Packing lunch for eight to fourteen people, twice a week.

Twice a week, we spend most of the day at friends’ houses.  We bring our day’s schoolwork with us, and once a week we bring lunch for the children (five to ten of them all together, depending on who shows up).

We used to cook a hot lunch for everyone, but that got ridiculously exhausting and messy as our families grew.  We finally gave it up during my most recent pregnancy.  Nowadays, one family brings a lunch already prepared. 

Usually, that’s one or two loaves of whole-wheat bread made into sandwiches and repacked into the bread bags (don’t ask me why I never figured out that very sensible trick until Hannah showed me), plus some fruit.   Other things are possible.  The key is to bring it with all the messy work already done — all that’s left to do is maybe to cut up the sandwiches and put them on plates.  Or paper towels.

I like to make two different kinds of sandwich when it’s my turn; it’s nice for the kids to have a choice.  And it’s not really harder or messier, especially since I always make it the night before.   The kids drink water, or milk if the host family has extra.

Here are some of the things I have brought that need no additional preparation (beyond cutting sandwiches into quarters):

• Peanut butter sandwiches with honey or apple butter.
• Cream-cheese-and-salami, and cream-cheese-and-cucumber sandwiches.  (The latter is very, very popular with the kids, more than you’d think.)
• Tuna-salad sandwiches, and egg-salad-and-watercress sandwiches.
• Turkey-and-mustard, and turkey-and-mayonnaise sandwiches.
• Cocktail wieners and cheese cubes and pineapple chunks — and a box of toothpicks. 
• "Deli Tray Day" — hard salami and sliced cheese and whole-grain crackers.
• Pre-made hummus and lovely whole wheat pitas.

Then there are some things that require just a little bit of work once we get where we’re going.  I usually call ahead to have my friend preheat the oven.

• Quesadillas:  the night before, I sandwich a mixture of canned refried beans, shredded cheese, and salsa between corn tortillas.  They are repacked cold into the tortilla bag.  Upon arrival, I put them on a foil-lined baking sheet and bake them for about 10 minutes at 350 degrees.
• English-muffin pizzas:  The night before, I separate the English-muffin halves and repack them into bags.  I bring a can of pizza sauce and a bag of preshredded cheese — maybe pepperoni if I’m feeling generous.  I assemble these on foil-lined baking sheets and bake them for about 10 minutes again.
• Pasta, pre-cooked and packed in plastic bags, and a container of pre-made tomato sauce.   Just heat the sauce and mix the two together.   I recommend against spaghetti — elbows or shells are far less messy. 
• Variation on the above:  use chili.
• Variation on the above:  mix the pasta with olive oil, canned tuna, peas, and a little dill.  This one’s good at room temperature.
• A pre-assembled casserole (great if you are making one for dinner some other day of the week) — our kids love homemade macaroni and cheese, or anything taco-flavored.
• Nachos:  just bring a bag of good-quality whole-corn tortilla chips, a bag of shredded cheese, and salsa.  Make a whole jelly roll pan (foil-lined!) in the oven.

What goes on the side? 

• Grapefruits or oranges, sliced, the slices cut into quarters, pre-packed in a plastic bag.  It’s easy for a child to bite the flesh off the tiny scrap of rind.  We always give the kids a second plate for the rind, otherwise the little ones throw it on the floor.
• Whole small apples or whole clementines, one per child.  (Unlike other citrus fruit, the kids can peel their own clementines.  Same thing as above re: the extra bowl.)
• Pre-cut chunks of melon.
• Baby carrots or celery sticks — always pre-cut!  I sometimes bring yogurt cheese to stuff the celery with.

It used to be that the moms ate the same lunch as the kids (except D. who can’t tolerate wheat and is always smart enough to bring a container of salami and cheese for herself).  Heaven help the rest of us if the children left lots on the plates — we’d nibble PB&J crusts all day! 

Recently we’ve been going more low-carb.  The easiest thing to do, many days, is to make a big cheese omelet for the moms to share.  It only dirties one pan, only takes a couple of minutes, and there’s always plenty of eggs and cheese and coconut oil around.  (Our tribe believes in saturated fat.  I mean, really believes in it.)  Sometimes, if we’re not hungry, we’ll make a quick sipping-soup out of chicken stock (or canned broth) and canned coconut milk, simmered with a little ginger and Thai fish sauce or soy sauce.  If there are leftover cold greens to put in it, so much the better.

We gather together, remind the kids to put down their forks, take a minute to quiet down.  The mother who’s hosting says grace according to her own family’s formula, everybody says Amen, and we all dig in.