{Today’s Lunchbox} GVA -> IAD Transatlantic Lunchbox

On Friday I shared my lunchbox for my trip from Washington, DC to Switzerland, so today’s lunchbox is the return trip lunchbox.  I was visiting my family in Switzerland, so had full access to a kitchen to prepare all of this, as well as two well-stocked health food stores.  This was a 9+ hour flight so, as with the outgoing trip, I made sure to pack extra food.  I figured I needed a lunch, snacks, and a pre-landing small meal to serve as dinner since, while I was landing in the afternoon, my body would be convinced it was dinnertime by then because of the time difference.  So the lunchbox contained:

• Sandwiches made with a chickpea-flour-based flatbread I started experimenting with while on vacation.  I am still tweaking this one, as I am looking for a high-protein flatbread to add to my diet generally, so will definitely share the recipe once I am happy with it.  The sandwiches contained roasted eggplant slices, tofu-based feta from Go Dairy Free (I first made this while on vacation and this is such a remake), hummus, and harissa (see note below).  These sandwiches were truly delicious.
• Sliced red peppers and cucumbers.
• Quinoa crackers
• Gingersnap Lara Bar
• Cashew Cookie Lara Bar
• Artisana raw nut butter pouches in Cacao Bliss, Coconut Butter, Almond  and Walnut.
• Raw almonds

I was pleased with all aspects of the lunchbox, but was definitely most looking forward to this part:

Yay for lunchtime!

Regarding the harissa, I discovered this brand in my mom’s kitchen (she buys it in France).  While not certified gluten-free, the ingredients are far better than most harissas I have seen in the U.S. (i.e. no food starches, no oil, no general catch-all ingredients that could hide gluten) and the brand itself does not manufacture any gluten-containing products, so I decided it was a safe bet.  I ate it several times over my vacation and it really kicks hummus up a notch in a nice way. 

Another nice part of the lunchbox were these quinoa-brown rice crackers, which I bought in Switzerland. I had had the chestnut-flour-based crackers from the same brand on a previous trip.  These crackers are a bit more refined than I would like (the brown rice on the label, for example, is described as semi-whole-grain rice, which makes me wonder how refined the brown rice flour was), but they are really good for travel, particularly with nut butters:

Incidentally, the nut butters and Lara bars were left over from my outgoing trip, and I had packed additional nut butters and Lara bars in my suitcase, along with the raw almonds (which had been included in a Nutsonline order as a sample).  While I knew I had access to a kitchen for the return trip lunchbox, I could just as easily have relied on purchasing gluten-free crackers and fruit or vegetables and pairing them with the nut butters and Lara bars and nuts for the return lunchbox.

Tomorrow, a return to work-day lunchboxes. 

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