Thursday, November 3, 2011

Lunch from hell, part II

 Several months back I wrote a riveting little post about my daughter's relentless campaign to get me to buy Lunchables™ for her "sack" lunches. That was lunch from hell, part I, I guess. Here is a little update on my dear child's renewed adoration of the evil, highly-processed and environmentally toxic little package known as the Oscar Mayer Lunchable™. In her defense, this time around I don't think she was trying to coerce or beg me into purchasing the lunchable. It was more like she was simply expressing her undeniable attraction to it and trying hard to understand why something so cute, so compact, so neatly-packaged and so flawlessly marketed could be the epitome of evil that I make it out to be. In the end, we had an uncharacteristically unheated discussion and I was able to explain why our own, homemade rendering of the cheese, meat & cracker lunch would be healthier and produce far less garbage to end up, eons later, sitting in a landfill. A new and improved plan was formulated to create our own "lunchable."

Yes, you are seeing correctly. Those are star-shaped pieces of American cheese. As well as star-shaped pieces of ham. Since this pic was actually taken following the second day's preparation of the homemade "lunchable," an extensive collection of cheese scraps has accumulated, which is just visible on the left side of the photo. I ask you, who is going to eat all those cheese scraps? I don't even really like American cheese, unless of course it is sandwiched between two excessively-buttered pieces of grilled bread and it's all melty and oozey and then it's quite delicious. But that sandwich is best prepared in a greasy diner by someone who goes by "junior" so I still find myself with a considerable pile of cheese scraps and no good solution for what to do with them.

A much bigger problem, however, is the fact that the beautiful ham and cheese stars came home in her lunch box today largely untouched. While quite enthusiastic about this new lunch option yesterday, when they were novel, today... not so much. And although you might see this as totally unrelated, I would just like to point out that I have a Master's degree. And not in Home Economics, as you might suspect.

Educated mind, please accept my deepest apologies. And maybe while I'm at it, I should also apologize to the creator of the Lunchable™, Oscar Mayer (whoever he is), and the whole Kraft Food corporation, because I am clearly not as clever at packaging a lunch for my child as you all are. It's back to PB&J for Martha. But do me a favor, please, just one more time, check out this delightfully creative, as well as celestial display of luncheon morsels. Can you even get over how cute that is? Neither can I.

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