provides shock absorbtion within the lunchbox during cycle ride to work :)

[valkyriekaren.livejournal.com]

I like the Covent Garden fresh soups - they cost about the same as buying a sandwich and a drink from the shops, and if you have them with some nice bread are very filling. I think Co-op probably do own-brand fresh soups now too - most supermarkets do, and there are Baxters brand ones too.

[sashajwolf.livejournal.com]

If I take my own lunch (which I don't do as often as I would like), the contents are basically the same as your lunch yesterday, so I guess our nutritional needs are different. Microwaveable leftovers sounds like a good idea, either frozen or left in the fridge from the previous night's dinner - I used to do that when I worked at a place that had a microwave in the staff kitchen.

Since you have a toaster, you could also try crumpets or muffins instead of bread, for variety, or vary the type of bread you use. Hot soup with Irish soda bread is hard to beat, for instance.

[rubygiggle.livejournal.com]

Toast bagels. More filling than sandwiches. Plus everything goes with them, and you can get nice poppy/sesame seeded ones etc too -fresh ones from a supermarket bakery section is best.