Alternative to Plastic Lunch Boxes - Toxic

[evezhu]

As plastic is highly toxic, I am saddened to see so many school children eating right out of a plastic lunch box and drinking from a plastic bottle.

My challenge is to find something to pack my 13 year old son's school salads and raw noodles into that won't soak through and leak.

He also wants something that looks 'cool'.

Any suggestions?

Thanks
Eve

[MareeM]

Hi again Eve!

This has been a worry for me too. I have gotten rid of most of the plastics out of my house and use a lot of glass pyrex storage containers. This isn't very good for school though I imagine. I wonder if you can find something in bamboo? I have seen some pictures of these Japanese style lunch boxes - Bento I think they were called (you can get plastic ones, but I've seen them in bamboo or wood too). They have compartments in them.

There is a couple of plastics that are considered safe & used for most water bottles (I've done a bit of research on this - check out www.mercola.com), they are Polyethylene #1, #2, #4 or Polypropylene #5. They should still not be heated though - so I would wash them in lukewarm water - maybe dry in the sunshine to kill any bugs.

Hope this helps!

Happy New Year to you.
Maree.
Fellow Ozy

[travelingtoes]

I used the lunch bags from www.ecobags.com I don't consider them cool looking, but they do their job. You can always decorate them too.

ETA: Here's a more direct link http://www.ecobags.com/Our_Products/Lunch_Bags

[Bridle]

If your son is willing to be edgy-cool this may do the trick...

Here's a picture:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/4425345.stm

Here's more about them:

Not so long ago, in India, the word was mostly used for light lunches prepared for working Indian men by their wives after they have left for work, and forwarded to them by Dabbawalas who use a complex system to get thousands of tiffin-boxes to their destinations. The lunches are packed in steel or tin boxes, also sometimes called tiffins or tiffin-boxes. A common approach is to put rice in one box, dal in another and yet other items in the third or fourth. The other items could be breads, such as naan, vegetable curry and finally a sweet. This system delivers thousands of meals a day and does not use any documents as many Dabbawalas are illiterate. It has been claimed that the tiffin delivery system of Mumbai is so efficient that there is only one mistake for every million deliveries[1]. Another modern usage of the word also applies to lunches that may be packed by parents for children attending school, to provide a lunch during the school day if the student eats lunch at school.

[Bobbie]

Do you let him watch Carry On films? In Carry On Up the Khyber (which is actually considered one of the highest quality British films ever made) tiffin is used as a euphemism for .....

This may be a silly idea, but how about empty coconut shells? Or dehydrated avocado skins.

[evezhu]

Thanks for all of the suggestions for my son's non-toxic school lunchbox.

Love the Tiffin, but I don't think he would go for it - too different. That's the problem - inevitably it will be different because of the need to be different to the old plastic.


I'll look into the eco bags - it would be nice if they made them in teen friendly designs, but I suppose that a design might be made with toxic paints.

And thanks fellow Aussie for the link re. the plastics - very interesting.

Happy New Year to you lovely people, spread throughout the world but linked through a sense of connection to nature and all the good that it provides.

Eve

[Bridle]

Eve

Too bad on the Tiffin. Here are some other ideas...

How about checking out a commercial restaurant supply company or an outdoors place [thinking campers] for non-plastic containers that would work (I'm thinking having the look and feel of what I think of as a construction workers metal lunch box).

Ultimately it will be good to hear what you do find.

Best

[raw-siobhan]

can you give me a brief overview of the plastic situation? My girls have tupperware-like lunch boxes with sections in them that are removable and I like these boxes because they separate the fruits and veggies from eachother, but I didnt realize plastic lunch boxes could be toxic. how does that happen??? :(

[mongomango]

There are these http://www.amazon.com/s?ie=UTF8&search-alias=kitchen&field-keywords=stainless%20steel%20lunch%20box&page=1
It seems that they have plastic bowls within them but perhaps you could find the same size bowls in silicone or something that you could replace them with?

[michigan roman]

glass canning jars with lids .
wrapped in old towels inside a plastic or metal lunch box to
protect glass from breakage .

and tell son ignore peer pressure because this
is your long term health im concerned about ,
it just may be possible that food stored in plastics
is responsible for some of the millions of cases
of stomach ailments per year . we cant say cuz
plastics only been around 70 years or so , so i dont
want to gamble on it .

[English Tracy]

Bobbie - you cracked me up with the 'Carry on up the Khyber' comment!! Truly a classic British film!

EachPeachPearPlum has a thread about lunchboxes in the 'Raising Raw Kids' section. Plus lots of pictures.

Tracy

[RowanC]

The small canning jars is the answer I think you should look into. You can buy nice small jelly jars that would fit into a lunch pail. They hold one serving and are reusable. You can buy a dozen for under $8 usually at your grocery store or Walmart. :D

If you were to write Ball Jars and tell them of this dilemma, they might even make a kid-friendly design on their jars or lids and give you a box for the idea! Because I think a lot of parents might pick up on this.

[RowanC]

Here is a great alternative. I just did a Google search on Glass Container Lunch Box.

http://www.onelifemall.com/category.aspx?categoryID=47&gclid=CPCpkqGHvYkCFRE8gQodixIuNg

Here is another good website that sells stainless steel drink bottles.
http://www.laptoplunches.com/

Here is a stainless steel container.. looks cool to me! In fact, I think this is the BEST one.. even for ME!
http://www.reusablebags.com/store/togo-ware®-2tier-stainless-steel-food-carrier-p-669.html


Here are the SIGG products, which are sprayed with a plant resin to protect the food from plastic toxin.
http://www.nontoxiclife.com.au/index.php?main_page=index&cPath=67_171

Here's a stainless steel drink bottle for $9
http://www.healthychild.com/catalogue.php?exp=&cat=11

You can use this stainless steel lunch jar:
http://www.thisnext.com/item/2B2B3AF1/3AEF68AA/Zojirushi-Mr-Bento-Stainless

Or you can use a run of the mill small thermos, which are glass lined. You can get them at Walmart or any big variety store.

If you are making dry snacks, wrap them in good old waxed paper instead of plastic! You can use kid's tape to tape them shut.

Good luck!

[michigan roman]

wow rowan what a report ! you can see the mothering
instinct in you coming out . you must be a great grandma .

that 2 teir stainless steel container is great .
then the stainless steel water bottle is also .

i think ya solved the problem ! :)

[RowanC]

Thx.. yeah.. I like problem solving.

I loved that 2 tiered lunchbox too! I think I"m going to order one for myself so I can take my food to the country job. :D

[raw-siobhan]

I thought about using some of these ideas. The glass is the least expensive. How can I make it safer to carry around in my girls' backpacks and make it so that the glass container doesnt break? Any ideas?

[juliebove]

glass canning jars with lids .
wrapped in old towels inside a plastic or metal lunch box to
protect glass from breakage .

and tell son ignore peer pressure because this
is your long term health im concerned about ,
it just may be possible that food stored in plastics
is responsible for some of the millions of cases
of stomach ailments per year . we cant say cuz
plastics only been around 70 years or so , so i dont
want to gamble on it .

I don't know of a school that would allow a glass jar! The school my daughter went to in NY didn't even allow plastic lunch boxes. The kids could only bring soft sided lunch containers and paper bags for snacks. Anything hard could be used as a weapon and glass certainly could.

As for as plastic goes, I don't believe it is poison. If you really believe it is, then you'd best not be using a computer what with all the plastic they contain.

[juliebove]

I got my daughter a lunch bag here:

http://builtny.com/

It's made of neoprene. It's stretchy and insulated. I like that when empty it is flat. It also conforms to the shape of the food. It takes up less room and can usually fit into her book bag unless I put something really huge in it.

I've seen metal water bottles. They would not be allowed at my daughter's school though, at least not in some of the classes. Although I've not seen any particulars in this year's class, last year they were allowed only bottles with the sports tops to prevent accidental spills on paperwork. This rule came about after a boy dumped a whole bottle of water over onto my daughter's math paper.