School Lunches : Pink Potatoes? Yum!

Believe me, I know: You’re harried, you’ve occasionally left the house with a hole in your sock, grooming is but a fond memory, and your 5-year-old thinks that the words “past your bedtime” are the doorway to paradise. To top it off, now you have to pack lunch five days a week for a tiny tyrant who is absolutely capable of deciding, in the time it takes for cheese to melt, that he hates the quesadilla he couldn’t live without when you dropped everything to make it five minutes ago.

Worse yet, you are the primary target of that most powerful of combines, the convenience food/entertainment industry complex, a synergistic cabal of businesses whose sole mission in life is to convince you that kids don’t eat unless you serve them packaged food imprinted with a favorite character’s likeness or endorsement.

But don’t cave in. The truth is, you’re in a much more powerful position than you realize, once you understand the basic tenets of pre-pubescent food service.

First, realtors are not the only ones who talk about “pride of ownership.” A cooking kid (or even just a mixing kid) is an eating kid. Second, grammar schoolers still want to grow up to be like mom or dad, which can mean eating what the grown-ups eat. This particular yearning will soon evaporate and be replaced by weary disdain, so take advantage of it while you can. And, third, never forget that your child cannot yet read your cookbooks and so does not know anything about truly authentic regional Italian cuisine or instructions such as, “Serve piping hot.”

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Kindergartners are intensely aware of how dependent they are. They can’t drive, can’t read the newspaper, can’t even order the double chocolate sundae with nuts unless their parents tell them it’s on the menu. Refusing to eat--or insisting on the same marginal cuisine, lunch in and lunch out--is one of their most effective power plays.

It may be scary when a lunch box comes home untouched, but the child will not starve; a growing kid’s hunger will win out long before you have to resort to soda pop and potato chips. If the kid’s requests are more nutritionally sound than that, though, give in. I know one boy who embarked on a white diet in elementary school. He ate white food--cottage cheese, plain noodles, white bread, milk. Ten years later he’s a star swimmer, entering the freshman class at Harvard. So stand your ground, but be prepared to lighten up.

What I mean is this: Lunch-box food does not have to fit the standard 1960s sandwich/juice/piece of fruit or carrot sticks paradigm. Neither does it have to reflect recent box-office grosses. Nutritionists periodically step onto the breakfast soapbox and remind us that we don’t have to eat traditional breakfast foods at breakfast; the important thing is to eat a decent meal. The same holds true, with mild constraints on size and perishability, at lunch.

Today it’s much easier to pack a lunch than it used to be, thanks primarily to the housewares companies. They are making hard plastic containers that eliminate squished food, are easy to open and even protect the environment by replacing disposable plastic food bags. The juice boxes, with their own built-in straws, really are leakproof--and, according to one grateful kindergarten teacher, eliminate the juice geysers you get with containers that must be punctured with a straw. At least one company is also selling a line of containers with larger-than-usual tab closings, big enough for a small hand to grasp and open (the traditional ones often aren’t). Now lunch doesn’t have to begin with the frustration of waiting for an adult to help out.

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The only real question is what to serve.

Let’s start with the issue of creative deception. It’s really OK to practice a little sleight of hand in the interest of nutritional balance.

The easiest way is to find things your child likes and then fool around with them. My daughter developed an early affection for pesto--matched by a dislike of anything else that was green. How to get those dark veggies into her? I steamed a zucchini and put it in the food processor with more traditional pesto ingredients--and then, just to mask the greenery a bit, smoothed the sauce with nonfat ricotta.

I might not serve it to purist friends, but Sarah continues to love it. She even loves it when the dread spinach replaces half the basil. I figure by the time she comprehends real pesto, she’ll have forgotten the particulars of her kindergarten cuisine.

It’s unlikely that most kids would willingly eat a beet, but when blended with a comfort food like mashed potatoes, it’s almost irresistible. Citrus restaurant owner Michel Richard makes a delicious potato and beet puree. Sure, it’s best served the moment you’re done preparing it. But it’s also fuchsia. Pink potatoes! The very notion sent Sarah into peals of laughter, and the novelty distracts her from the fact that she’s eating it at room temperature.

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Which brings us to the best diversion. Let your children participate in the growing or preparing of a food, and they are likelier to gobble it up at lunch time. The first time I made Richard’s puree I gave Sarah a hand ricer and she went to work mashing until, as she put it, “all the white stuff is gone.” By the time she finished she had a proprietary interest in the outcome. She had to eat it.

The best sources of kids’ recipes are Alice Waters’ “Fanny at Chez Panisse” (HarperCollins: 1992) and Mollie Katzen’s “Pretend Soup” (Tricycle Press: 1994). Waters’ book was, for a long time, our daughter’s favorite bedtime book. It’s full of short stories about life at the famous Berkeley restaurant, all of them accompanied by winsome illustrations, all of them featuring the indefatigable Fanny, the Eloise of the culinary universe. The recipes are easy to make and fun to eat, and the corn bread--simple for a child to help measure and mix--is a perfect lunch-box treat either by itself or sliced horizontally to serve as a unique sandwich bread.

Katzen’s book offers illustrated recipes so that even the pre-reader can work through a recipe with a little assistance. Looking at the drawings gives a child a real sense of power--this is a youngster’s universe, full of funny names and silly decorations--but the food is substantial enough to satisfy parents. Katzen’s bright pink fruit dip may not be the apotheosis of good eating, with its frozen raspberries and cream cheese--but there’s yogurt in it too, and it’s less sweetened than the bevy of yogurts aimed at kids.

And it’s a portal to fresh fruit. If you’ve got a little tub of fruit dip in your lunch box, you need something to dip into it; Sarah studied the illustration and insisted on banana slices--which she usually avoids--simply because they were in the picture.

Setting up a food as mom and dad’s favorite, which (for some kids) makes it worthy of attention, requires cooperative parents, but it’s easier than you think. We eat so much pasta in our house that Sarah grew up believing it was the one food real people ate. Since she desperately wanted to be a real person, she ate--and eats--almost anything if it’s part of a noodle sauce. Pastina cooked in chicken broth (with the carrots mashed through), fusilli with corn, chopped tomatoes and olive oil, penne with tomato-and-turkey-sausage sauce. On the days when I break down and make her a tuna sandwich, she acts like I’m neglecting her.

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By now working moms are weeping into their Filofaxes, wondering how they’ll ever do right by their children, but I speak as an overextended parent myself. It’s not difficult to offer variety. Make a pound of pasta at night even though your family won’t finish it, and send the leftovers, sprinkled anew with Parmesan or garnished with cherry tomatoes, as the next day’s lunch. Roast a chicken on the weekend and add the leftovers, cubed, to rice with a tablespoon of pesto.

If you study the convenience foods, you see them for what they really are--diminished versions of real foods (and only a few of them) that you can more healthfully, and cheaply, make yourself. Are you really going to pay more money for something whose shelf life is longer than the warranty on your car?

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This smooth sauce, milder than traditional pesto, might make wary kids a bit more willing to eat something green.

SARAH’S PASTA SAUCE 1/4 to 1/2 pound zucchini, cut in thick slices 2 tablespoons olive oil 2 cloves garlic 1/4 cup toasted pine nuts 2 cups fresh basil 1/4 cup nonfat ricotta cheese 1 pound short tube pasta Parmesan cheese

While water for pasta comes to boil, steam zucchini until tender. Add to oil, garlic, pine nuts, basil and ricotta cheese in work bowl of food processor. Puree until smooth.

Cook and drain pasta and mix with sauce. Sprinkle with Parmesan cheese and serve. Makes 6 servings.

Each serving contains about:

374 calories; 16 mg sodium; 3 mg cholesterol; 10 grams fat; 60 grams carbohydrates; 13 grams protein; 0.38 gram fiber.

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All a parent has to do is melt the butter and set out the measuring cups and spoons. Kids always seem to enjoy recipes that involve making eggs disappear into a batter. From Alice Waters’ “Fanny at Chez Panisse.”

FANNY’S CORN BREAD 3/4 cup cornmeal 1 cup flour 1 tablespoon sugar 1 tablespoon baking powder 3/4 teaspoon salt 1 egg 1 cup milk 1/4 cup butter, melted

In medium bowl mix cornmeal, flour, sugar, baking powder and salt. Make well in middle. Add egg and milk. Gently stir dry ingredients into milk and egg until batter is smooth. Stir in melted butter.

Bake at 425 degrees in buttered 8-inch pie pan until browned on top, about 20 minutes. Makes 6 servings.

Each serving contains about:

243 calories; 618 mg sodium; 59 mg cholesterol; 10 grams fat; 32 grams carbohydrates; 6 grams protein; 0.16 gram fiber.

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It’s nice to tuck a treat into a lunch box every now and then--and if you’re going to choose a blueberry muffin, this berry-rich version is the best. It’s adapted from “Mark Peel & Nancy Silverton at Home” by Mark Peel and Nancy Silverton (Warner Books: 1994).

BLUEBERRY MUFFINS WITH NUTMEG TOPPING 1/2 cup unsalted butter, at room temperature 1/2 cup granulated sugar 1/2 cup powdered sugar 1 1/2 tablespoons vanilla 2 eggs 1 cup buttermilk or plain yogurt 1 teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg 1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder 1/2 teaspoon baking soda 1/2 teaspoon salt 1 1/3 cups cake flour 2 tablespoons whole-wheat flour 2 cups fresh blueberries 1/2 teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg stirred into 1/4 cup granulated sugar

In large mixing bowl, cream butter with both sugars until very light in color. Scrape sides of bowl with rubber spatula. Add vanilla, eggs and buttermilk, beating constantly.

In another bowl stir together nutmeg, baking powder, baking soda, salt and flours. Add to butter mixture. Gently mix just until combined. Gently fold in blueberries. Fill paper-lined muffin cups to top with batter. Sprinkle each muffin with about 2 teaspoons nutmeg sugar. Place on rack in upper 1/3 of oven.

Bake at 400 degrees until muffins are lightly browned, about 20 to 25 minutes. Remove muffins from pan to cooling rack. Serve warm or at room temperature. Makes 16 muffins.

Each muffin contains about:

159 calories; 153 mg sodium; 43 mg cholesterol; 7 grams fat; 23 grams carbohydrates; 2 grams protein; 0.28 gram fiber.

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The potatoes and vinegar make the beets less strident--and any kindergartner with pink potatoes is assured of being the center of lunchtime attention. From “Michel Richard’s Home Cooking With a French Accent,” by Michel Richard (William Morrow & Co.: 1993).

RED SQUARE POTATO PUREE 5 small russet potatoes, peeled and quartered 2 teaspoons red wine vinegar Salt Freshly ground pepper 4 medium beets, peeled and quartered 1/4 cup milk Salt 1/4 cup unsalted butter, chopped, at room temperature 2 tablespoons minced chives or green onions

In medium pot cover potatoes with cold, salted water. Bring to boil over medium-high heat. Reduce heat and simmer until very tender and almost falling apart, about 20 minutes. Drain. Set large-holed sieve over same pot. Mash potatoes through sieve, using large mallet and up-down motion. Stir in vinegar. Season to taste with salt and pepper. Can be prepared ahead, covered and set aside at room temperature.

Meanwhile, in separate medium pot cover beets with cold, salted water. Bring to boil over medium-high heat. Reduce heat and simmer until very tender and easily pierced with knife, about 20 minutes. Drain. Puree beets with milk in blender until smooth, pulsing on and off and stopping to scrape down sides of container. Season to taste with salt and pepper. Strain beet puree into potatoes through fine sieve, pressing on beets to extract as much juice as possible. Can be prepared ahead, covered and set aside at room temperature.

To serve, stir puree over medium-high heat until warm, using wooden spatula. Add butter and stir until smooth. Can be prepared 1 hour ahead to this point and kept warm in larger pan of gently simmering water. Mix in chives. Makes 4 to 6 servings.

Each of 4 servings contains about:

272 calories; 247 mg sodium; 32 mg cholesterol; 12 grams fat; 38 grams carbohydrates; 7 grams protein; 1.57 grams fiber.

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It’s weird, it’s colorful, it’s halfway between soupy and goopy. The kids we served it to gobbled it up. From “Pretend Soup” by Mollie Katzen and Ann Henderson.

BRIGHT PINK FRUIT DIP 1 (10-ounce) package frozen sweetened raspberries, thawed 1/2 cup softened cream cheese 1 cup yogurt 2 teaspoons lemon juice

Place raspberries (including all liquid) and cream cheese in blender or food processor. Puree until smooth. Transfer to bowl.

Add yogurt and lemon juice and whisk until smooth. Makes about 2 1/2 cups.

Each 1-tablespoon serving contains about:

19 calories; 14 mg sodium; 4 mg cholesterol; 1 grams fat; 1 grams carbohydrates; 1 gram protein; 0.21 gram fiber.

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Antique lunchboxes in photos from Marc Mapelli and Geri Wynn Antiques, Pasadena Antique Center, Pasadena.

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Lunch bag in photo from Bristol Farms Cook ‘N’ Things, South Pasadena.