The Lunch Lady

Today I'm introducing you to my friend Melissa Hill Jones. 

Several years ago, Jones began changing her family's lunches as part of a move to an overall healthier way of eating. 

Jones started documenting her homemade school lunches on Facebook in a series called The Jones Family Lunch Project.  From her post on September 10, 2009:  "The Jones Family Lunch Project Mission is to feed our entire family the same healthy lunch and develop the culinary skills of our 3 children through modeling, experimentation and active participation."   

According to Jones, "The Jones Family Lunch project started with us finding our way, and now the feedback I get is that we are inspiring changes in others. Our kids are actually eating these lunches, and my husband and I are looking better than we have in years. People notice and want to know what was our secret." She continues, "No magic pills, no expensive weight loss program, no fad diets, we just made the small changes over time that add up to sustainable lifelong habits. We learned to eat our vegetables, and cut out the junk food."

 The album of lunch photos on Facebook represents the changes she and her family have made in their lunch menus and their overall eating habits.  The project continues today.  Sharing photos of her lunches allowed her to exchange ideas with diverse friends online, keep a record of what she made and produce a visual menu to show the kids and help plan future meals.  All photos on this post are taken by Melissa Hill Jones.  

I sat down with Jones to talk about the genesis of this project, its evolution, and the effect on her family. 

Jones said the lunch project really started when her kids were small.  At the time, they were attending Jewish schools which required lunches to be dairy or parve.  This means they could contain no meat or shell-fish.  She was trying to avoid packing the same lunch of peanut butter and jelly every day. In some situations peanuts were not permitted, and some of her kids have problems with tree nuts and dairy which limited their protein options.  

In addition she was concerned about the waste and cost associated with single-serving foods.  "Our lunches were generating lots of waste" from prepackaged items like applesauce, string cheese, and yogurt tubes, Jones said.

As the kids' elementary school moved to a spiffy new building and started a "green" initiative, she and another mom organized a fundraiser for the school selling Laptop Lunches, which are Bento box-style colorful, reusable lunch containers.  The boxes have been a successful part of her strategy to make real 
food fun to eat.

Tofu Stir-Fry Lunch

Initially her husband was concerned with the logistics of packing completely homemade lunches.  "He was concerned with how complicated it was going to be," said Jones.  It is definitely easier to use prepackaged things.  There is more time involved in packing and washing the containers as well.

Black Bean Lunch

Curry Lunch

Some of the family's favorites lunch items now include black bean burrito fillings, stewed kale served cold,  tofu stir-fry and Indian curries created by Jones' husband.  Early on Jones tried to recreate homemade versions of commercial products like cereal bars.  These were popular with her kids but too labor intensive.

Peanut Butter and Jelly Lunch with Hummus

Peanut butter and jelly sandwiches still show up on the lunch menu but less often.  In the past fruit would return home uneaten.  Now fruit is cut up which seems to make it more appealing.  As the family has moved towards a vegan eating pattern, cheese and other dairy products have left the lunch boxes.

Jones's preparation habits include making extra of their main dinner course to use for lunch the next day, cutting up lots of fruit for breakfast and using the extra for lunch and cutting large quantities of fresh vegetables ahead of time to store in the fridge.  This goes along with the Jones family motto of "Always be Prepared."  As their eating overall has focused more on healthy choices, they try to keep junk food out of the house and healthy foods readily available.

Jones feels that getting her kids involved in lunch preparation was key, from helping choose the lunch containers to cutting up fruits and vegetables.

Today Jones is a full-time college student, wife and mother of three and part-time teacher.  She is a busy woman!  Asked for advice for other time-pressed parents wanting to do a packed lunch overhaul, Jones suggested looking first at the sides.   "Try to work in fresh fruits and vegetables and send nutrient-dense, high fiber stuff," she recommends.

Israeli Salad Lunch

She experiments with different types of food and reads cookbooks and recipes for inspiration, although not necessarily exact plans.  She mainly works with what she has in the cupboards and refrigerator.  This is one source of inspiration for Jewish cooking, and another for curries.

The results of this years-long change in eating include "massive weight loss" on the part of the adults in the family, less waste generated and money saved by not buying prepackaged foods.  


Concludes Jones,"We have started a Jones Family Cookbook, so our biggest challenge may become a legacy to pass on to our future generations so that we may break the chain of heart disease, diabetes, and cancer that had plagued our own parents and grandparents. We want our children to have a better life, and ironically the path to better health started with their lunch and the snap of a camera."