My first thought is to pack up tonight's dinner for tomorrows lunch. Chicken strips served hot tonight will be great cold tomorrow with some ranch dressing for dipping.

If you are concerned about keeping things at a safe temperature, you could freeze a bottle of water/juice to keep in the lunch bag/box. DD can drink this when thawed.

My advice is to go light. DD8 will probably not eat big portions and will still enjoy a snack when home. I found less was more with my dd - now 15. :-)

We aren't vegetarian but my kids take a lunch every day as well. Over time, with feedback, we developed a few things that work well for us. Taking dinner for lunch is one of those things--if we've had home made pizza the night before, I have them pack their lunches right at the dinner table, as part of cleaning up. Put it in the fridge and it's ready to go the next day. I also make soups and keep them frozen in thermos sized quantities, just thaw, heat, and put into the thermos. Pasta is another, but sometimes it's hot mac and cheese. My crew likes a cold tuna noodle salad, too. Noodles, mayo, tuna, and for one onion and pepper. The other kid likes it plain. When I'm serving these, I (or they) make a batch, then they immediately put it into lunchbox containers and put it in the fridge. I usually get a few days of lunches from a pound of pasta. They also like sandwiches, on which you can put any number of things, including roasted vegetables and cheese for a veggie spin. Egg Salad is also a winner for my kids. They've also taken salads to school in Ziplock plastic boxes, with whatever they like on it, including veg and cheese and seeds (friends have nut allergies, so no nuts go to school). They pack croutons and dressing in a separate side container to prevent sogginess. Home made hummus and veggie sticks with whole grain bread, felafel, and pitta stuffed with hummus and veg have also gone to school occasionally over the years.
That's all I can come up with off the top of my head veggie wise, but I'll add more if I think of anything brilliant that I forgot. :-p
Cj

What about cold peanut noodles? You could toss some chopped vegetables into the pasta water a few minutes before the noodles are done, drain all, then add in peanut sauce while the noodles are still warm, mix well, then chill. This will be fine if eaten at room temperature or cold.

Cold Peanut Noodles

1 lb spaghetti, can use linguine
1 cup shredded carrot
1 cup chopped scallion
1/2 cup thinly sliced red bell pepper
1/4 cup chopped cilantro, can use parsley

1/3 cup smooth peanut butter
1/4 cup reduced sodium soy sauce
2 tablespoons rice vinegar
3 tablespoons sesame oil
2 tablespoons brown sugar
1/4 teaspoon black pepper
1/4-1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
1/4-1/2 teaspoon hot sauce, or red pepper flakes sesame seed, for garnish (optional)

Bring a large pot of boiling water to a boil. Cook spaghetti noodles according to package directions; drain; rinse in very cold water and drain again.
Place cooled noodles in a large bowl and toss with the carrots, scallions, bell pepper slices and cilantro.
In a small bowl, whisk together the sauce ingredients until smooth.
Drizzle the sauce over noodles mixture; toss to coat well.
Serve room temp or cold.
Garnish with sesame seeds if desired.

Or Black Bean & Corn Salad with Jack Cheese? Give him some tortilla chips and tell him it's salsa:

Black Bean & Corn Salad

â¢1 can (15 ounces) black beans, rinsed and drained
â¢4 ounces Monterey Jack cheese, cut into 1/4-inch cubes
â¢1 can (8-3/4 ounces) whole kernel corn, drained
â¢1/4 cup sliced green onions with tops
â¢3/4 cup thinly sliced celery
â¢1 small sweet red pepper, diced
â¢3/4 cup picante sauce
â¢2 tablespoons olive oil
â¢2 tablespoons lemon juice
â¢1/2 to 1 teaspoon ground cumin
â¢1 garlic clove, minced

â¢Combine all ingredients in a large bowl; mix well. Cover and chill several hours or overnight. Yield: 8 servings.

What about hummus to spread on pita chips and cucumbers with yogurt dip?

A peanut butter, honey and banana sandwich on whole grain or wheat bread with string cheese for extra protein, veggie sticks and dip?

Teresa

Some ideas we've done and have been added to the rotation:

Devilled eggs
Black bean salad
Quesadilla with guac
Vegetarian sushi
Soup in a thermo
Falafel in Pita with tahina and yogurt sauce
Wraps made with leftovers from dinner

I know that some of the regulars here don't like pinterest but I love it for the wealth of ideas you can find in one place. Ideas you can expand on and adjust to fit your own tastes.

Here is a link that might be useful: Vegetarian lunches on Pinterest

I found the container makes a difference with my daughter, who has a peanut allergy and takes lunch everyday. The sandwich cutter is from pampered chef and the bento is from easy lunch boxes. That are reasonable and bpa free. I have their dip cups, too. Got on Amazon.

Here is a link that might be useful: Link

My girls carried lunch too, thei lunches here were always disgusting.

Some favorites were bean burritos, sandwiches in pita pockets, I packed the filling separate from the bread and they "stuffed" the salad or whatever in the bread themselves. They liked leftovers like pasta or fried rice in a thermos, chili was OK but soup was "too messy". I made bread dough, cut it into rounds and made "calzones", fill them and bake. They were little homemade hot pockets that we filled with everything from pizza ingredients to broccoli and cheese to eggs. Vegetarian chili would be good in them, I think.

Amanda often took half a baked potato and poured her hot chili from Thermos over the potato, letting the chili warm the potato sufficiently to be acceptable.

Good luck!

Annie

We have this for dinner often and I always make extra for school lunches -

Cold Greek pasta salad with cooked rotini, garbanzos, feta, cukes, cherry tomato, olives and greek dressing

Oh, hummus might be good too, if she likes it, either with vegetables like celery or some toasted pita.

Annie

Summer rolls with dipping sauce
Veggie sushi

One of my friends, who lived in Japan, makes rice balls from leftover prepared sticky sushi rice. She puts some canned tuna (or left over fish) with a bit of wasabi on a small scoop of rice, pushes into the rice with her thumb, then covers with more rice to form a ball. For vegetarian, you could use avocado, egg, or seasoned fried tofu, even fruit (she often uses ume - a pickled plum). They are easy to make and eat, and yummy. Can dip in a bit of soy sauce when eating them.

These are more complicated than what she makes.

Here is a link that might be useful: Japanese rice balls

these are all great ideas! I am printing this out and making a plan to try some of these with DD.

L2CF6--> thanks for the tip on pinterest. I will check it out. I created a login eons ago but haven't really used it.

I saw this online ages ago, and loved it. Time consuming, but I bet it gets easier with practice.

Here is a link that might be useful: Kids Bento Box lunches

Hot lunches in the thermos have always been a challenge for us because DS doesn't like any soup or stews. We've had success with oatmeal in his thermos, or fried rice. He also loves pulled pork sandwiches, but I don't know how to make a vegetarian version of that. :)

He likes build-your-own tacos too. In place of taco meat, you could use lentils.

If she likes indian food, what about chana masala?

Susytwo - Oatmeal is a brilliant idea. She does not want to take channa masala to school. Loves it at home.

Ali - those bento boxes are cute but a friend who tried something like this said that it was a leaky mess. I do like the idea of mini skewers of fruits and veggies and the like baking cups to separate the contents. I think one other idea to do a little bit of several things. I am not sure how practical this is in the morning rush as I don't want to be dragging out and putting away several things. Lunches packed the previous day get bleh by morning. These boxes are so cute though!

If you get some small lidded containers for hummus and dips, plus some snack zip bags for crackers, pita chips, and vegetable dippers, you could fill them at least a day ahead with no "bleh" at lunchtime.

When I still worked I used to take bentos all the time since there were no readily available food sources near my office. Leaking was not a problem with the ones I had. Www.justbento.com has lots of good ideas, not all of which are Japanese. Maki at Just Bentos also talks about storing a "stash" of bento fillers in the freezer.

Other than that, dinner leftovers were my staple. I would also pack bread, filling, and lettuce separately to combine on the spot into a nice, non-soggy sandwich. Also, if you look around a little you can find small packages of real cheese (processed cheese is just industrial (i.e. "cheap") cheese melted with salt -- nothing yucky or chemical added to it despite the name) from France where cheese is more highly respected. A handful of crackers and some fruit will round out a meal. Pink Lady apples resist browning when cut and will be perfect in appearance at lunch time if tossed into a solution of a pinch of Fruit Fresh (vitamin C) and water as you cut them. If nuts were not an issue, then almond or peanut butter would be great accompaniments instead of cheese.

I don't have leaking issue but hear you on the morning rush. Cheese and cracker an fruit idea is perfect. I have lots of things pre-ready to grab. My son now wants to take lunch lol

Great tip on the pink ladies - I had no idea and funny I just bought pink ladies yesterday :)

Do you have Trader Joe's by you? They have really good wraps and salads to go and vegetarian options like Falafel. Some supermarkets do, too. Add a fruit and a cookie and good to go. Stock some in the fridge for the grab and go days when it is crazy. They are reasonable and considering our school lunch is up to $3 for junk at school, they are in ballpark.

Our entire family packed lunch nearly every day for years. One mainstay was cold vegetable salads like caponata, Italian bean and tuna salad and varieties of coleslaw, mushroom or carrot salads. Wedges of pita bread with hummus or baba for dipping often were an accompaniment.

DD#1's favorite was fruit and cheese platters - varieties of cheese cubes or slices, a few kinds of fruit pieces (sometimes from grocery store salads bar), a zip-lock baggie of crackers, and a couple of slices of rolled-up cold cut ham or turkey.

DD#2's was a halved and slightly hollowed out wheat bagel stuffed with egg or ham salad and carrot sticks with a small container of dip.

Most usual dessert was a square of what we called Snack Cake - uniced cakes with nuts or dried fruits in them like fruited gingerbread.

I love all the great ideas. I spent a bit of time organizing myself for lunch rush this weekend and it is hopefully easier this week. I will of course yield to my tendency to overorganize and devise a rotation system etc :)