School lunches advice from an expert: Kate Gosselin, mother of 8
If you want to learn about something, ask an expert.When I wanted hints about packing school lunches, I asked Kate Gosselin, the mom in TLC’s reality series Jon and Kate Plus Eight, who is speaking to food writers on behalf of the Grains Foods Foundation.
Granted, Kate’s got only two children in school — 7-year-old twins Mady and Cara are in the second grade — but she’s also got 4-year-old sextuplets at home. Aaden, Joel, Collin, Hannah, Leah and Alexis are in preschool three afternoons a week, which means that Kate and the kids must sit down to lunch at 10:50 a.m. on those days. Planning and organization are obvious necessities for the Gosselin family, but Kate’s also concerned with nutrition and variety.
She asks the older girls each evening what they’d like for lunch the next day, then gets to work as soon as she’s done with dinner. Nine times out of 10, Cara and Mady get sandwiches. “They rarely agree on what kind of sandwiches,” Kate says.
“I cut out the sandwiches in shapes sometimes, change the bread,” she says.
Each lunch also includes yogurt or a cheese stick, a piece of fruit and something crunchy, such as popcorn or an oatmeal-raisin cookie. Finally, she tucks in a note. “Just my way sending love along with them to school,” she says.
None of her kids are picky eaters, although Joel went through a phase where he wasn’t interested in dinner. “For about a month, we had to tell Joel to pick up his fork or he didn’t,” she says. To compensate: “I bulked up his breakfast and lunch.”
Kate says she’s always thinking about new and different recipes. “I’m constantly at the store looking for things that are healthy but kids like,” she says. “It’s kind of my hobby. I like to fill them with healthy calories.”
She buys bread in bulk, “a whole flat of bread that the bread man brings in,” because her family goes through a loaf a day. She has three chest freezers (and two refrigerators). “The advantages of having eight kids is nothing has a chance to go bad or get stale,” she says.
Here are some recipes that Kate Gosselin developed for the Grain Foods Foundation:
FALL HARVEST SANDWICH
2 slices whole-wheat bread
1 tablespoon honey mustard
1 slice Cheddar cheese
2 slices honey ham
1/2 Granny Smith apple, sliced thin
Top 1 piece of bread with mustard, then cheese, then ham, then apple slices. Top with the remaining piece of bread. Cut on the diagonal and serve.
PB & APPLE
2 slices whole-wheat white bread or oatmeal bread
Peanut butter
1/2 apple, thinly sliced and drizzled with a tiny amount of lemon juice
Spread each slice of bread with peanut butter. Place thin apple slices on one slice. Close sandwich and cut into triangles.
CREAM CHEESE ROLL
1 slice whole-wheat white bread
Light cream cheese
1 slice smoked turkey
1/2 cucumber, sliced lengthwise
Trim the crusts of the bread and gently roll out the slice so it resembles pastry. Spread with light cream cheese. Place the turkey slice in the center of the bread. Add cucumber slices. Roll the bread similar to a sushi roll and cut into mini rolls.
CREAM CHEESE ROLL (FOR ADULTS)
1 slice whole-wheat white bread
Light cream cheese
1 slice smoked salmon
1/2 avocado, sliced
Trim the crusts of the bread and gently roll out the slice so it resembles pastry. Spread with light cream cheese. Place the smoked salmon in the center of the bread. Add avocado slices. Roll the bread similar to a sushi roll and cut into mini rolls.
HANDY HUMMUS WRAP
2 or 3 leaves lettuce
1 whole wheat or whole-wheat white wrap
2 to 3 tablespoons hummus
1/2 cucumber, sliced lengthwise
1/2 red pepper, cut into long strips
Place lettuce leaves in the middle portion of the wrap. Top with hummus. Add sliced cucumber and red pepper. Roll and cut in half.
(107 votes, average: 2.48 out of 5)
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Judith Evans is the food and travel editor for the Post-Dispatch. 
So, everyone screaming to stop watching the show if we don’t ‘like’ it…does that mean if I simply stop watching, the exploitation will immediately and automatically cease?
Sorry to burst your ego bubble Kate, the expert sandwich maker, but those so called ‘orignal’ lunch recipes arent a new concept. A quick google search and you can find your same exact ‘orignal’ ideas. You arent the first parent to prepare a sandwich on whole grain bread. If you are such the sandwich expert, Subway is taking applications.
Wow! Topping the bread and filling with another piece of bread? Awesome! Wait’ll I tell my friend, the Earl of Sandwich.
I will thank the Gosselin’s personal chef for the recipes. @@ LOL.
Cheryl. Kate did NOT do IVF. Ugh. Take time to realize the difference between IUI, IVF, injectable gonadotrophin therapy, and clomid. IVF would have been much more responsible since you can limit the amount of blasts that get transfered. Before you make judgements on “IVF” you may want to actually understand it first.
Seriously? Do we need Kate Gosselin to tell us how to make a sandwich? If you can’t make a sandwich, “Top with the remaining piece of bread. Cut on the diagonal and serve”, then I’m pretty sure we can’t find this website, or the power button on the computer. Geez, give me a break!
Kudos to the Gosselins’ PR rep for conning you into citing Kate Gosselin as an ‘expert’ on anything. I used to watch this ‘reality’ show and never saw her cook anything besides pancakes. Lunches appeared to be anything she could pull from a bag (vegetables, cheese puffs) or box (raisins) and slap on a paper plate.
Regarding the above recipes….none are new as my mother fed me these sandwiches over 35 years ago! Please say that she did not have the audacity to claim that these were ‘her original’ recipes.
Same on you and on your publication!
10:50 for lunch??? What time do they eat dinner, 3:00? They must get up at 5 AM! And you mean to tell me Kate’s up before 8:00? That’s a joke! Lunch must be her first meal of the day then, Lordy Be!!!
I can honestly see both points of view. It’s easy to read all the bad and get drawn in, but then I put things into perspective. I may not agree with many decisions Kate makes, but I do think she loves her kids. I think they are fed, bathed, housed, clothed, & so on. So I know that all their physical needs are being met. I can’t help but think of all the kids out there…in our country,in our own state,city, and neighborhoods who are suffering because they don’t have their physical needs being met (food, shelter, clothes, etc..). So you move on to emotional. Once again..her personality and the way she treats the people around her can leave me open-mouthed..shocked. So again I put things into perspective. Jon and Kate remain married raising 8 kids together. They watch movies as a family, they take long and short trips as a family, they interact with the kids outside on their driveway, the eat together, and on & on. Like I said..I may not agree with her style of parenting, but that’s ok. How many of you are divorced or know of someone who is. How’s that working for them? I know from being a child of divorce and a wife of one that it comes with many issues. So many kids are coming home from school to an empty house because mom and dad both work. They are left to their own devices until evening. Where is your concern for those kids? So many children are the victims of physical and sexual abuse. Where is your outrage..your anger? It’s right here! You use so much energy hating these people. Why? Because they “use” their kids for money? Please be honest with yourselves. Whether you have one kid or 10..if you were offered an ungodly amount of money in exchange for being taped for your own show would you refuse? I know. I know. “Yes!”. Fine..say what you will, but there are kids that need to go to college, food to be fed, clothes to buy, utilities, motgage, car, car repairs, insurance, doctor, dentisit, optometrist, etc..
I just want you to simply put this into perspective. Stop looking at the tv and look at the bigger picture. You need a mission? Go outside your door and help those that really need help! Volunteer! You aren’t going to change Kate Gosselin by telling her you don’t agree with her parenting or lack of, but you can make a difference in the life of a child who is REALLY suffering. Do it! Get off your butts and stop blogging about Kate Gosselin and those “poor” kids. LOL
I say Kudos to the Gosselin’s PR team for getting you guys to go beserk about something like sandwiches. Wake up! Don’t you know that a bunch of readers who never watched J&K Plus 8 are going to see these comments and be like “mmm..I wonder what all the fuss is about? I’m going to have to watch that show to find out.” The more you rant the higher their ratings get. They are playing y’all for fools.