Does anyone have any good suggestions for individually wrapped GF snacks? DD starts kindergarten next week, and the 6.5 hour school day has an a.m. snack, lunch, and a p.m. snack (which seems like a lot of eating for such a short day!) I'm having a hard time finding pre-packed snacks that: 1. don't require refrigeration; 2. are nut-free as required for classroom snack periods; and 3. are also GF. What I've found so far: apple sauce squeezers and gummies (both of which we use for lows, so I'd prefer not to send for snacks), Pirates Booty, raisins boxes, and individual peanut packs (only allowed at certain lunch tables, but not for classroom snacks). Obviously, we'll be bagging up lots of GF pretzels and fruit, but I'd love suggestions for other GF on-the-go packs. (I never knew I'd be so wistful for those little baggies of Goldfish we used to tote in the pre-celiac days!)
Yeah, those little baggies of goldfish and graham crackers were the good old days. It is very hard to find GF on-the-go snack packs. And if you have to be nut free, then there goes most GF bars. I think you already fingered out, that you have to bag your own GF snacks. We buy jumbo box of snack sized ziplog bags. I fill it with a variety of GF snacks that my daughter likes. We also bought small snack-sized Tupperware, and those are handy for keeping her favorite fruits or cookies (they can get crashed in the ziplog bags), or GF cupcakes that I bake sometimes. If your child likes beef jerky, you can buy GF beef jerky from Costco. I like those, because they come in individually wrapped snack -size bags (inside of a jumbo bag, of course). They also have very little carbs. Another idea is to get an insulated box for the snacks. I use this to pack a gogurt or yogurt for snack. And I would add an ice pack or two to keep the snacks chilled. I think this is just a little more work for us moms, other than that, our celiac kids can still enjoy a nice variety of snacks.
Vans and Udis both make snack bars that are individually wrapped. My daughter loves them. Sometimes energy bars or power bars are gluten free.
I found skinny pop popcorn in single serving bags at Costco. Peanut. Tree nut, gluten and dairy free.
GF snacks in individual bags purchased from regular local grocery store: Pop Chips makes individual bags with 15 carbs per bag Lance has new individual packs of GF cheese (17 carbs) and peanut butter crackers (15 carbs) Boom Chick a Pop has individual bags of regular popcorn and kettle corn Snyders has the GF pretzel sticks in individual bags Sabra, and some grocery store brands, have individual mini cups of hummus that are good with many veggies, GF crackers
Thanks, everyone, for these great suggestions. The two other items I came across in my Internet searchings today were individually wrapped boxes of Craisins and snack packs of Van's GF cheddar crackers -- pricey at $5 for 5 packs on Amazon! Still, I think it'll be nice to have a few go-to convenience on hand while we try to get into the school routine, until lunch/snack packing become second nature.
If you have an Aldi near you, their Live G Free line is awesome! They have some cereal type bars in three flavors that could work. They also are selling a variety pack of various trail mixes, but make sure to check labels because some aren't gluten free.
Skinny pop, GF all natural cheetos, fruit twist (clif bar), PB&J bars, kind bars, GF cookies, homemade GF treats or bars, lays stacks (my son likes the cheddar and sour cream and onion flavor), string cheese, pepperoni, olives, go-gurts (freeze ahead, kills the good bacteria but every once in a while it doesn't really matter.), trail mix, and white cheddar smart pop My 7 year old GF t1d boy helped me with this list
oh and I think Annie's has gluten free bunny crackers at Target now, too. I feel bad making a list that aren't what I typically want my child to eat, however snacktimes at school fit into my 80/20 and sometimes I just want him to have something he really wants to have that is similar to others
My daughter also started kindergarten and I agree that finding the right snack has been difficult. At home she does not snack between breakfast and lunch and we have not been doing insulin at school at this point since she does not stay for lunch. So our challenge has been to find gluten free snacks that are fairly low carb. I have been trying to stay at 3-5 grams. We are allowed nuts so I send prepacked cashew packs of 5grams but otherwise it is mostly string cheese, beef or turkey jerky, hard boiled eggs, lunch meat or a scant few pretzels or crackers. So far it has been ok but she is going to tire of this routine pretty quick. She doesn't even like string cheese that much and I send it almost every day. When we were able to do bigger snacks (honeymoon) we did the Chobani greek yogurts which are 8-9 grams. I may try them again and just see what happens.
The update here: the good news is that, after an insane first two weeks of schoolday bgs, we've figured out a lunch that the school health aide can confidently prebolus for. The bad news is that we have to send exactly the same lunch each day to be certain that my dd will eat everything. For the past month, day in and day out, a.m. snack has been string cheese; lunch has been a very specific sandwich on Pamela's GF mix bread, with some GF cheddar crackers and berries; and p.m. snack has been pirate's booty. The school cafeteria does have some limited GF options, but I'm scared to let my dd try them because I don't what she will eat, and post-bolusing played havoc with her bgs. She's also a very slow eater, so I'm worried that 5 minutes in the lunch line might be the difference between her finishing lunch and not. I do feel bad sending her with the same unexciting food every day, and I think we're perpetuating her tendency to picky eating by playing it so safe. I just read a book about how the French instill a love of varied foods in their kids, and I don't think that's going to be our dd anytime soon. Sigh!
Snowflake - you could have her experiment with the lunchroom and post-bolus for the experiment day. Then, if you know she likes it, you can plan ahead for her to eat that lunchroom food that day and then pre-bolus as normal. A little bit of post-blousing while you are experimenting should be ok.
Hey, I just found individually packed gluten free Madeleines at our local Whole Foods on Monday. My daughter loved Madeleines before she had to eat GF. I bought a whole bunch, and have been putting one in her lunch boxes everyday this week. They are delicious.
this won't hep for school because its not nut-free, but the Nature's valley salted caramel protein bar is gluten free and soooo good! 14 carbs.
Thanks, Susan! I'm thinking about lunch right now, and the idea of a salted caramel bar - plus that picture of the gf madeleine - is making me hungry! We're almost two years into celiac, but it seems to have suddenly gotten a lot harder with the start of kindergarten. The other night, we were reading a picture book about T1D to dd, and she burst into tears at that inevitable line in every kids' diabetes book about how the protagonist can eat everything that other kids can eat, which obviously doesn't apply for us (dd is reading a bit now, so it's not as easy to edit that sort of thing out these days!). That's one of the only times that she's ever cried about having either disease, and man, is it heartbreaking. Based on comments dd has made recently, I suspect she's got a classmate or two who's been making snide remarks about GF food. Of course, that just tripled my resolve to stay on the hunt for better, yummier GF options!
-- I am right there with you!! My daughter's favorite power bar is Nature Valley's Almond Crunch. It is labeled gf, and rather hard to find. It has peanuts though. She has a new favorite, which is Amy's Crunchy bar (English Toffee with Almonds in Dark Chocolate), and Amy's Chewy (Soft caramel with Pecans covered in chocolate). I like how they have full size as well as half sized bars, so the half size is easy to include in the lunch bag as a treat. http://www.amys.com/products/product-detail/gluten-free/000390 http://www.amys.com/products/product-detail/gluten-free/000389 http://www.amys.com/products/product-detail/gluten-free/000388
