WE hear a lot about healthy packed lunches for kids - but what about the grown-ups?

In these days when the average office lunch consists of a quick bite at your desk, it's time to tempt workers with some tasty ideas to spice up sandwiches or add sparkle to salads.

First stop should be your fridge. In an age when we waste so much food - a recent Government study revealed households dump just under a third of all the food they buy - surely some of it could be made into a tasty lunch, saving money and the environment?

Leftover meat from Sunday roasts can be packed into tasty wraps or baguettes, half-eaten dips stuffed into pitta breads with the remainders of raw or roasted veg and delicious soups can be made from virtually any vegetable that's starting to wither, packed into a flask and then taken to the office.

Cookery writer Jane Lunzer Gifford has teamed up with the sandwich experts at Pret to publish Pret Food On The Move (Murdoch Books, £14.99) a book to give workers some mouth-watering inspiration for the ideal packed lunch.

There are certain potentially delicious items to look out for on fridge raids. She says: "A few desultory roasted veg? Mix with humous and finely chopped spring onions on toasted ciabatta."

Stuck for inspiration? Try tucking into a jalepeno chicken hot wrap as a tasty treat.

WHAT DO I NEED?

1 tortilla wrap cooked chicken breast, sliced 4 slow-roasted tomato quarters 1tsp chopped pickled green jalapeno chilli two slices red pepper 10 fine green beans, cooked in boiling water for two minutes squirt of tomato ketchup salt and coarse-ground black pepper two slices of Greve, Emmenthal or Gruyere cheese WHAT SHOULD I DO?

Preheat the oven to 200C (400F/Gas 6). Place the wrap flat on a surface. Arrange the chicken pieces over one half of the wrap. Top with the tomato pieces, jalapeno, red pepper and beans. Squirt some ketchup across the centre of the wrap and season with salt and pepper. Finish with the cheese slices and roll the wrap across the filling and tightly into a long cigar.

To wrap the tortilla in paper, take one piece of greaseproof paper big enough to cover the whole wrap and turn in the sides. Do the same rolling technique as when filling the wrap but with the sides turned in to make it more like an envelope (to stop the filling from wandering out when it is warm and runny). Tie kitchen string round the middle, if possible including the turned-in edges.

Put in the preheated oven for 15 minutes. Take out and tear the paper from around one end so that you can eat the hot spicy chicken like a lollipop.