Lunch Hour

The beautiful, internationally acclaimed guide to turning your midday meal into a masterpiece—featuring 100 easy, inexpensive, delicious recipes designed to be made ahead of time with just a few ingredients. There’s something depressing about “running out” to “grab lunch.” Sandwiches, soups, salads, sushi: the choices are overwhelming. But when’s the last time you really enjoyed eating lunch while hunched over your keyboard? That’s why Caroline Craig and Sophie Missing have reclaimed the noon hour for all those who love a tasty bite. Dining “al desko” doesn’t have to mean another weary forkful of a sad salad. Instead, lunch can be one of life’s great simple pleasures—especially when it’s made at home in just a few minutes, from ingredients you have on hand. Craig and Missing know firsthand the challenges of busy schedules, tiny salaries, and no spare time. They share their hard-won wisdom in 100 recipes littered with time-saving techniques and tips to make each meal special—plus weekly menus and Sunday shopping lists to make it all that much easier. The Little Book of Lunch features clever approaches to classics, making them easy for transportation; delicious at room temperature; and quickly assembled for when you barely have five minutes, or for when the cupboards are bare. It includes: • Wholesome, healthy salads like tabouleh and the miracle “rainbow rescue” bowl • Make-ahead meals like grilled halloumi, vegetable and avocado couscous • Inspired twists on tuna salad and the BLT from the Sandwich Hall of Fame • Quick soups like “faux pho” and spicy lentil and coconut • Sweet treats to bribe colleagues, like salted caramel brownies

Ever said, "I wish I had time to make that!"? With this fun project book, you can slide in time to sew every day-little by little during your lunch hour! Perfectly portable projects can be completed in as little as an hour or over just a few lunch hours during the week. Choose from pillows, small quilts, cute bags, and more--all beginner friendly, simple to start, and fast to finish. Whether lunchtime is spent at the office, on the road, or right at home, break up each busy day with some sublime stitching time!

Rediscover the pleasure of taking a real lunch break, and improve your health, happiness, and productivity. Statistics show that only one-third of American workers leave their desk to take a lunch break, which has a negative effect on productivity, creativity, and innovation. Gone for Lunch is a friendly, fun, and inspirational book that offers readers ideas for how they can reclaim their lunch break! With a challenge included for every week of the year, each activity is designed to be suitable for anyone anywhere—at home or at work, in the city or the countryside. Drawing buildings, trying yoga, volunteering, going for bike rides, handwriting letters: her challenges range from indoor to outdoor, active to sedentary, and the health benefits are endless.

Lunch has never been just a meal; the meal most often eaten in public, lunch has a long tradition of establishing social status and cementing alliances. From the ploughman’s lunch in the field to the power lunch at the Four Seasons, the particulars of lunch decisions—where, with whom, and what we eat—often mark our place in the world. Lunch itself has galvanized political movements and been at the center of efforts to address poverty and malnutrition; the American School Lunch Act of 1946 enforced the notion that lunch could represent the very health of the nation, and sit-ins and protests at lunch counters in the 1960s thrust this space into moral territory. Issues of who cooks lunch, who eats what, and how and when we eat in public institutions continue to spur activists. Exploring the rich history and culture of this most-observed and versatile meal, Lunch draws on a wide range of sources: Letters and memoirs Fiction Cookbooks Institutional records Art and popular media Tea room menus Lunch truck Twitter feeds, and more Elias considers the history of lunch not only in America, but around the world to reveal the rich traditions and considerable changes this meal has influenced over the years.

With over 60 delicious, healthful, unexpected recipes, BRING YOUR LUNCH ensures DIY lunchtime success—and significant weekly savings—while keeping the brown-bag doldrums away. And it doesn’t matter if you’re a make-ahead food planner or a harried last-minute type—with its innovative, doable strategies, cooks of all kinds can learn to overcome the obstacles that keep them hooked on expensive takeout or boring PB&Js. There are quick Last-Minute Lunches, including salads—Kale Salad Agrodolce, Beet and Apple Salad with Walnuts and Cheese—and sandwiches—Proscuitto and Provolone Sandwich with Fig Jam, Deli Counter Banh Mi, El Turkey Club. Leftover Leitmotifs: Lamb Pita with Spicy Yogurt Sauce, Vietnamese Lettuce Wraps, Salmon & Swiss Chard Summer Rolls, Lo Mein with Garlicky Greens. Recipes that use the freezer wisely—Pumpkin Curry with Shrimp, Easy Empanadas, and other recipes are ready to go when you are. Snacks for when you want to ditch the vending machine—Tropical Fruit Energy Bars and Chickpea “Nuts.” Plus notes on essential equipment, tips for shopping and prepping, and a lunch larder of extras—Lemony Miso Dressing, Green Pea Hummus, Homemade Mayo. It’s time to end the cycle of broken lunch promises, too many trips to the taco truck, and all that money that disappears every week. It’s time instead to choose to BYOL—it’s healthy, wealthy, and wise, and now easy as could be.