Help me add fat to my child's lunch

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP here, thanks for the suggestions. I agree that his lunch is sugar-heavy which is one of my issues with it. He won't eat cream cheese and has noticed when I tried to add butter and refused to eat it. Likes avocado but not guac so if I sent guac and chips he would only eat the chips. Won't eat hummus or even whipped cream.

He does like cheese sticks, not sure why I had not thought to throw one in his lunch. I will try some of the other suggestions too, but basically, he is a carb/sweets hound and he likes his carbs plain. Maybe we can do chicken nuggets in a thermos. For proteins he likes chicken nuggets, chicken, fish, and occasionally he will eat a burger. I'm going to try a chicken sandwich.

PP who mentioned the granola butter -- what is the brand and where did you buy it?

I bet he likes this! And I agree that putting in some cheese sticks may help boost the protein and fat. Buy carefully, though. Some of them are low-fat, which is what you don't necessarily want (although any fat would help, I guess!).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:A jelly sandwich, fruit, and a yogurt are all full of sugar. I would find something else to replace the jelly sandwich. How about cheese? Or cheese and turkey?

Yes, his palate is getting addicted to sugar. Put healthy foods in there and after a couple of days, he will eat them.

[Anonymous]

I had an underweight kid and also threw in cheese sticks everyday. Chicken avocado sandwich on bakery bread (non sugar heavy Wonder bread) or in a pita would be great. Also, oddly, my kid loved a whole apple in his lunch and would always eat a few bites (which is great, doesn't need to eat it all) for something sweet at the end of the meal. I also would make homemade mac and cheese in individual containers and freeze them. Take one out overnight and put it in the oven as soon as I woke up so it would be scalding hot for a thermos for lunch. My DS also loved Clif bars -- son't know if there is an allergy free one for you, but those really pack on calories, protein and weight.

[Anonymous]

Meant to add that the Martha Stewart mac n cheese recipe is great for this.

[Anonymous]

Can he tolerate pumpkin seeds? I often replace sunflower seed recipes with pepitas, or blend them into butter because DD prefers that.

Avocado is a natural. If he likes cold pizza, why not send in the fixings for pizza - slices or pepperoni, shredded cheese, etc.

I often make crepes or tortillas for DDs lunch as she too will only eat jelly sandwiches, but you could easily adapt either of those to have more egg or fat in the batter/dough.

As has been mentioned - cheese sticks, Babybel cheese, laughing cow cheese… load him up!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Things that he will eat at home include rice, chicken, fish, pasta, chicken nuggets, waffles & sausage. He just doesn't seem to eat those things when we send them in his lunch as leftovers.

Try changing to croissants for his sandwiches. Croissants are higher in fats (lots of butter) than most breads.

You can adjust the way you cook most of his favorites to include more fat. Rice or pasta can be cooked in chicken broth instead of water. You can add butter or oil to the cooking water. You can cook chicken or fish in oil, either fried, or pan fried. Waffles, you can add more whipped butter to the recipe. Look online, there are many tips for reducing the fat in recipes for most of the above. You can reverse those or adjust to use more butter, olive oil and other fat sources.