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The Brown Bag Brigade Your One Stop buy Work Lunch concepts

Sunday, December 22, 2013


For two years, I’ve been fairly systematically packing my lunch for work. And like loads of alternative personal finance bloggers, it’s saved Pine Tree State mad dough – somewhere within the neighborhood of $2500, I’m idea. to place it in additional concrete terms, that’s five-hitter of the payment on a house, 2 sweet vacations, rent for four months, 10 160GB iPods, or eighty semi-decent pairs of shoes. Nice.

Alas, life’s been alittle agitated of late, therefore last week I opted for takeout soup, sandwiches, and Z-grade dish over home-cured salads and be-tupperwared leftovers. Admittedly, it absolutely was a pleasant modification, however it conjointly served as a reminder. i used to be stuffed by the top of every day, down $40 by the top of the week, and couldn’t BELIEVE what percentage disposable plastic and foam containers I had tilled through. (Thanks, Midtown!)

I know brown sacking has been coated thoroughly by each single media supply breathing (ABC, BBC, Highlights Magazine, The Hills, etc.), however its importance can’t be exaggerated. Simply, as a result of conveyance lunch to figure is:

 low-cost (see initial paragraph),
    Healthy (as it provides you management over your food), and
 sensible (for the environment).

So, with nice excitement, ado, celebration, gum olibanum, and myrrh, I gift you with … the remainder of the post! its 2 key sections: the primary is chock jam-packed with tips to assist set up your hour meals with efficiency and effectively, whereas the second is an in depth information of lunch concepts from the straightforward greenback, Chow, WebMD and on the far side. (Suggestions welcomed!) I guarantee, with time and a containerful of effort, you’ll neer blow $7 on a lame, unpunctual Subway hero once more.

Plan ahead. once you’re drawing up a grocery list and/or looking, don’t forget to incorporate enough food for many lunches. check that it’s stuff you wish, and wouldn’t mind continuation 2 or 3 days per week, to boot. Unfussy, healthy, easily-pulled-together mainstays like bread, sandwich fillings, spreads, salads, fruits, and vegetables square measure all solid bets. take care to ease abreast of the pre-packaged frozen meals, tho (Weight Watchers, Lean cookery, etc.). They price a lot of, each in money and metallic element intake, than a self-created lunch.

Prep the night before. nobody needs to wake twenty minutes early so that they will half-assedly slap a bologna sandwich along before the 8am train. aggregation Associate in Nursing straightforward lunch within the evening can allow you to sleep longer AND increase the chance of a meal you’ll get pleasure from. If those nightly ten minutes square measure too inconvenient, youll be able to perpetually …

Prep in bulk. Clever fashion plate and also the straightforward greenback have the most effective posts I’ve seen concerning constructing meals as a group, however there square measure tons – TONS – of comparable ways on-line. (That I’m having issues finding, naturally. Help?) youll be able to knock out a week’s lunches in an exceedingly single Sunday time unit, then freeze or refrigerate them till required.

Don’t accept sandwiches. selection is that the spice of lunch. Any burgeoning brown bagger can get sick (real fast) of PB&Js perennial ad nauseum, therefore try and modification the menu up whenever youll be able to. transportable chow like soups, bento boxes, burritos, make-your-own pizzas, and particularly leftovers square measure important to creating BYOL a lot of appetising. (See the hooked up list below for a lot of concepts.) Speaking of…

Use leftovers showing wisdom. Once The adult male boarded the Brown Bag train (it’s right next to Soul Train), coming up with lunches became alittle harder. I solved  lots of that by creating double the dinner servings and packing [*fr1] away for Next Day Consumption. The leftovers add a large amount of nutritionally-sound selection AND it’s infinitely thrifty, since I’m not making entirely new meals.

Pack snacks. Ahhh … the four o’clock coma. Fellow table jockeys, you recognize what I’m talking about: that mid-afternoon lull in brain activity wherever work takes second priority to off ones guard on your keyboard. To battle the snooze, I try and pack one or 2 lightweight, transportable snacks per day. Fruit is right for this, however buggy, hummus, vegetables, popcorn, and kooky ought to be enough keep you from predatory the selling machines. Avoid the 100-calorie packs, though, as theyre the most important ripoff, ever.

Invest in reusable lunchboxes and utensils. Seriously, the waste created by Chinese takeout lunches may fill a complete workplace in concerning 2 months. Why try this to Earth once carrying environmentally-sound meal packaging will build a big dent in your garbage while not cost accounting a fortune? in person, i exploit thoroughly-cleaned Parmesan containers. (That is, till they A) break, B) square measure broken, or C) steal off to create their own secret instrumentality Colony.)

With that, it’s on to the lunch concepts themselves. every "#" may be a totally different post jam-packed with suggestions, from DIY dish to angular  turkey clubs. Readers and fellow bloggers, if you have got any favorite articles or comment threads please pass em on. I’ll add below, and along we will produce THE master lunch information.

Ask Metafilter: #1, #2, and #3

Chow: #1, #2, #3, and #4

Clever Dude: #1 and #2

Dollar Stretcher: #1

Fabulous Foods: #1

Global Gourmet: #1

Just Bento: #1 (see whole blog)

Lunch in an exceedingly Box: #1 (see whole blog)

Medicine.net: #1

Serious Eats: #1, #2, #3, #4, and #5

The Simple Dollar: #1, and #2

WebMD: #1

Weight Watchers: #1

Wise Bread: #1

Yahoo Answers: #1

Zen Habits: #1

And thats it! Happy feeding, everybody!

(Photos courtesy of Flickr members stelladoll7 and luckysundae.)


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