Enter the $2.50 Brown Bag Lunch!

I started brown-bagging it and never looked back. I quickly developed a formula for packing my lunch every morning – and it had to be in the morning or I’d forget the bag sitting in the refrigerator. The formula satisfied all of the major taste requirements and was this simple: Just remember The Four S’s!

1. Sandwich – A standard Oscar Meyer (lite) bologna& mustard sandwich. This is the most important (and substantial) part of the lunch and almost NEVER varied. ($1.50 including cheese) See more below.
2. Saltie – Fulfilling the need for something crunchy and saltie a pack of crackers (Keebler or Lance) or one of those “snack pack” sized bags of chips/doritos/gold-fish did the trick. ($0.25)
3. Sweet – Ending the lunch munch would be something sweet. Often a banana, box of raisins, apple or single-serve apple-sauce pack. Of course sometimes I would splurge and have an nutragrain-bar, quaker-chewy-granola-bar, oatmeal-cream-pie or star-crunch. ($0.50)
4. Soda – Diet Mt. Dew & Diet Sierra Mist were the most common just because Pepsi products were on sale more often than Coke’s products. If I could get it I enjoyed Diet Minute Made or Lipton Tea. My rule: Never pay more than $3.50 for a dozen cans. Once in a great while I would catch a 12 pack of Snapple on sale for around .50 a bottle and would grab a pack. ($0.25)
5. I later added an extra “S” when I had to work past 7:00 I would have a Snack – This would invariably be a piece of fruit.

But back to the sandwich… here’s the PERFECT sandwich:

Note: Never use Mayo! I’ve heard it is evil.

% Daily Value**