Review of Lunch Lessons: Changing the Way We Feed Our Children (Paperback)

The photograph on the cover of this book is a bit misleading. The topic of "Lunch Lessons" has a lot more to do with improving American school hot lunch programs than it is about packing healthy brown bag lunches for your own child. It does include a list of recipes at the back of the book.Many sound great, like the "Three Cheese-Vegetable Strata" and the "High Protein Squares" (a homemade replacement for power bars).They also look very time-consuming.Although I haven't tried any of the recipes, it seems to me that making your own pizza dough for the "Pizza Wheels" might take a bit longer than anyone wants to spend making lunch. Actually, I think the recipes are really in here to inspire the people who make hot lunches in school cafeterias.

Like other reviewers I am interested improving school nutrition policies.I head a health committee at my daughter's school dedicated to improving nutrition and fitness for the students and their families.As such this book should be a perfect fit. Unfortunately for me, my daughter attends a private school and almost all of the information in this book, including the reference list in the back, is only helpful if your child attends a public school. (I've actually found more useful information on government web sites than I have in this book!)That doesn't mean it's been completly useless.There are a few great tidbits to be found here and there.I found the recommendation about "laptop lunches" really great.I don't think I would have found out about the company and their fabulous lunch boxes had it not been for this book. (The cover photograph shows a "laptop" lunchbox.)

In the end I think I would recommend this book to anyone interested in taking on the enormous problem of unhealthy school lunches in public schools. If you're looking for new ideas for your child's lunchbox there are probobly better books out there. If like me you're trying to improve the health policies at a private school there probably won't be many ideas in "Lunch Lessons" that you can use exactly as described.



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