5 Healthy Lunch Box Ideas

Does your lunchbox look like this?

The idea for giving you 5 healthy lunch box ideas came to me after chatting to one of our clients. What she told me made me laugh at the time, but then I realised she was probably not the only one who had this particular belief. So I tested the belief out on a few people and they all agreed!

So, what’s the belief? It’s that ‘taking your lunch to work with you means you’re boring‘. This particular client, we’ll call her Jill, said that she thought only boring people took their lunch to work with them, and if she started to do that it’d mean she, too, was boring. And getting boring is a sign that old age is creeping in, which means that losing weight is going to be harder, and there’ll be no fun in life anymore…I’m getting carried away with the last bit but you can clearly see how one innocent little belief can have a MASSIVE impact on the action you take with your weight control and health. One friend didn’t think it was necessarily ‘boring’ to take your own food to work, but it was certainly far more exciting and interesting to go and choose your own from all the cafes around the place, rather than rely on the contents of your own fridge.

Jill and I had fun with her belief because I was quick to tell her that I take my own food at every opportunity, so I must be very boring. Being a cool and hip chick myself, I knew she wouldn’t be able to defend the belief that well BUT we did then realise that this belief had a lot to do with boring school packed lunches. Yep, it’s those dull white-bread-and-peanut-butter sandwiches that locked that belief in good and proper.

Whether or not you recognise this belief in yourself, these 5 Healthy Lunch Box Ideas should still give you some new inspiration to take your own lunch to work.

Fridge full of delicious food for your super salad!

1. SuperSalad.

Salads for lunch drum up images of iceberg lettuce and tasteless tomatoes. My salads are super-yummy BUT rely on fantastic ingredients to start with. So you need to get organised and get yourself to a great Farmer’s Market or a fruit ‘n’ veg shop. Try to avoid the supermarket aisles for this one, the taste is guaranteed better if you make the effort to go to the markets or good quality veg shop. The aim is to have so many lovely tastes that you’re not bored.

1. Salad base: Get as many different types of salad leaves as you can and chuck them all in a big plastic container. Add in 1/4 – 1/2 avocado (depending on size), tomato and any other bits of veg you’ve got around – e.g. carrot, zucchini, capsicum, olives etc

3. Protein: Add in some form of protein like small tin of tuna (100g tin, drained), 2 hard-boiled eggs, some chicken (1/2 – 3/4 breast) etc

4. Legumes:  Add in small tin (100g) of mixed beans or lentils. RINSE THOROUGHLY first

5. Seeds and Nuts: Sprinkle on pepitas and sunflower seeds, and a few walnuts or pine nuts

6. Cheese: add 3 small chunks of fetta if like

7. Dressing: 1/4 fresh lemon and squeeze all over, then about 1 tablespoon of a great olive oil (flavoured if like)

8. Extras: any other extras you can think of that are salad or veg based (i.e not a block of cheese on top)

N.B. This lunch box is both of our ‘go-to’ lunch when we’re out of home.

2. FabWrap.

This is going to have similar ingredients to the above, but less overall quantity and minus legumes (‘cos you have the wrap instead).

1. Get a Mountain Bread or Gluten-Free Wrap or similar.

2. Spread with hummus.

3. Add in some or all of ingredients as above

4. Make it so full of yummy things that it’s hard to ‘wrap’, so use a toothpick to hold it together til lunchtime

3. LovelyLeftovers

The more you get into the habit of cooking, the more you can cook a bit extra and take it the next day for lunch. Sounds simple, but it’s a mindset shift to cook extra ‘for the next day‘ rather than to polish off that night.

1. Fill plastic container with leftovers

2. Add a few healthy extras if required e.g. salad base

3. Take to work with your fork and eat cold or warm (don’t like microwaves myself, but warm up briefly in microwave if you have one at work)

4. RawRewards

If you’re into raw lunches, then here’s an idea for your lunch-in-a-box.

1. Chop up broccoli and cauliflower into little florets. Chop up zucchini, capsicum, carrot into little sticks.

2. Add in a small handful of currants and small handful of nuts (chopped is better).

3. Add sesame seeds

4. Lightly coat in lemon juice and sesame oil.

5. Wait til lunch…!

Simple Shake

5. SimpleShake

If you tend to skip lunch completely, or approach it haphazardly, then a smoothie will at least get you used to having something in the middle of the day. This is a breakfast recipe, but let’s not be rigid…! You MUST be able to keep this in a fridge up until drinking.

1. 2 eggs (raw)

2. 1/2 cup of berries

3. 1/2 coconut water (fresh or from bottle, go for 100% coconut water)

4. 1 tbsp of flaxseed meal

5. small handful of nuts (raw nuts only)

6. few drops of vanilla extract.

7. Blend and pour into sealed container, put in fridge as soon as you get to work.

So there we have it. 5 Healthy Lunch Box Ideas, hope you find at least one of them worth considering