With all of my prepping for the week, I fully intend to bring my lunch to work 4 out of 5 days per week. I usually allow myself a treat on Friday, like a Chipotle bowl or a big chopped salad from the local market.
To be honest, I don't have much variety in what I bring to work. I typically pack up the following for the day:
breakfast - oatmeal, a make ahead burrito, an egg sandwich or frittata
lunch - a salad, an apple with a scoop of peanut butter and a string cheese
snack - a banana, cut up with a scoop of peanut butter
Usually this gets me through the day without a problem! But it isn't much diversity admittedly.
I cart it all to the office in my trusty little Built lunchbag.
I love this thing. It's a neoprene material and that means it's sturdy and stretchy. It usually fits all of my breakfast and lunch goodies. Let's take a peek inside at yesterday's lunch:
The only thing not pictured is a tiny Tupperware with about 2 Tbsp of peanut butter inside. I think the key for me is having lots of sizes of Tupperwares. I use at least 3 per day (for salad, dressing and pb) but sometimes more if I decided to bring carrots and hummus, for example. I love having some really small ones which take up very little space in the bag.
Sure, I probably look incredibly dorky toting a lunchbox down the street. In fact, I pass by a church preschool on my walk to work and sometimes I feel like I'd fit right in :)
But in all honesty, this totally works for me. It's usually not super heavy. The handle slides over my wrist so that I can still hold onto the handrail on the train or put my hand in my pocket while walking. And for those days when I want more of a shoulder situation? I simply pack up the lunchbox and drop it into a tote bag, like my purple Burberry sweetie:
I especially use this guy when I also want to bring a pair of heels to the office (though admittedly I keep like 3 pairs of shoes at work at all times...don't tell Shaun because he already thinks my collection is out of control :)). I simply throw in the lunchbag and heels and I'm good to go. Usually I don't find it to be too heavy to carry this on one shoulder and my purse (with wallet, kindle, lipstick(s), lip balm(s) and more) on the other.
So that's how I get my daily lunch done and my tips for getting it all to the office unscathed. So far, so good!
Questions of the Day:
Do you bring lunch to work?
How do you pack it up and cart it around?