Frugal Food: English Muffin Pizza and Protein Packed Tuna Melts

You may have read my previous post about doing battle with your kid’s school lunchbox. Here are two great recipes that make great, healthy, filling snacks when your crew comes home hungry:

English Muffin Pizza

Ingredients:
1 Whole Wheat English Muffin, split in half (two pizzas)
1½ T Marinara sauce
½ mozzarella stick

Directions:
Spread the marinara sauce on each muffin half. Grate the mozzarella stick over the pizzas. Note, you can double the recipe (2 English muffins to make 4 pizzas) in order to use the whole stick. (You could grate any mozzarella, but I always have mozzarella sticks on hand to pack in lunches…) Now, place it in your toaster oven or convection oven or broiler and heat through until the cheese is melted.

I started doing this with bagels, but when I realized that I could buy English muffins for cheaper and that the muffins had less calories, I made the switch. My son devours these! DO NOT microwave these. It is faster, but the bread will get rubbery.


Protein Packed Tuna Melts (4 sandwiches)

1 can Tuna packed in water, drained
1 can Sardines, drained
1 T Ranch Dressing (or Mayo)
1 t Season All Spice (or our family favorite, Adobo, a traditional Spanish spice)
8 slices Whole Grain Bread
4 Cheddar Cheese slices (the real stuff, not the processed cheese food)

Combine the first four ingredients together in a bowl and mix well. Be sure to break up the sardines to disguise them! Spread the mix on a slice of bread and top with cheese slice. Top with another slice of bread and place in your sandwich maker or Panini grill. I actually use my George Foreman grill. If you don’t have any of these, you can go old school and just grill it in a pan spritzed with cooking spray. Use a plate to press the sandwich and repeat after flipping the sandwich with a spatula.
Many thanks to Missy Chase Lapine, The Sneaky Chef, for the idea of adding the sardines. Mixed in with the tuna, it is a great way to boost protein intake and Omega 3 fatty acids and it only subtly affects the taste.

If you are watching calories, you can use less filling or half a slice of cheese for each sandwich.

I enjoy eating these quick meals just as much as my kids do after a long day at school!

This post originally appeared in Maribel's Frugal Families blog for Chesapeake Family in October 2010.

Saving Money with School Lunches and Snacks

Lunchbox battles start early on in the school years, but here are some tricks of the trade that keep my first grader happy and decently fed without too much hassle.

Many school cafeterias offer healthy options, but that’s not really helpful if he can still choose to have hot dogs with those chips for lunch. I’ve decided that it is worth the effort to pack the boy’s lunch, save a few bucks and make some attempt at giving him healthy choices.

Here are my lunch packing rules of the road. Based on your child’s preferences, some of these may not work for you. The key is to find what does work and use that to leverage healthier eating options at a fraction of the cost.

1. Don’t pack the fruit! Let’s face it. It’s too easy for kids to just dump unwanted food in the garbage can and trust me, they are doing it. So, since I know my guy won’t eat the fruit while he’s at school, I don’t even bother to put it in there. Instead, I pack raisins, dried fruit, granola bars, dried cranberries or yogurt covered raisins. Yes, there is a high amount of sugar, but the kid is also getting the fiber and carbs from the fruit also. Apple & Eve Fruitables are the juice box of choice in our house because I can buy them in bulk at BJ’s, they have no high fructose corn syrup and contain 2 servings of VEGGIES, that’s right, veggies such as carrots ingeniously disguised with berries, banana, orange or other fruit.

2. Pack snacks you know they like, even if it’s not a meal. Great options here are cheese sticks, dried cereal, pudding (calcium!), portable yogurt and a favorite sandwich. Some kids hate bread, so flatbread is a great way to make many interesting sandwiches with whatever filler they prefer. Pack crackers and lunch meat and they can assemble their own sandwiches. Again, the name of the game is to get them to eat the food you actually pack. The next tip will allay your fears that your child is not properly fed.

3. Flip the script. My son has a nice hot snack as soon as he gets off the bus. Some great ideas are tuna melts, grilled egg salad sandwiches, leftover spaghetti, and homemade bagels pizzas. The key here is that I can see that he is actually eating the food. Also, since I packed snacks that are not too hateful and that I know he loves, I’m sure he’s eaten those also. Here is where the leverage comes in – he’s already had all his “goodies” for the day, so now you can clamp down and serve hearty food at home. Again, when the boy says he’s hungry, I offer the fruit, whole wheat, protein and the other “good stuff” that was missing in his lunchbox. Wham…. Got him!

4. Dipping sauces are magic! Peanut butter, ketchup or ranch dressing, hummus are condiments that can encourage a picky eater. I will slice an apple and arrange it on a plate with peanut butter in the center. This does not pack well for lunch, but is great for an at home snack. Chicken and veggies may also be tastier with a bit of dressing. Again, for our crew, these things don’t pack well, so I make sure to serve them at home after the portable snacks have been polished off.

5. Prepackage it yourself. Those 100 calorie snacks are convenient, but they are nothing but a portion controlled size of the regular thing. Save a few bucks by buying snacks and prepacking them yourself in snack bags. Doing a week’s worth of bags afterschool one day makes lunch packing a snap. Also, you have a wider variety of snacks to choose from this way.

This article originally appeared as one of Maribel's Frugal Families blog posts on Chesapeake Family.

Frugal Families: Saving Money with School Lunches and Snacks

Check out my latest post for Chesapeake Family....
Frugal Families: Saving Money with School Lunches and Snacks

You can also follow me on Twitter...