What do you pack in your child’s lunch?
Even if you pack your kids’ lunch in an insulated bag with ice packs, the food is likely at an unsafe temperature by the time they eat them.
A new study of preschoolers’ lunches found that most of the food sent from home was not safe to eat by lunchtime.
“The main finding of our study is that more than 90 percent of perishable items were at an unacceptable temperature – according to USDA guidelines – an hour and a half before lunch,” said study author Fawaz Almansour, a doctoral candidate in the department of nutritional sciences at the University of Texas at Austin.
“This was an eye opener. As a parent, when my child comes home with a stomach ache or vomiting, I usually think it’s a virus. I don’t think the food I serve is the problem,” he said.
When food isn’t kept at less than 40 degrees fahrenheit (4.44 celsius), bacteria can multiply rapidly, which makes foodborne illness more likely, especially for kids under the age of five.
The researchers tested 706 lunches 1.5 hours before the kids’ scheduled lunch time. About 39 percent of the lunches had no ice packs, while 45 percent had just one ice pack. Only 1.6 percent of perishable items were kept in the safe temperature zone recommended by the USDA.
Even when multiple ice packs were used, food often wasn’t at a safe temperature. Results of the study will appear in the September issue of Pediatrics
So what do we pack our kids lunch? Fruit, dried fruit bread, crackers are some options. Packing a hot lunch in a thermos will hopefully keep food hot enough until lunch – or will it?
Schools that have cafeterias don’t all offer healthy choices either. Some schools offer hot lunches delivered to the school.
Stay-at-home parents can drop off fresh lunches at school just in time to eat. But working parents may face more of a challenge.
What do you think?
1 Comment
Vomiting or having a stomach ache is almost never related to a virus, instead it is very likely related to bad food. I don’t know what Fawaz Almansour was feeding his children, but it sounds serious if his children were vomiting. Finding food that stays good and your child likes to eat might be a challenge, but a challenge worth challenging.