Food

What you use to pack your child’s school/camp lunch largely depends on how much time you have to spend in the morning. Rushed parents sling things into plastic bags; those with time to spare fill up precious bento boxes. But most of us are treading a middle ground, lacking the time to fiddle excessively yet wishing to inject this mundane daily task with a scintilla of style.

Enter Mimi the Sardine, maker of sturdy, simple, brilliantly hued Lunchbugs. This photo doesn’t do them justice. The bags are beautifully crafted of eco-friendly coated cotton, with strong handles and smooth, heavy zippers that even small kids can operate themselves.

“We double-stitch, we make sure it holds up, and we have very few returns,” says Pia Andersson, a San Francisco Bay Area mom who began her business by sewing bibs on her kitchen table after she emigrated to America from Sweden and had a daughter. “I sent a few to Hanna Andersson, and because I have Swedish eyes and a Swedish visual sense, she bought them.”

Andersson wound up designing children’s clothing for Hanna Andersson and Garnet Hill, but these days her own line pays the bills, and she says Lunchbugs are the company’s most popular item. All Mimi the Sardine bags, aprons, cloths, mats and bibs are wipe-clean and feature bold prints and Marimekko-like colors.

Available at mimithesardine.com.

South Beach, Hollywood and Scarsdale are fine places for kids to visit, unless those locales have the word “diet” in them. In a world where carbs and sugar have been so vilified, it’s important for parents to lay the groundwork for a healthy attitude toward food.

Donna Fish, a social worker specializing in eating disorders and the author of Take the Fight Out of Food: How to Prevent and Solve Your Child’s Eating Problems, offers tips on how children can enjoy real food for real life:

Super Bad: When eating diet-challenged foods such as fries or a donut, try not to say “This is bad for me” in front of your child (no matter how you feel).

Model Citizen: Set a good example. Stop eating after one portion. Show enthusiasm for your food.

Adults Only: Being a good role model doesn’t mean you can’t be on your own, say, low-carb diet. But your mini-me shouldn’t have the same food restrictions.

Clear Signals: Teach kids to stay connected to their body signals. Eat when hungry. Stop when full.

Intervention: Some kids have trouble self-regulating. It’s acceptable to tell a child who has trouble with intuitive eating, “It’s OK. You’ve had enough.” Many parents are held hostage by a fear of creating an eating disorder when in fact, a little parental guidance is in order.

Mirror, Mirror: Keep your vanity hidden inside your walk-in closet. Never say, “Do I look fat?” “I feel fat,” or variations thereof.

Forbidden Fruit (Or Cupcake): Prohibiting a child from eating junk food makes those treats all the more desirable. And when kids do have access to the banned treats at school or on a playdate, they become fixated on them, and all hopes of portion control go out the window.

Food for Thought: Be kid-relevant when explaining nutrition — for example, “You need to eat protein so you can concentrate during your soccer game,” or “Eat well and you’ll grow into those rollerblades.”

Enough: Kids should learn the concept of moderation. When parents lay the right foundation for good eating, children can navigate well for themselves.

Piece of cake.

You’ve found a rocker, bouncy seat and play mat that fit in with your furnishings. But that high chair — bright blue and plastic and junky all over — is your final battle.

Swap it for Svan’s new Anka convertible high chair, made from sustainable wood (read: no plastic junk). An adjustable seat, tray and footrest give babies 6 months and up their own little bistro for one. And if you manage to snag a reservation outside of Chez Mama, the chair folds and stores easily.

But why would you ever leave now?

Available at generationorange.com.

May is National Salad Month, which means that now is the time to start eating healthy (summer wardrobe, notwithstanding). In honor of radicchio and romaine, below are some links that may come in handy.

• Check out kid-friendly chef Annabel Karmel’s easy recipe for Lettuce Boats.
• Before you hit the grocery, brush up on The Shopper’s Guide to Pesticides in Produce.
• And if winging it isn’t your thing, consult one of these books for leafy green tips on healthy pregnancy eating.

You’ve taught your kid not to trade lunches, no matter how tempting that fluffernutter looks. Not only is his turkey-and-tomato ‘wich lower on the sugar scale, but his allergies forbid foreign foods.

Keep his snacks in check: STAT Kids makes customized lunch bags that can be personalized not only with a name, but health alert (peanut allergy, no soy, asthma, diabetes). The insulated poly bags will blend in with the other lunch boxes on the playground, but help keep risky business at bay.

Which gives you more time to bake gluten-free cupcakes.

Available at statkids.com.

The Skip Hop Palette Plate Feeding Set ($28) seems cleverly calculated to appeal to kids and their parents. For the parents: the set’s designed to look like a artist’s palette. For the kid: little containers that keep food separated. This is of primary importance, because you know if the peas touch the mashed potatoes, Armageddon will follow. And hey, you never know, maybe the tiny-bites-of-this-and-that will actually convince your kid to eat. If not, the set comes with cup-covers so you can throw the whole thing in the refrigerator for later.

Available at skiphop.com.

All the warnings you ever heard about lead in toys come flooding back to you the minute your see your young chef sticking a Made in China play spoon in his mouth. Ever wondered why the box his cookware came in had a “Warning: Not for use with real food” sticker on it?

A safer option is Green Toys’ beautifully basic Cookware and Dining Set ($40), made from recycled milk jugs and other plastics and containing no traceable phthalates or BPA. They’re unpainted, so you needn’t worry about lead, and they’re durable and safe enough to be used to hold real food. Tea parties without fear! What a wonderful world we live in.

Available at WoodenHorseToys.com.

You can’t do Cabo with a rambunctious 3-year-old. But you’d still like to infuse a little south-of-the-border flavor into his life this Cinco de Mayo.

Whip up a dish from the new Handstand Kids Mexican Cookbook. You and your little bambino can try your hand at tilapia tacos, fiesta corn and apple cinnamon taquitos. Just like its Italian predecessor, many of the book’s recipes are peppered with authentic vocab.

And next year, it’s the Yucatan.

Available at handstandkids.com.

Maybe breakfast really is the most important meal of the day: The New York Times recently reported on a study exploring whether what a mom-to-be eats during conception impacts the sex of her baby. According to researchers at England’s Oxford and University of Exeter, high levels of glucose (encouraged by eating breakfast) in Mom’s body could mean a boy is on the way. So if your heart is set on a DH, Jr., pile on the eggs and pancakes?

Snack Traps are so 2005 — and if you carry them into your bag, you’ll soon have a purse bottom littered with gummy Cheerios. The sleek Boon Snack Ball Snack Container has a much sexier design, and can be used as a toy in a pinch. And it sure looks a lot less frumpy when you pull it out of your bulging-at-the-seams diaper bag.

Available online at Boon Inc.