Back to School Lunch with Branston Pickle

I was recently approached by Branston and asked if I could create a lunch for them featuring their pickle, and I was honoured to do so.  I love a good ham and pickle sandwich and I thought it was about time to introduce Small Child to this tasty treat.

Branston's mantra is 'Make it special', and that is exactly what I try to do when I make Small Child's lunches.  Sometimes I succeed, sometimes not, but I always try, and I know he appreciates the effort.  He has already started requesting themes for his lunches for the next school year, so I'd better recall my creative brain from holiday as we only have a few days left before term begins! I had the new school year in mind when I created this special lunch - I thought it would be good to start the year off with a positive and encouraging attitude.

In this lunch was a ham and pickle sandwich, which I shaped into a rocket with the aid of a sharp knife and a bit of imagination.  I cut windows into the rocket using a mini circle cutter, and added triangle shaped wings, which I had cut from a crust of bread.  I decorated the rocket with pieces of yellow pepper, and added flames cut from cheddar cheese and decorated with slivers of ham.  I rested the rocket sandwich on a bed of lettuce leaves.  On the side I packed raw carrot and yellow pepper strips with a nice dollop of pickle to dip them in, and a helping of grapes and blueberries for dessert.  I decorated the fruit with alphabet food picks spelling out the words 'AIM HIGH', and sprinkled over a few mini stars cut from another slice of cheddar cheese.  This was the first time I've packed a lunch in the new Yumbox Panino bento box - do watch out for my review of it coming soon.

Small Child was delighted to receive this creative offering for lunch, the first fun lunch he's had in a while, and he soon devoured it, lettuce leaves and all! He said he really enjoyed the pickle sandwich, and actually asked if he could have some more vegetables because he still had some pickle left for dipping when he'd finished the ones I'd packed!  This is something of a result, because he seems to have gone off houmous a bit recently, which is our usual dip for veggies.

I'm really very sad that the holidays are almost over, but there is a little part of me that is looking forward to getting myself back into a creative frame of mind ready for another year of fun lunches!  Do you do anything fun with your child's packed lunches? Over the next week Branston will be asking their fans to share how they make their child's lunch special in their first week back at school, and there are prizes to be won too - head over to their Facebook page to find out more!

Grace

Disclaimer; This lunch and blog post was commissioned by Branston.  I was compensated for my time, however all opinions expressed in this post are my own.