Easy Lunchbox Recipes

Roast Beef Herbed Cheese Sandwich — Pack yourself a sandwich of thinly sliced roast beef, spreadable herbed cheese, and ripe tomato slices on an onion roll with chips and carrot sticks (Photo Credit: Adroit Ideals)

Easy Lunchbox Recipes. Who doesn’t like to go out to lunch with colleagues? I used to go out to lunch all the time. But now, I’m just as happy eating a lunch that I’ve made myself and that I know what ingredients went into it. Also, I’m saving most of that average daily $20+ and spending it on better ingredients for lunch AND dinner. The extra calories in a daily restaurant lunch don’t need to find their way to my waistline. Take your lunch outside if your work location has an outdoor seating area.

1960s and 1970s vintage lunchboxes — 1960s and 1970s vintage lunch boxes (Image Courtesy: Pinterest)

It’s been a long time since I have used that one fancy cartoon-based lunchbox in grade school. I don’t remember very many of the designs of my lunchboxes in grade school — only that the thermoses usually ended up broken fairly quickly. Later, in high school, it became more fashionable to buy lunch at the school cafeteria. There were no refrigerators back then and no real cold packs either. Amazingly, I lived through the unrefrigerated bologna and American cheese sandwiches with Miracle Whip for grade school lunches. That’s also back when we all looked forward to the shelf-stable Hunt’s Snack Pack puddings and diced fruit that Moms would put into our lunch boxes. My favorite was an apricot pudding from a different brand than Hunt’s that was very tasty. Nowadays, the snack pack puddings should be refrigerated.

Bologna and American Cheese Sandwich — A Bologna and American cheese sandwich with Miracle Whip on Wonder Bread was a lunch staple in the 1970s (Image Credit: Family Circle Magazine)

My usual “lunchbox” nowadays is a fancy black and gold insulated bag with a shoulder strap that my favorite Lexus car service manager gave to me. I don’t own the Lexus anymore but still love the lunch bag. It keeps food cold until lunchtime with only one cold pack yet doesn’t fit too many items. Same with my fancy Tory Burch lunch box and thermos from the Target Neiman Marcus Holiday Collection a few years ago.

Tory Burch thermos and lunch box — The Tory Burch lunch box and thermos from the Target Neiman Marcus Holiday Collection in 2012 (Photo Credit: Adroit Ideals)

What if I want to eat something that doesn’t fit into those lunchboxes? There are a lot of other lunch container options in my pantry. I love the idea of the glass lunch containers if you have a concern about plastic’s leaching into your food. And the bento boxes are pretty ingenious and come in a lot of different materials.

I like to purchase reusable containers for my lunch items. My favorite containers for sandwiches are the Sistema brand. They’re also dishwasher safe so I can be sure they’re properly cleaned and sanitized before using the next time. They are plastic yet I find that they’re handy. The lids snap on without fear of spillage.

Now to the food! A favorite quick lunch is an easy-to-eat and easily packaged sandwich or wrap. Some salads travel well including pasta salads and composed salads so check out my list below. Salads with just greens and dressing usually get soggy so I save those types to eat at home. Remember that most salads and also my easy hummus bowls can be layered in Mason jars.

Layered Mason Jar — Layer your salad ingredients in a mason jar (Image Credit: GooseberryPatch.com)

So what’s my favorite? Hard to say. I do like a good chicken salad sandwich. Be sure to keep these lunch meals chilled until ready to eat. Add a bag of “healthy” chips or crudites or fruit to your lunch main course and you’ll have a good meal.