Lunchtime pro! As Jenny Mollen prepares to send her two sons back to school come fall, she has a few tricks up her sleeve when it comes to preparing their lunches.
“I approach lunch-making like it’s a paint-by-numbers project,” the 43-year-old Dictator Lunches cookbook author — who shares Sid, 8, and Lazlo, 4, with husband Jason Biggs — exclusively told Us Weekly. “I am a full believer in pushing boundaries with kids’ lunches. “Even picky eaters can be compelled to try new things.”
Mollen — who wed the American Pie star, 44, in 2008 — has consistently tried to inspire her boys to add nutritional elements into their family dishes, though the coronavirus pandemic provided a challenge.
“I’ve always been sort of a stickler about healthy food, but halfway through quarantine I was like, ‘How would you like to try something called fast food?’ And my son’s head exploded,” the Girls alum previously told Us in August 2020. “He’s like, ‘Wait, are you kidding? Hold on, hold on. A toy comes with it?’”
She added: “I don’t have time to get creative [amid lockdown] because it’s already onto the next meal. My kids, like, want a feeding every 15 minutes so I haven’t been doing a lot of, like, building towers out of French toast or anything like that.”
Despite Sid and Lazlo’s recent tastes for fast food delights, Mollen has remained committed to adding healthy ingredients to their meals.
“I am trying to make sure I incorporate a lot of fruits and vegetables into their diet and am keeping it fun and interesting,” the Arizona native told Us at the time. “I think [children] should eat what you eat, but I do think it’s fun to, like, make it compelling by telling a story with it. So I’ve been doing a little bit of that, but really I am just trying to survive! It’s been a real experience.”
The City of Likes scribe unpacks her kids’ metal lunchbox and breaks down what Sid and Lazlo can expect each day:
Getting Crafty
“I use a cookie cutter to turn a sun butter and jelly [sandwich] into a Linzer torte-looking main event,” Mollen said.
Healthy and Fun
The actress added: “Hard-boiled eggs can be boring, but with some silly knife work can be turned into floral arrangements perched on a bed of greens.”
Snack Attack
For side dishes, Mollen chooses a selection of fruit, veggies, Top Seedz’ grain-free seed crackers and a “bribe” — which could include adding a pair of candy eyes to a Babybel cheese serving to resemble a ninja.
Dictator Lunches hits shelves on September 13.
