Ideas for lunch at work

[renae172]

Here is my dilemma. My husband works construction. They have no microwaves or hot water. What kind of ideas can you give me for lunch. He is tired of sanwiches and vienna weinies and beanie weinies (which add up price wise I might add) and I cannot come up with anything. Any suggestions.

[marjorie]

How about soup, goulash, etc. in a thermos? Maybe with a wrap put into one of those small coolers sized for lunches or 6 packs of drinks. Tonight I brought in a big salad, to which you could easily add meats if he was willing to deal with the cooler type idea.

[zacsmum]

How about home made pasta or potato salads? You can make lots of varieties. Serve them with cold chicken and they make a great meal. As mentioned above, the thermos for soup and stew is a good idea. Try making home made pizzas, even if you just make them on english muffins and serve them cold. Bake some scrolls, you can make these sweet or savoury. Keep things interesting by using different kinds of bread - pita, lavash etc. My partner loves cold home made sausage rolls. Scotch eggs are good too, as is cold sausage pie. You can do lots of things with pastry. How about mincing some bacon in the food procesor, mixing it with grated cheese, placing it on top of a chicken breast, wrapping it all in filo pastry before cooking and serving that cold? Savoury muffins are good too, make a basic muffin mix from scratch but only add maybe 1 or 2 tablespoons of sugar to it instead of the usual, add diced ham, cheese and corn kernals to the mixture before cooking as usual - diced sundried tomatoes are nice in this too.
I have the same issue with my partner, you just have to be creative.

[PrincessPerky]

On the lazy side (thats me) DH takes a cold breakfast, bagles or muffins, cup of milk, yogurt with chocolate chips. cup of juice, etc. (he can heat up lunch, but only eats breakfast at work)

Funny to me the cup is a sippy cup . the lid is the same size as the plastic containers, so he puts a flat lid on the sippy cup and the 12 oz is perfect sized for milk or juice.

[DivaJen]

Originally Posted by renae172

Here is my dilemma. My husband works construction. They have no microwaves or hot water. What kind of ideas can you give me for lunch. He is tired of sanwiches and vienna weinies and beanie weinies (which add up price wise I might add) and I cannot come up with anything. Any suggestions.

Can he bring a small cooler with some blue ice in it? If so, that opens up a whole lot of possibilities. Tortilla wraps, all sorts of salads (pasta, bean, potato, regular), yogurts, leftover pizza, cold chicken.....

[Tree0164]

What about one of those heated thermos with leftovers. It will keep food warm.

[CheaplyClever]

My husband also takes his lunch to work. He uses a flat-top six-pack cooler. We freeze a bottle of water to put in the cooler and keep everything cold. When the water thaws out- something to drink! I would have trouble with the contents of the cooler if husband couldn't microwave. We always fix his next day lunch from tonight's supper. I sometimes freeze an extra plate for next week's lunch.

How about pinwheels; flour tortillas with pimento & cheese, a little crumbled bacon, small pieces of ham, and lettuce wrapped up tight and cut into quarters. The trick to a cooler lunch is to pack lots of healthy snacks (apple or orange, bag of peanuts, cheese and crackers, yogurt, jello with fruit, a soda, Little Debbie cakes, snack sized candy bars, carrot sticks, strawberries, peanut butter crackers) to supplement the simple sandwich or cold pasta main meal. The snacks can rotated to be the surprise and are very filling. I send plastic spoons and forks with him, and they can go in the dishwasher if he brings them home.

Thinking of construction lunches...Years ago my brother worked construction with lots of travel. The crew stayed broke until payday. They used to put cans of soup on the dashboard in the winter and let the defroster heat it up for lunch. They also favored the bread surplus stores. Everybody could spend a dollar and split the goodies!

[CheaplyClever]

[quote=zacsmum]Bake some scrolls, you can make these sweet or savoury. cold home made sausage rolls. Scotch eggs are good too, as is cold sausage pie.

This doesn't sound like food we eat in North Carolina! What are scotch eggs, sausage rolls, sausage pie, and scrolls? How do you make them?

[zacsmum]

scotch eggs - 6 eggs, 500g sausage mince, bread crumbs - Hard boil the eggs, cool and peel. Divide the sausage mince into 6 portions and mould each portion evenly around each egg. Rolll each egg in breadcrumbs, chill for 1 hour then deep fry until golden. Cut each egg in half to serve, great with a variety of sauces or on their own.

Sausage rolls - defost some frozen puff pastry sheets and cut each one in half so you have two large rectangles. Combine 500g sausage mince, 1 small chopped onions and 500g pork and veal mince. Place some of the mixture down the centre of each pastry square, roll pastry together so it joins at the bottom and seal. Place them on a greased oven tray (cookie sheet i think you call them), brush with milk or egg and cook at 180 degrees celcius (360 farenheight?) for 45 minutes or until golden. Yummiest served with tomato sauce (i think you call it ketchup?)

Sausage pie - this ones easy. Line a pie dish with puff pastry, cook some sausages and cut them in half. Place sausages in the pastry, pour some beaten eggs over the top. Top the pie with more puff pastry and seal. Pierce a hole in the top of the pie to vent and bake for 30 mins or until golden.

Scrolls - This one you can get really creative with. You can use either a bread dough or scone mix (i think they're called biscuits in america). Roll the dough out into a large rectangle about 1cm thick. Place any ingredients on top you like. Roll the entire thing up from long end to create a long sausage shape. Cut the roll into slices about 1 1/2 inches thick, place close together on a greased oven tray, scroll side up (so you can see the ingredients all rolled together in a spiral shape) and bake. Baking time depends on what bread/biscuit mix you use. Some popular ingredients are sweet chilli sauce and grated cheese. Ham pineapple, pizza sauce and cheese. Custard with a very sweet whipped cream icing on top sprinkled with coconut (with this one, cook the scrolls with the custard inside then ice once cool) Just experiment until you find your favourite fillings.

[Tree0164]

Great suggestions Zachmum... loving hearing different food ideas from across the world.

[CheaplyClever]

Thank you for the recipes. I printed them and will try the eggs this weekend.

[kashi]

I love seeing recipes from other parts of the world, too! Thanks zacsmum, I'm going to try your scrolls sometime soon.

[zacsmum]

That's good, i hope you like them. Let me know how you go.

[CRFSaver]

My favorite lunch is quite simple. Summer sausage and cheese. Cut into slices I can eat them plain or on crackers. get a block of cheese for 3 bucks and a hunk of summer sausage for a couple bucks. Add in any of the pasta salads or chips or fruit.