AS the start of a new school year kicks off, parents will be dusting off lunch boxes ready to pack them with delicious delights once again.

And many of those parents will be planning the traditional sandwich, crisps and a biscuit combination, which can often be chock full of saturated fat, salt and sugar.

A recent survey by the University of Leeds found that only one per cent of lunchboxes meet the nutritional standards set for school meals.

Food writer Amanda Grant hopes her new book, Healthy Lunchboxes For Kids, will help parents realise it’s easy to abandon boring sandwiches and salty snacks, and replace them with balanced, healthy, packed lunches that children will enjoy.

“It's all about giving them some goodness and keeping their energy up,” she says.

But it doesn’t mean spending extra hours in the kitchen, or being a culinary genius, she promises.

The mother-of-three explains that the trick is to make food for lunch boxes when you’re already cooking.

“I'm a busy mum – I’m working and I've got three little ones – so I totally understand about having to juggle lots of things.

Amanda's top tips

• Always add a piece of fruit or vegetable to the packed lunch – it will become habit for your children to eat it.

• Vary the fruits and vegetables – ask the children to help you to work through the colours of the rainbow each week/month.

• Try offering a dip with vegetables. A small pot of hummus served with carrots always tends to be a popular.

• Keep food chilled by putting kitchen paper around a frozen bottle of water and placing it in the middle of the lunch box. It will keep everything cool, and should thaw enough by lunchtime to give your child a refreshing drink.

• If your child comes out of school starving and with food left in their lunch box, encourage them to finish what's left before offering anything else. Some children will deliberately leave the bits they don't like if they think something more interesting might be on offer after school.

“Cook extra pasta when you’re making a pasta dish, or make double the amount of soup you need when you’re cooking it for dinner – this will help you prepare things that are a bit different.

“Even adults would get bored if we had a cheese sandwich every day.”

The book features everything from one-pot salads and hot food dishes to snacks and sweet ideas.

“Healthy to me is all about variety,” she adds, suggesting that parents put some dried fruits in a child's lunch box instead of fresh, or make a fruit smoothie at breakfast which can go into a bottle for lunch.

“It can be really simple and fit in with everyday eating – it’s just thinking of it slightly differently and not quickly whizzing things together in that breakfast madness when you're trying to get the children fed and out of the house by a particular time.”

Another important part of the healthy lunch box mindset is getting the kids involved in making their packed lunches.

By doing so, parents can pass on some culinary skills to the kids and encourage them to eat what they make.

“As parents we get into this mindset of giving children something because it's easy and we know they'll eat it,” she says. “We need to push ourselves out of that comfort zone. It may take a bit more effort, but the rewards are huge.”

• Healthy Lunchboxes For Kids by Amanda Grant is published by Ryland Peters & Small, priced £10.99.