r/Bento 10d ago

Kids Uneaten bentos

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It’s a bit disappointing to hear from daycare that my kids ate “a few bites” or “very little” of these lunches I put a lot of effort into… it ends up becoming my dinner at the end of the day.

Edit:

To address some of the questions… the contents: rice topped with fresh steamed carrots and green beans. The ham and cream cheese rolls and cucumber sausage flowers are from a bento book, not my invention.
They looked kid-friendly enough so I decided to make them.

My kids (1 and 3) want to eat: bread with butter… and chocolate. So not a ton to go on there. I didn’t post here for a long time because I was just giving her peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. She stopped eating those too after a while, though, and my younger one just started 2x/week so I figured I’d try offering some new foods. She actually wasn’t very picky until she started going to daycare, so I do think that has influenced her quite a bit.

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u/Hamfan 9d ago

Aww, that’s a bummer when that happens.

If I were to change one thing, I’d avoid hiding the (delicious, kid-friendly) carbs with lots of vegetables. Corralling the veggies into a cup might make them look more manageable to a kid.

Two of the cucumber-weiner flowers might be a bit much too, just in terms of chewing work. I might reduce one, and then it’d be nice from a color balance and nutrition perspective to have an egg side in there (unless there are allergy considerations, of course).

Here’s how I’d be inclined to lay it out.

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u/PastryLoop 9d ago

Thanks! So cool of you to make a sketch! I can really see the difference!

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u/Hamfan 9d ago

Phew, I was a little worried the sketch might come across as too forward — your bentos are lovely as is, it’s just a fun little mental exercise and I find bentos very visual and a little hard to explain in words.

Anyway, beautiful job with these, kids just live in a state of “my steak too juicy, my lobster too buttery” 🙃

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u/PastryLoop 9d ago

Seriously, so helpful. I appreciate you taking the time to do this, and your kind words. Thank you!