fourth grade students who had the least protein intake in their diets
had the lowest achievement scores. Equally important, childhood
obesity is a growing concern

Grr.  A lot of advise like this ends up missing the mark, IMO.  As a
Society, we have both under-nourishment and over-eating problems, but
an particular child is likely to fall into one catagory or the other.
If we have the problem of getting our kids to eat ANY of their lunch,
we probably don’t need to worry quite so much about increasing
nutritional “goodness” as just “like-ability.”

Here are a couple things I’ve noticed; not all are applicable to
pre-schoolers…

1) One problem is that at home, the kids prefer hot meals, and they
don’t pack as lunches very well.  Several people have reported
here, and I’ve seen when driving for fieldtrips, that some things
that *I* think of as needing to be hot, kids seem to enjoy even at
room temperature (macaroni and cheese, chicken nuggets, pizza
bites…)  Eww.  But if it DOES work for you, it’s worth knowing.
(I’ve had some success with cold cooked chicken legs; having thrown
a couple extras in the oven earlier in the week.)  Likewise, it’s
useful to know which cold vegis your child will eat.

2) My pickiest daughter is more likely to eat a slice of bread, a
slice of cheese, and a slice of ham (packed individually) than
a ham and cheese sandwich (and she won’t take apart the sandwich,
either.  I don’t get it, but I’ll happily pack it!)  The “build
your own lunch” motif is generally useful.  Eldest daughter is
happy with a bagel and a tupperware container containing cream
cheese and peanutbutter.  Cheese&crackers, or meat/tuna salad and
crackers have been successful.  Lunchables work sometimes, if they
have just the right combo - too often they come home with only two
components eaten.

3) Our school seemed to make it a habit at the lower grade levels to
make sure that the remains of lunch went back home with the child
instead of into a trashcan, allowing us to see what they did or
didn’t eat.  If your school doesn’t do this by default, you might
ask whether it is possible…

4) The multi-cultural areas that tend to surround high-tech provide a
multitude of interesting choices.  My son likes potstickers, which
survive ok in a thermos.  My daughter likes rice balls (furikake)
and sushi (raw fish might not be a good idea, but if it’ll survive
hours in safeway’s refridgerated shelves, it’ll probablty survive
hours in a lunchbox with an icepack, and of course there’s lots of
sushi that doesn’t involve ingredients that are any more perishable
than the average american sandwich.)  Tortilla are extremely
versatile, and can be rolled or folded to yield variety.

5) speaking of totillas, BREAD comes in useful varieties.  Tortillas,
bagels, pita, Nan (or whatever passes for packaged Nan), french
bread, sliced bread, crackers…  And CHEESE - slices, wedges,
spreads, sticks… (and that doens’t even include “real” cheese.)

I also found the suggestions in that article to be rather high in
sodium/salt content, although that seems to be particularly difficult
to avoid, and I’m not sure how much it really matters.  YMMV depending
on famility health history…