Healthy Lunch Ideas for Your Little Ghouls

Halloween is a little over a week away, and I am strategizing on how I can amp up the kid's lunches for the Halloween week.  With both of them being in middle school, I have to add thematic items for the season without it being too, shall I say............embarrassing and uncool! And honestly, I don't even know if I will be able to get away with it, but if I add a bit of the "gross" factor, it might just work. 

All parents want to make sure their children get the needed nutrients into their diets (myself included), so sometimes adding a bit of "fun" into the healthy food mix helps.  During this season, kids are inundated with artificial colors, flavors, and chemicals because of all the candy handed out during October 31st.  Add to that the Halloween parties serving neon-colored cupcakes and punch, and you have a recipe for major overload of junk into their little bodies.  So let's help minimize this overload by offering them a nutrient dense, healthy lunch to get them through their school day.

So for all the moms (and dads) who will pack the lunches of their little ghouls during the Halloween week, I have compiled healthy, fun ideas that can make any child "scream" with delight upon opening it at lunchtime.  Many of these ideas can also be used to substitute junk food during holiday parties at school. 

Photo by Life as a Healthy Mom

I use a laptop lunch system, but you can find BPA-free, sectioned lunch containers by Ziploc.  When the kids opened their lunches they could see all of it at once.  Add a Halloween cloth napkin, a stainless steel drink bottle, the "menu", and a joke for them to use on Halloween night, and you have a fun, waste-free lunch!

Main Dish Ideas:

Mini Cheese slices with Bug Encrusted Crackers 

• You can use mini cookie cutters to cut the organic or vegan cheese into pumpkin shapes.
• Use any cracker with black flecks in it. I use Back to Nature's Organic Stoneground Wheat Crackers with Flaxseed. For a gluten free alternative, you can us Snyder's of Hanover's Natural Whole Grain Tortilla Chips.

Bone Roll-ups 

• Spread natural peanut butter and fruit preserves onto an organic tortilla, and roll it up.  Cut into pieces. Place roll ups rolled-side up.

Pumpkin Face

• Cut a sandwich into a pumpkin shape

Coffin Sandwich

• Cut sandwich in a coffin shape

Mummy Dogs

• Wrap nitrate-free hot dogs (such as Applegate Farms, Trader Joes, or Wellshire Farms) biscuit dough made from non-hydrogenated oils/artificial ingredients
• Serve with "blood", aka organic ketchup (we use Trader Joes' brand)

Monster Smoothie

• Blend organic yogurt, pineapple, spinach leaves, almond milk, and a touch of vanilla and stevia.  The smoothie is GREEN, and I promise............you cannot taste the spinach!
• Advise your child to "shake up the monster" before drinking.

Zombie Sludge

• Smash an avocado and add a touch of salt, lemon juice, and a bit of salsa.  Serve with "bat wings", aka blue corn chips

Vampire Mouth

• Cut an apple in half and cut out the core thereby making the "mouth".  Line the edge of the apple with "jagged teeth", aka slivered almonds. 

Mummy Pizzas

• Spread pizza sauce onto a bagel.  Shred mozzarella cheese in wide strips and place over sauce to create the "wrapping" of the mummy.  Add sliced olives for eyes, and place into toaster oven until cheese is melted.

Here are Halloween-Inspired Names for Healthy Foods:

Bat Teeth Monster Toenails Claw Clippings Vampire Teeth Scabs Witch Skin Cyclops’s Eye Dracula Vitamins Bat Wings Jack O Lantern Frankenstein Skin Ear Wax Eyeballs Spider Eggs Ghost Juice Lil' Punkins Brains

Raw Sunflower Seeds Raw Pecans Raw Cashews Slivered Almonds Dried Cranberries Dried Apple Rings or Pieces Sliced Kiwi Pomegranate Seeds Organic Blue Corn Chips Orange with Jack O Lantern Face Cut Out Roasted Seaweed Monterey Jack./Cheddar Cheese Blend Rolled into Balls Green Grapes Hard Boiled Eggs Organic, Hormone Free Milk or Non-Dairy Milk Draw a Pumpkin Face onto the Skin of a Mandarin Orange Cauliflower Florets with Organic Ranch Dressing

Now, if you want to add a "treat" to the lunch, here are some ideas that are fun.  I have added links to some the recipes:

Meringue Bones
Gelatin Worms --I would choose and all-natural gelatin dessert that doesn't use artificial colors.
Vampire Bites
White Chocolate Skulls--I went to a candy making store and found skull molds.

So there you have it...........do you have some Halloween-inspired food ideas?

Happy Halloween!