I gather this is your first and perhaps only child?
Soups and stews are messy for a kindergartner to open and eat. She will need more help than the teacher will want to give. Most parents send sandwiches because they are neat, easy and provide an endless variety of possibilities.
The peanut butter balls sound good, a but heavy on the sweet/carbs and messy but pretty good.
A sandwich, a bit of fruit or some raw veggies and a cookie are fine for a 5 year old.
Linda C

Here is a recipe from "Healthy Choices for Kids" class I taught. Be sure to get your child involved in selecting and making foods for their lunch. You'll find they enjoy foods they had a hand in making. Children who are too young to use a sharp knife can cut most fruits and vegetables with a plastic knife. Keep in mind what a serving size is for your childs age, and that lunch is part of their daily requirement of foods. -Grainlady

GRANNY SMITH SALAD
(serves: 4)

1 Granny Smith apple
1 T. orange juice
1 rib celery
1 small carrot
2 T. golden raisins
1/4 c. nonfat or low-fat vanilla yogurt
Lettuce leaf (optional)

1. Wash hands with soap and water and gather all the ingredients together.

2. Wash apple, celery, carrot and lettuce leaf. Cut apple into 4 wedges. Remove seeds and stem. Cut wedges into small cubes.

3. In a mixing bowl, toss together apple wedges and orange juice.

4. Thinly slice celery and grate carrot.

5. Add to apples in bowl the celery, carrot, raisins and yogurt.

6. Chill. Serve on a small lettuce leaf (if desired).
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Lunch hints:
Protein: choose lean meats, such as turkey slices, chicken, and roast beef for sandwiches.

Carbohydrates: choose whole-grain bread, pasta and rice. Try tortilla wraps, pita bread, or mini bagels. Try mixing fun-shaped pasta and meat - many can be consumed cold.

Calcium: Milk, yogurt, cheese, cottage cheese. Dried figs, seeds, and nuts also provide moderate amounts of calcium.

Vitamins and minerals: Include some fresh fruit - bite size pieces rather than whole pieces of fruit in serving sizes appropriate for your childs age. Raw vegetables with a small amount (1-2 T.) of an accompanying dip (Ranch Dressing, hummus or sour cream and chive dip) are popular with children. Don't forget things like cherry tomatoes, cucumber chunks, bell pepper strips.

Include a vitamin C-rich fruit such as kiwi fruit or citrus, which helps boost iron absorption.

Sandwiches cut into fun shapes appeal to young children. Use cookie cutters for hearts, stars, circles, gingerbread people, etc.

Have things changed that much? This is not a rhetorical question. I ate a p & b sandwich (or ham) with a snack of choice: little debbie, chip package, nutty bar, homemade cookie, etc..., small fruit, and milk EVERY day until middle school! And this was by choice! It seems like I recall everybody else ate about the same thing.

My son eats a pbj sandwich every day. He adores for them to be cut into bite size pieces, calling them "popcorn" bites (thanks to today's popcorn chicken ads), or cut into heart shapes with a cookie cutter. I pack a cup of fruit or sauce with a plastic spoon, because they make those individual ones to carry. All-fruit drinks come in pouches which also travel well. When he's in a growth spurt, I might include something more, but usually just the three. Since our school has snack times with things like cookies, chips, and crackers, I don't include them in his lunch. Your peanut butter balls don't sound any messier or less nutritious than cookies, so I'd pack them if it were my son's lunch. And they sound delicious!

My younger son did not like sandwiches so I fixed him little kabobs of meat and cheese cubes on skewers. With some veggie sticks, fruit and a cookie treat, he had enough lunch to keep him going.

Cheese and crackers packed separately in snack zip bags or small containers; cold (which will warm up to room temp) pizza, chicken nuggets, sausage/bacon biscuits, chicken leg, pasta salad, BBQ cups (will post a recipe if you want), all these will suit a youngster. They don't seem to mind if something is hot or not.

If you stay away from chips and too much prepackaged food, you will be giving her better nutrition. A Little Debbie or fruit roll-up for dessert is fine. Little boxes of raisins or any dried fruit she likes would be nice in small amounts. Fresh fruit is a given!

Teresa

I agree with Linda soups and stews are a bit tricky for a little one to manage. If she is very good at handling all the pouring and clean up that's fine, most her age need help and the teacher will not be happy!

Also big caution on peanut butter, no schools in this area permit it due to the allergies of other children.

My daughter was not a sandwich kid...at all...so lunches were a challenge. Some of the things I sent her for lunch when she was wee but you need to invest in a very good thermal lunch box and use a cold pack too.

fruit and cheese kabobs
ham & cheese roll ups
pasta salads (not mayo based)
bologna and cheese stacks
fruit, cheese and meat in a divided container
cold meatloaf with sliced tomatoes
tortilla roll ups
hard boiled eggs

Trail mixes (homemade??) are great too.
Nuts, raisins, other dried fruit.
Grapes are easy to eat!
Pickles.
And all of the above!
Ask your daughter too....after a few days, she may want different things. Have her help prep! Ask if the quantities are too much or too little.
Deanna

Those peanut butter balls were always a favorite of my kids. They are not messy when packed in a tupperware container.

Soups, stews, pasta dishes are also not messy when packed in an easy to open, eat out of tupperware type container.

I feel more comfortable when the items are cold and kept cold with a blue ice or frozen drink.

A slice of pizza in foil, or triangle of quesadilla, is popular here.

At the kindergarten age, I had several divided tupperware containers, round, maybe 6 or 7 inches in diameter. I would put differnt items in each area, cut up fruit, leftovers, half a sandwich. Don't forget a plastic spoon, fork or spork.

Hi Linda C thanks for your response. I don't feel the pb balls are too high in sugar at all. I use natural style unsweetend pnut butter and of course the milk adds additional protein. I will freeze them as well and that will keep them cold and more contained (ie neater). I am pretty sure they won't be messy as the coating will keep the nut butter inside which is also bound by the dried milk. Emma certainly enjoys sandwiches, I just thought it would be fun to try something a bit different.

Here are some ideas:
Drinks - juice boxes, yoohoo or water bottles
sandwiches - whatever your child likes - sometimes I'll cut the bread with a large cookie cutter or use different breads. Wraps are also fun.
Sometimes I'll pack leftovers from dinner, like chicken fingers, hamburgers or pasta.
Soups or stews should be no problem if you use a wide mouth thermos (just unscrew the top and eat).
For dessert/snack: fruit, cookies, pre-packaged snacks are very handy (granola bars, carrots w/ranch dip, string cheese, fruit cocktail....)
Some schools may have rules about what a child can bring for lunch (like no soda, candy or Peanut Butter).

I do lots of pasta salads. Mine also enjoy it when I send eggrolls, Taquitos, corndogs, or bagel bites. I buy them frozen from Sam's or Costco and just thaw them in the morning and they eat them at room temp. Wraps and quesadillas work well also. Mine aren't big on sandwiches.

I have a very picky son, and to make it worse, the school is peanut free, so that eliminates the popular pb&j from our menu.

On the morning of his third day in kindergarten, he looked up from his breakfast to watch me pack his lunch and remarked, "Oh no! Sandwiches again?" Yes, Day 3. So we've had to mix it up a little.

-We do scrambled eggs and mac & cheese in the thermos, and the occassional hotdog, but he won't touch soups or stews at all

-Once a month I try to bake some hearty jumbo muffins. You can freeze them and throw one into their lunch every few days.

-Kolbassa and crackers is a favorite. So are cheese cubes.

-Homemade, nutfree, granola bars are very filling

-Leftover crepes with some maple syrup for dipping gets high praise

-Build-your-own fajitas with chicken, lettuce, rice and shredded cheddar

-the school provides cold milk, so sometimes I'll pack him a bowl of cereal, and a separate beverage, so he can use the milk for cereal.

-Lots of cut up veggies and fruit. We like cucumbers, carrots and cauliflower. And for fruit, bananas and mango are tops on his list. You could provide dip, but my son prefers his produce naked. :)

I'm not Vegan, but I love to visit the Vegan Lunch Box blog for inspiration. Check out the archives for pictures of some pretty creative lunches... Vegan Lunch Box

Amanda never liked sandwiches either, so she often had "ham and cheese boys", a little "sandwich" with ham on the outsides and cheese in the middle, cut into the shape of a gingerbread boy with a cookie cutter. She also had peanut butter and jelly rollups made with flour tortillas, or a pickle or an asparagus spear wrapped in a slice of turkey spread with cream cheese. Ashley liked a baked potato, room temp and cut into wedges, with ranch dressing or A1 sauce or garlic breadsticks with pizza sauce to dip them, again room temperature was fine with her.

I mde lots of trail mix, sent in little bags. Muffins were popular and although she didn't like sandwiches she would eat a corn muffin with bacon and cheese in it, or corn and bean salsa with chips. She always liked hummus with pita chips too. Pasta salad was popular, as was leftover pizza and believe it or not, devilled eggs. They were messy and squishy, but she just ate them with a fork. I always tried to pack a napkin and plastic fork or spoon so she didn't have to worry about losing silverware. I always packed a "treat", such as a homemade cookie, chex mix or puppy chow and fresh or canned fruit. Sometimes my kids liked those pudding cups too.

I tried freezing juice boxes to keep the rest of the lunch cold, but they didn't thaw on time, ever, plus Ashley always wanted MILK. She still drinks an inordinate amount of milk.

Annie

Uh, Annie? "Puppy chow" is literally only for puppies here. What is that the slang term for up yonder way? I know you didn't really feed her dog food! teehee...

THIS is Puppy Chow!

CHEX MIX PUPPY CHOW
Printed from COOKS.COM

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9 cup Chex
1 cup chocolate chips
1/2 cup peanut butter
1/4 cup butter
1/4 teaspoon vanilla
1 1/2 cup powdered sugar

Put cereal in large bowl. Melt chocolate chips, peanut butter, and butter. Remove from heat and stir in vanilla.
Pour over Chex cereal, put into a large plastic bag with powdered sugar and shake well to coat.

Spread mixture evenly on wax paper and allow to cool.

I would make it before Christmas to have around as munchies and put it in the freezer...........when I went to get it out, the BIG container was only half full.........more than one kid found it and "just sneaked a handful". LOL
Good stuff! Even the big kids like it!! I'm sure there's more variations, but this is the basis.

Deanna

Deanna, that's the stuff I make too. My girls would fight over the last handful, but it was a little messy with that powdered sugar coating.

Sorry, Rob. LOL

Annie

Absolutely ok! We just call it plain ol' chex mix, regardless of which, savory or sweet. I get it now. My favorite is the "Muddie buddies", but phew, talk about messy!

I pack my girls 1/2 a sandwich most days. PBJ, turkey/cheese, tuna salad, chicken salad, egg salad.

Into the sandwich-sized Tupperware container, I put the 1/2 sandwich and some type of "treat" such as pretzels (Deirdre's favorite), wheat thins, Fritos (Delaney's favorite), gold fish, etc.

On top of that I may add a dried pinapple slice in a soft Baggie or a Hershey kiss or a piece of Halloween candy. Maybe yogurt-covered raisins or golden raisins. Close the Tupperware container.

Then comes fruit or veggie - apple sauce, mandarin oranges, jello with fruit, baby carrots, or grape tomatoes.

Last comes organic milk (which the school doesn't sell and the milk line takes to much time for my slow eater anyway). On occasion, I put in calcium-fortified OJ box. Sometimes, I throw in a yogurt.

Throw in a napkin and an ice pack. That's it 80% of the time.

Other days, I pack soup or pasta or other leftovers in a thermos you just take the lid off. I run very hot water in the thermos while nuking the soup/pasta, then fill it almost all the way up so there's not much air and the contents stay hot.

Be careful now tight you screw the lid on!!! The first day I sent soup in Delaney's cute Scooby Do thermos, all the lunch ladies tried to open it and they had to call the janitor over to get the lid off. Apparently, it was on so tight it created a vacuum! (And who knows where the janitor's hands were before the lunchroom???)

We've also done cheese-and-crackers and celery-peanut-butter in place of the 1/2 sandwich. They love turkey pepperoni, too. They may get a hard-boiled egg. I saw some kids with cold pizza and thought that was a brilliant idea.

I let them buy lunch one day a week to have the experience of making their own selections and paying for their purchase. Our school has a keypad where you enter your lunch code to have the $ deducted from your account. Way cool.

Kari