As an advocate for affordable, healthy nutrition for all, Rea Mokoko, a registered dietitian and mom has come up with quick and easy-to-make lunchbox meals for kids. The dietitian not only recommends healthy meals for her clients but also runs a catering business that offers nutritional foods. The founder and CEO of Plates and Scales joins us this morning to share a few ideas for lunchbox recipes.
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Welcome back now as an advocate for affordable Healthy nutrition for all rioko a register dietician and Mom has come up with quick and easy to make lunchbox meals for kids The dietitian not only recommends healthy meals for her clients but also runs a catering business that offers nutritional Foods
She is the founder and CEO of plates and scales and she joins us now this morning to share a few ideas of lunchbox uh recipes very good morning toia thanks for joining us welcome good morning good morning good to have you on the show this morning thank you likewise great
Stuff now now that the kids are fully into school mode uh what are some of the best lunchbox options that you that want to share um yo I have quite a number I’ve got a 10day menu but there are some easy things I always say don’t discard leftovers if there’s some leftover
Chicken you can just chop it up put it into a sandwich put it into a wrap um something easy also to make is like French toast which is here I’ve made it um so French toast is another quick simple one that you can put together um
Chips and some things that you can just throw into the air fryer you know the air fry is a new healthy thing that you can be yeah so things like your chicken nuggets your chicken strips that you can throw into the air fryer that are good
Quick and fast to make yeah how do we make lunch boxes more creative and more nutritious because you know some parents they always have bread and cheese and pone 5 days a week oh my gosh um that is very true and I always um I always with
With my menu um I try to limit the bread to about one day week because there’s so much that you can play around with so this this is a menu like chicken wraps you can make wraps for over um there is a chuna pasta simple cooked pasta chop
Some Tomatoes chop some cherries and some chuna and then you mix it some fish chuna with what though um so it’s It’s a pasta so it’s like macaroni then you put the tuna in there you put your cucumbers it’s like a tuna pasta salad so it can
Be have you can have it cold so it’s ideal right right right so you don’t always have to have bread as no you don’t always have to have bread there there’s also mac and cheese there’s some Toasties there’s Burgers also because burgers using a bread um brown bread raw
With some uh Patty and some lettuce it means that this is It’s a healthier version and the kids are not always getting the uh bread with uh cheese ham and po there’s a lot to play around with yeah yeah and then in terms of the quick options because I did
Mention that you know some parents uh are going for the quicker options so what would you recommend um so quick options like I said from the leftovers I always try to use make left um suppers that I can incorporate the next day so something like your rice and strip so it
You know the the meal where it’s just like cooked rice with veggies cut up and the CH that can be thrown the next day into your lunch boxes uh mac and cheese can also the work work the next day so try to plan a day a day in advance to
See okay can this be used the next day or things that you can throw in your air fry so once once you’re getting the kids ready you can just put things in the air fryer and just assemble you know some parents find it U you know quite hard
That they are now competing with tuck shops because you can prepare scating for your kid and then the TU shop at the school or the school Cen offers even more nicer and more nutritious meals how do we make sure that our kids stick to the scuffin that you prepared for them
Um so number one limit giving them money so that’s number one those kids don’t earn they don’t earn a living without you giving them the money they can’t buy anything I was actually in the other day I went to my kids school to get uniform
And the kids were going into the T the cafeteria in and out and most of the things that were buying were literally sugars oh gosh um so you must remember that that whatever you give them it’s up to them what they decide what they buy
Yeah um so you need to be very careful around the money situation every time I pack a lunch box for my kids I always emphasize why I’m packing what I’m packing so I will let them like a lunch box like this where it’s french toast on brown bread it’s brown bread cuz it’s
High in fiber high in fiber and fiber is good for your time so that’s why we’re using brown why do why do I pack fruits and vegetables they know that fruits vegetables are high in fiber they have vitamins and minerals so when they are IM when they’re feeling a bit sickish
I’ll tell them thing your immune system the one that’s supposed to help you get better needs things like fruits and vegetables actually build it up so you can be strong so education education is key we should not do things without informing kids and making them part and parcel of everything that we’re doing
Because it means that they don’t they don’t then they just think you’re being you’re forcing them to eat healthier live healthier they don’t get the whole thing behind it but and then how do we make fruits uh you know so cool for them and an attractive thing to eat even
Without supervision because you can make scaf tin for your kids and put in throw in a couple of fruits here and there and the scaf tin comes back with the fruits but there’s no bread but there’s no other foods but the fruits always comes back how do we make sure that they
Always eat fruit and make it you know a habit that they always do so I think I always say that eating habits start at home so if your kids are used to eating fruits in the home environment then it it won’t be a foreign thing when they
Open their lunch boxes and they see a fruit so what I do in the house is that there’s always a fruit basket fruit basket that’s always nicely displayed with fresh fruit uh for them so when they come to me and they say I’m hungry I’m like where the fruit basket there’s
Always a water dispenser where they can just get water so it becomes a habit so when they open that lunch my kids know that when they opening that lunch boxes they’re not expecting fruit juices they’re not expect in anything high in sugar they know that it’s always something healthy what’s wrong with
Fruit juices though uh fruit juices are 100% they’re high in sugar um uh one container of fruit juice will contain about 5 teaspoons of sugar would you allow your kid to have and you remember the foods have hidden sugars so if we accumulate if we calculate the number
The amount of sugar they have a day it becomes too high so wherever you can limit it so I always say that so how should they down their Foods then you recomend bottle of water or or milk like I say you build the habits at home and
When you’re building the habits at home you educate on the importance because now if they’re always Downing it with sugary things their palette will be drawn to more sugary things and that’s you see how adults are now Downing 2 lit of coke a day yeah yeah it’s because
Those those habits were built from a young age and they were not educated on the importance of just drinking water let’s let’s drink water let’s drink water that’s the that’s one of the biggest things that is a tough task though because I myself as an adult I
Don’t see myself eating a nice healthy sandwich and then drinking water to down your whole no my kids are but you’re quite right it needs to start at home The Habit needs to start at home yes because we have so many right now the childhood obesity is a real thing Co
Came and really messed us up uh because our kids are indoors they were not active and it was a thing that most people were cooking so and most of the cooking was really unhealthy calorie intense and then a lot of kids picked up a lot of weight from that time on and
Right now most I think three every three out of five kids right now battling with childhood obesity and remember obese kids are more likely to become obese adults so it’s education education let’s fix the problem now because before we get adults that are prone to strokes and hypertension it’s really on the increase
Right now okay all right R lovely chatting to you thank you so much for sharing your tips with us thank you so much awesome awesome we just spoke to Ria Moko a registered dietician and founder of plates and scales about the incredible work she’s doing with the
Lunchbox ideas of for parents that they can try out for their children