I love filling my kids lunchboxes with fresh recipes and giving them something to look forward to at school at midday.

And it makes it all worthwhile when I hear my children say “I’m always excited to see what you’ve packed for my lunch, Mum!”

As a passionate home cook who believes in cooking simple recipes from scratch, I love creating tasty, nutritious recipes for my family and to share them with other parents.

As a mum, I relish the opportunity to nourish my children with home-cooked food, which means avoiding damaging additives like artificial flavours, preservatives, trans fats, and the refined sweeteners that are so common in processed, packaged food.

The 40 recipes in my Easy Wholefood Lunchboxes ebook are designed to be prepared and cooked in advance.

Most of them can be made for dinner and doubled up, so for days afterwards you’ll have extra portions handy to throw into lunchboxes like a true lunchbox Ninja 🙂

It’s also amazing what goodies a Sunday sesh of a couple of hours can produce!

This recipe ebook is an ‘homage’ to kids everywhere who love eating, and who look forward to exciting and diverse lunches.

With over 200 lunchboxes to tackle every year (!), Easy Wholefood Lunchboxes was also created for the parents dreaming up a constant supply of delicious options  to keep their children happy and satisfied, while ensuring they are receiving vital nutrients as they grow physically, emotionally and intellectually.

The Easy Wholefood Lunchboxes eBook is split into 3 sections

1. My recommended lunch boxes, containers, drink bottles; my easy lunchbox system; and preferred ingredients
2. 20 sweet recipes
3. 20 savoury recipes

Plus a gorgeous photography to accompany each recipe.

I hope you’ll be inspired to create the simple, delicious recipes full of wholesome, real-food ingredients in your own home, helping your children to thrive and nourishing the whole family.

Enjoy these Raspberry Coconut Squares which is one of my kids’s favourite recipes included in the ebook.

Many of the ingredients in this recipe can be sourced from my one-stop-favourite, organic wholefoods online store, The Wholefood Collective. They go to great lengths to ensure everything they source is amazing quality, they stock all my favorite products and I don’t even have to leave the house! Oh and the cherry on the cake is they donate profits to improve food security for vulnerable Aussies.

Here are some of the ingredients you’ll need:

Rapadura sugar
Vanilla powder
Milk
White spelt flour
Desiccated coconut
Baking powder
Sea salt
Shredded coconut

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Raspberry Coconut Squares

Prep Time 15 minutes

Total Time 50 minutes

Author Brenda Janschek

Ingredients

• 250 grams butter softened
• ½ cup rapadura sugar
• 2 eggs
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• ¼ cup milk of your choice
• 1 ½ cups white spelt flour
• 1 ½ cups wholemeal spelt flour
• 1 cup desiccated coconut
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• ¼ teaspoon sea salt
• ½ cup raspberry jam I use St Dalfours
• 1 – 2 cups frozen raspberries
• ¼ cup shredded coconut

Instructions

• Preheat the oven to 180°C and line a square pan 20cm x 20cm pan with parchment paper.
• In a large bowl, cream butter and sugar on high until pale and creamy (around 2 - 3 minutes).
• Beat in egg, one at a time.
• Add vanilla and milk and stir.
• Combine white flour, wholemeal flour, desiccated coconut, baking powder and sea salt in a seperate bowl, add to the creamed mixture and fold in well.
• Place half the batter into the prepared tin and flatten using a wet butter knife.
• Spread the jam evenly over the base, then using wet butter knife carefully spread the remaining batter over the jam layer.
• Press the raspberries into the top of the batter and sprinkle generously with shredded coconut.
• Bake in preheated oven for 30-40 minutes, or until golden brown. Cool completely before
• cutting into squares. Store in airtight container for 4 days.

If you make this recipe please do take photos and send them to me.

If you share them on instagram, remember to tag me @brendajanschek. I get a total kick out of seeing you bring my recipes to life.

If you haven’t already heard of it yet, it’s called Mish’s Dishes. We first discovered each other through Facebook (as you do!) and have stayed in touch over the last couple of years, offering support, ideas and sharing recipes.

The following recipe is inspired by Mish and is a recipe she shared with me for one of my kid’s cooking classes. It is just so decadent and delicious that even my conservative mother-in-law and teen nephew inhaled them. What’s really special about them is not only do you get an extra burst of goodness by adding the zucchini and carrot, but they combine to produce the most wonderfully moist, rich texture. So they aren’t just in there for the ‘healthy factor’!

Who’ d have thought that combining chocolate and veggies in this way would be so delicious?

Try it and find out! (The recipe makes a lot, so you can also halve the recipe and make smaller muffins, just perhaps reduce the cooking time by 5 minutes).

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Rich and Delicious Chocolate Muffins (with Vegetables!)

Author Brenda Janschek

Ingredients

• 275 grams butter room temperature
• 1 cup rapadura sugar
• 2 eggs
• 2 cups spelt flour
• 1/2 cup cacao powder
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/4 teaspoon bicarb of soda
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 cup yoghurt
• 1/2 cup milk optional, use if mixture is too dry
• 1 zucchini grated and squeeze out the moisture
• 1 carrot grated and squeeze out the moisture

Instructions

• Preheat oven to 175 degrees celcius
• Line a 12 hole muffin tin with paper cases
• In a large bowl cream the butter and sugar until light and creamy
• Add eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition
• Stir in the yoghurt and milk if using
• In a separate bowl combine the flour, cacao, baking powder, bicarb of soda and salt
• Pour into the creamed mixture and fold ingredients together until just combined
• Fold in zucchinis and carrots
• Fill the paper case until 2/3 full
• Bake for approximately 2o – 25 minutes or when toothpick comes out clean
• Cool in the tray for 10 minutes then turn out onto wire rack.