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As you can tell from my previous post, I have had lunches on the brain.  In particular, I have been thinking about sustainable (and cool) ways to pack lunches for my kids.   After falling in love with a huge variety of Japanese Bento products, I started to worry about the controversy of storing foods in plastic containers.

The gist of what I have learned is that plastic containers made from HDPE (#2), LDPE (#4) and polypropylene (#5) tend to be more stable and less prone to leaching chemicals, when used properly.  You should avoid using them to store hot food, and should not heat food in them.  You might also want to be cautious about putting them in the dishwasher, freezer or exposing them to other harsh treatment.  I suppose that I can feel fairly confident that if I don’t use my adorable plastic bento containers  in an unorthodox fashion, they should be unlikely to leak toxins into my kids’ food.

One alternative, of course, is to use storage containers made from materials other than plastic.  Glass is completely nonreactive, but would be totally impractical to send to school with my children.  Stainless steel containers, on the other hand, are sturdy and totally safe for food storage.

Please continue here for a description of some cool stainless steel food containers for lunches.