What did you offer your toddlers as luch on port days??

[Newbi]

HI - We will be traveling with my 15 month old daugter - I read through many of the threads that we are not alowed to take fresh products (I presume this includes fruits, milk, juice, tea ect) from the ship on port visits. What did you offer your children??? I have never been on a cruise before - but know from traveling that one doesn't always have the oppurtunity to have lunch / or buy snacks while touring. Anybody have any ideas?? Anything that worked well??? We're departing from miami - I am not an american so we'll have to buy most of what we need when we get there!!!

Please help :-)

[Marksmom]

Originally Posted by Newbi

HI - We will be traveling with my 15 month old daugter - I read through many of the threads that we are not alowed to take fresh products (I presume this includes fruits, milk, juice, tea ect) from the ship on port visits. What did you offer your children??? I have never been on a cruise before - but know from traveling that one doesn't always have the oppurtunity to have lunch / or buy snacks while touring. Anybody have any ideas?? Anything that worked well??? We're departing from miami - I am not an american so we'll have to buy most of what we need when we get there!!!

Please help :-)

We took a lot of prepackaged Gerber brand food and drinks for port days. They have flavored drinks that are sort of like a milk replacement that come in individual servings and don't have to be refrigerated. They also have Pasta pick-ups (ravioli) they say to microwave but we frequently served at room temp if necessary.

There are also several new brands of applesauce (or other various mixed fruits and veggies) that are like baby food that come in individual squeeze packages that I've heard others have used for older babies/toddlers. They have a small spout so they can eat directly from the packages.

If you go to any grocery store when you get to Miami to the baby food aisle you should have a variety of prepackaged options, anything sealed you can take off the ship. Gerber even makes a yogurt blend that doesn't need refrigeration.

[cb at sea]

The ship will have small boxes of Cheerios...they are great finger foods.

Usually tours are short enough to eat before or after. Many (not all) of the longer ones will offer either a lunch stop or have a box lunch as part of the trip...check on that!

You can bring almost any packaged drink you want....a couple containers of milk in a small cooler would be fine.

[NJfoodie]

We pack food because DS has a milk allergy which can be challenging when eating at restaurants/food vendors in ports. It's easier for us to ensure that he has foods that we know he can safely snack on. He's now 3 but we've sailed w/ him since 15m. We bring onboard with us single-serve boxes of soymilk and juice, and individual packages of dried fruit, cereal bars (like nutrigrain bars) and crackers w/peanut butter. We also get from the breakfast buffet on the ship individual cereal boxes. If you wanted dairy, you could get room temperature stable single-serve boxes of milk (usually in the aisle w/ juice or coffee/tea), and I think in the baby food section in the grocery store there are options for babyfood yogurts and custards that are individually packaged.

[boulders]

Originally Posted by Newbi

HI - We will be traveling with my 15 month old daugter - I read through many of the threads that we are not alowed to take fresh products (I presume this includes fruits, milk, juice, tea ect) from the ship on port visits. What did you offer your children??? I have never been on a cruise before - but know from traveling that one doesn't always have the oppurtunity to have lunch / or buy snacks while touring. Anybody have any ideas?? Anything that worked well??? We're departing from miami - I am not an american so we'll have to buy most of what we need when we get there!!!

Please help :-)

We usually just ate on the ship. For many ports, you can't bring ANY food off.

[cruzinlisa]

I am taking some individual bags of cheez it crackers (prepackaged snack size) and fruit and grain bars. I also plan on picking up some of the boxes of cheerioes if I can find them on the ship. Not the most nutritious, but it will do in a pinch in between meals.

[TheCalicoCat]

We took the Cheerios from the breakfast buffet.
I brought juice boxes & cereal bars from home.
For our next cruise, I have already purchased single serve dried fruit & nut mixes. (I got mine at Target in the snack food aisle.) My son will be 3.5 on our next cruise, but those snacks will work for his parents as well.

[RCKM43]

You can get milk in juice boxes (horizons, and there are several other brands). They are perfect for travel and don't need to be refrigerated.

You could either get gerber small juice bottles (plastic 4 ozs) or juice boxes like motts for tots.

As far as food. You could try to find packaged individual containers of things like cheerios, animal crackers, apple sauce (some companies sell pouches that have a spout that you can almost drink from so you wouldn't need a spoon and you can put the top back on it if it isn't finished right away). Goldfish often come in individual containers as well.

Fresh fruit will be harder because you can't bring that off the ship. The only other option I can think of that is close is getting baby food jars of fruit which would be like eating apple sauce.

BTW gerber also makes shelf stable containers of yogurt too if that is something you think your DC would like.