The Lunchbox Gourmet |
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Some Lunch-Packing TipsGeneral TipsThe plastic egg which holds the toy inside the Kinder Egg treats makes a wonderful salad dressing container. It is made from strong food-safe plastic, it's washable and reusable, and is small enough not to take up too lunch lunchbox space. Thermos TipsPre-heating the thermos helps keep things hot. Just fill it with boiling water and let it sit for ten minutes before you fill it, and make sure all packed items are hot when they go in. Rice, pasta and barley in homemade soups will absorb liquid, and thicken after packing. You may want to leave space to top up the liquid with hot tap water when you are ready to eat. It really doesn't take extra time to pack a thermos meal. Just pour in some boiling before your morning shower to preheat it, and warm up the food while you eat breakfast. Before you leave the house, pout out the water, pour in your food and go! You can thaw frozen mixed vegetables or frozen single servings of veggie ground round or cooked meat equivalent by running them under hot tap water for a minute or so. A mini-strainer makes this really easy. Handy ingredients to always have on hand in your freezer for quick thermos lunches: cooked mince or veggie ground round in individual portions, cubed or shredded cooked chicken or meat, frozen vegetables, frozen hash brown potato bits. Handy pantry ingredients for quick thermos lunches include Minute rice, small pasta shapes, couscous, ramen or udon noodles, canned soup and canned tomato. |