Welcome to A Month of Aldi lunches!

We created this to help you make good food your kids ( and YOU) will love. We know keeping a food budget under control can be overwhelming. We have 3 growing kids with appetites that don't quit. Keeping our kids full and happy is a never ending ordeal. So, we made this plan with YOU in mind. We want to help YOU stay on budget and keep your people fueled! 

Happy Lunch Packing!! 

TIPS AND TRICKS

  • Hot Lunch. We budget each month for all 3 of our kids to have hot lunch one time per week. Our kids look over the school lunch calendar each month and decide what days they will eat at school. We plan lunches for them accordingly. We made you a free blank calendar (see below). Print it out and adjust lunches for your family's needs

  • Peanut butter / nut butter. We know many of you deal with peanut allergies. Feel free to substitute any nut butter for the meals that require peanut butter. Our local Aldi does carry almond butter. Please customize your lunch planner based on what works for your family.

  • Lunch Containers. WE LOVE divided lunch containers. We have 3 kids and at least 10 of these divided containers.  They make lunches easy to make and can be washed in the dishwasher. Be careful to purchase lunch boxes that will fit your divided containers as these containers tend to be longer than some lunch boxes. We purchased our lunch boxes from Lands End. We have the ClassMate soft side for our kids. 

  • Panini press. We were gifted a panini press a few years back. I swore we would never use it and begged Brad to give it away. Shockingly, it is our number one tool for lunch making these days! You can make a great hot lunch in under 5 minutes with a panini maker. We make our quesadillas and panini sandwiches with a panini press. Simply wrap your sandwich in foil and toss in the lunch boxes! Check it out here. 

  • Fresh fruit / frozen. We try to purchase fresh, in season fruit from Aldi all year long. Our kids typically eat apples in the Fall, oranges in the Winter, and berries in the Spring. However, feel free to substitute frozen fruit if you need. Simply place frozen fruit in your kids lunch the night before (or in the morning), it will thaw by lunchtime. Aldi has some great frozen fruit options we love! Experiment and see what works for your family. 

  • 5 minutes or less. With the exception of the hot dog roll ups, all of our lunches can be make in 5 minutes or less. We know your mornings are crazy. You don't have time to mess with a lunch. We want our lunches to be fast and good.

  • Sides and such. We usually pare our lunches with something fresh and something sweet /or salty. Our older kids require a bit more food so we may add both to their lunches! It all depends on who is having a growth spurt! We love Aldi cheese crackers and kettle chips. We also love Aldi fig newtons and granola bars! We regularly purchase cucumbers, baby carrots, peppers, yogurt, and string cheese for our lunches. They are delicious and a fantastic price!

FREE PRINTABLES

We created this sample month to show you how we organize our lunches. Use this as a guide for planning your family's lunch needs. Click the button to download your free sample month of Aldi Lunches. 

We also created the blank monthly calendar. Print it out and customize it for your family! Click the button to download your free your blank monthly calendar.