Kids Dish

Not wanting her child to feel left out, a mom who didn’t bring her child’s lunch to the park that day let her daughter get a free lunch offered by the city. (The mom’s full post is located here, at Lime.)The lunch contained one of the peanut butter and jelly sandwiches that look like little pies and have no crusts that I’ve seen advertised during children’s programming on TV. (As an aside, I wonder if these Uncrustables will still be marketed during programs after the voluntary advertising bans.)

Unsurprisingly, after the first bite the little girl didn’t particularly enjoy the unnatural, unhealthy sandwich. Ten minutes out of the package left it gummy and weird. With all of the bizarre ingredients in something that should be so simple, of course it’s gummy and weird. It’s a shame that free lunch programs can’t just give a kid a regular, peanut butter and jelly sandwich.

Another blogger at Where’s the Revolution did some math and learned that putting aside the complete lack of nutrition, the economics of Uncrustables are shameful.

Here is how much one would pay for an Uncrustable (~ $2.99/ 4-pack)= $0.75

Here is how much one would pay for a similar peanut butter and jelly sandwich: (~ $2.59/18 oz. for a jar of Jif peanut butter, with 16 servings, ~ $2.45/18 oz. for Smucker’s grape jelly with 32 servings, and ~ $2.39/20 slices for a loaf of Wonder Bread with 10 servings)=~ $0.17

Here is how much one would pay for a good peanut butter and jelly sandwich (whole grain bread, natural peanut butter, organic jelly) (~ $3.89/18 oz. Crazy Richard’s all-natural peanut butter, with 16 servings, ~ $3.49/10 oz. Cascadian Farms organic grape jelly with 1 servings, ~ $3.00/20 slices of fresh-baked whole wheat bread at my local grocery store with 10 servings) =~ $0.74

Food is one of the things on which I don’t mind spending extra money. It’s food. We need it to survive. But I’m not spending too much money on prepackaged “convenience” foods laden with unnecessary fat, calories and preservatives when a simple peanut butter and jelly sandwich takes no more than a couple of minutes to make and costs no more than a dollar using only organic, healthy ingredients.