Filled Crescent Rolls

Here's another idea i picked up on Pinterest.  I made 3 variations of filled crescent rolls.  All were tasty and given a "thumbs up" by my kids for lunch.  All use Pillsbury Crescent Rolls to make, adding a filling before rolling it up to bake as directed

Variation 1 - cheese filled
Variation 2 - cheese & hot dog
Variation 3 -peanut butter and chocolate chip

I think the possibilities here are endless.

Pizza Biscuits

My 6 year old calls these pizza pucks, my 4 year old just calls them yummy. This is a very easy twist on baking powder biscuits that helps me get a little more meat into my kids diets.

2 Cups Flour
1 tbsp sugar
3 tsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
1/2 cup butter or margarine
1/2 cup chopped pepperoni (I just used one 100 gram pepperoni stick)
1/2 cup grated cheddar
3/4 cup milk

Pre-heat oven to 450*
Mix the dry ingredients together. Use a pastry cutter to add in the margarine until it's really nice a crumbly looking. Add the pepperoni and cheese. Stir in the milk (dough will be quite sticky).
Flour a flat surface and kneed the dough until soft and workable (flour your hands really well too for this). Roll out about 1/2 inch thick. Use a circle cutter (I use one of my kids plastic cups, about 2'' in diameter) to cut out the biscuits. Place on non-stick sprayed sheet and bake for 10-12 minutes. This recipe makes about 16 biscuits.

Pizza Pinwheels - School Lunch Idea!

The search for a great lunch for my first grader is officially on.  I answered the challenge with help from Jean Pare.  Jean Pare is the founder of the Canadian company Company's Coming.  I happened upon one of their book collections called Kids Cook.  It is a 3 in 1 collection (Bag Lunches, After School Snacks and Weekend Treats).  These cookbooks were designed with kids in mind.  It is geared to teach kids to cook (ages 8 - 15), but my 6 year old can do a lot of it with a little help from me.  We sat down together and looked through each recipe with him ticking off the ones that appealed most to him.  We decided that the pizza pinwheels would be the first recipe that we would try.  They were quick and easy and tasty.  He's had them in his lunch as the main part each day this week with no complaints.  This will be a repeat recipe for us.

2 1/4 cups Biscuit mix
1/2 cup water
7 1/2 oz can pizza sauce
2 sliced green onions
1/2 cup finely chopped green pepper
1/2 cup finely chopped pepperoni
1 cup grated mozzarella cheese
1/4 tsp dried oregano

Preheat oven to 400*.  Stir the biscuit mix and water in a medium bowl until the dough forms a ball.  Turn dough onto a counter that has been dusted with flour or biscuit mix.  Kneed the dough 20 times.  Roll out to a 12 x 12 inch square.

In a separate bowl, mix the remaining 6 ingredients.  Spread over the dough leaving an inch space all around the edges.  Roll up the dough from one side to the other (like a jelly roll).  Pinch the edges to seal.  Cut into 12 1 inch slices.  Place the slices on a baking sheet that has been sprayed with non-stick spray.  Back for 12 minutes.

School Lunch Ideas - Day 1

My oldest child starts back at school tomorrow.  He's beginning grade 1, which means full day school.  This also means the start of 187 (give or take) lunches that I will be packing up and sending off to school.  Lunch at home is no problem.  Lunch for a family picnic is not an issue either.  Lunch for school, that's a little trickier.  I know that the lunch I pack has to meet the following guidelines:
-no peanut butter
-nut free
-able to eat in a short period of time
-stay fresh for a few hours out of the fridge
-be interesting enough for my son to eat
-something that doesn't need heating up
-be healthy
The problem with the school lunches for me is the main course part of the lunch.  I'm not a fan of the everything comes in a package kind of lunch.  I know how much salt and preservatives are in those. The only kind of sandwich my son really loves is peanut butter and banana.  Great for home, banned from school.  He doesn't really like lunch meats (though he will eat one of those sandwiches once in a while) so the traditional sandwich takes a backseat.  At home we eat a lot of hot lunches, grilled cheese, tomato soup, chicken noodle soup, macaroni, mini pizzas, etc.  Some of those I know I can make and heat and send in a thermos (provided the thermos doesn't leak everywhere).
I know I'm not the only mom struggling for good solutions here.  I'd love to hear what other moms have come up with.  As we find winning lunches, I'll post them on this blog, hoping to help inspire some of the rest of you.  I'd love to hear what winning lunches you have in the comments section too!

Day 1 Lunch
-hummus and pita bread
-sliced strawberries
-vanilla yogurt
-dried fruit snacks
-orange juice