Bento #27

a bit of a mish-mash - I was running lower on rice than I thought - at least I have a stock of veggies!

corn pasta with taco-flavoured meat sauce, cheese, tomatoes, olives and green onion.
imitation crab and cabbage salad with mayo and black sesame seeds
pepitas (pumpkin seeds) with seasoning salt
black grapes and half an apricot

dinner post

I had to take a photo of dinner, because it was so pretty (dinner doesn't normally look like this, I promise you).
I was planning on serving rice with it and making some imitation crab maki sushi, but the rice did NOT cook properly (it was mush on the bottom and crunchy on the top). I took the imitation crab and mixed it with some cabbage, mayo, sesame seeds and pepper to make a salad.
The sausage slices are a honey garlic smoked sausage cooked with a bit of garlic and some teriyaki sauce.
Frozen veggie dumplings with homemade gyoza sauce.
And finally, the part I am most happy with is the Cha Soba (green tea buckwheat noodles) - served cold, I lightly toasted some nori over a burner and cut it into thin strips, made some soba tsuyu (dipping sauce) and served it with some wasabi and green onions (as per several websites when I was looking up how to serve the cha soba). I mixed the wasabi and green onions into the dipping sauce and dipped the noodles in before eating them. The noodles are so refreshing and the wasabi complimented the flavour so nicely.

I always wondered about all the different sauces they serve at Japanese restaurants, and once I started incorporating some of the cuisine into my cooking, I learned that those sauces are all pretty simple and only require 3-4 main ingredients used in different combinations.
My next goal is to make gyoza from scratch! I'll probably wait until we're moved in to our new house before tackling that.

Bento #26

I made matching bento for the Mister and myself - I've got the day off, but I cooked enough food for two.

Plain white rice
Spicy Tofu
Deviled egg
snap peas, tomatoes, mushrooms and carrots
white nectarine
strawberry flavoured mini pudding gel

The spicy tofu recipe was surprisingly hard to find, so I will share it:
1 lb extra firm tofu, cubed
1/4 c sweet chili sauce
1/4 c soy sauce
2 tsp sesame oil
6 cloves garlic
red pepper flakes to taste
sesame seeds
3 tbsp cornstarch
4 green onions, chopped

mix chili sauce, soy sauce, sesame seeds and pepper flakes - set aside
toss tofu in cornstarch to coat
heat some oil over med-high heat, add tofu and stir-fry until golden
add 1/2 of the green onion and stir-fry for 1 min
add sauce, simmer to reduce.
stir in remaining green onion and top with more sesame seeeds.


I bought some agar-agar powder yesterday, and I'm going to make coco-lime tea gel.
The tea is a loose-leaf tea bought at Tea Desire - they have a ton of varieties and flavours, and they're really reasonably priced (unlike some other specialty tea vendors)
It's a black tea with coconut flakes and dried lime wedges - so refreshing and delicious - we will see how it translates into a gelatin.

I also bought some Cha Soba - green tea flavoured soba noodles! I'm going to do a whole dinner with Japanese inspired food tonight:
Honey Garlic Teriyaki sausage over white rice
Imitation Crab Salad Maki
Tamagoyaki Nigiri
Cha Soba with traditional fixings (dipping sauce, wasabi, green onion)
Gyoza
I may even have to present it on these pretty square green glass plates I have with a bamboo design etched into them. They were actually the base for our wedding centrepieces (add a pillar candle, some glass aquarium beads, and bam!), but we kept them, because they're a really nice decorative plate. I've never had a chance to use them before, so I thought it might be fun.

Bento #25

This is The Mister's bento for tomorrow - I'm not working, so I'm skipping mine. But I'm hitting the farm market tomorrow, so I'll probably have a lovely salad for lunch instead.
He gets perogies and half a sausage, a deviled egg, snow peas, corn, grapes, and a strawberry, orange, pineapple salad.


Apparently a few people at The Mister's office had to come over to see what I made for him today, and they were trying to figure out what shape I had cut the hot dogs into (crabs, see last post). They all apparently think it's cool that I make him lunch, and someone asked if I was Asian - heh - nope, I just like Asian food.
I'm happy that he likes the lunches I make and puts up with my food experiments (the PaJeon was a hit by the way) and occasional whimsy.

Bento #24

Today's main dish is cold soba noodles with dipping sauce, nori furikake and chives
Top tier has 1/2 an apricot and 1/2 a clementine, frozen corn, snow peas and tomatoes.
Not much protein again, only 1/2 a hotdog cut into 2 crabs.
The white wedges are Pajeon - a Korean pancake with chives - the little pig container has some jeon dipping sauce in it.

PaJeon (makes about 10 pancakes in a small frying pan)
2 cups flour
2 cups water
2 eggs
chives, chopped fine
salt & pepper

mix all, let rest for 10-15 minutes
heat a little bit of oil in a small frying pan
pour in batter, sprinkle with more chives, seafood, whatever you want.
cook over medium for 5-6 minutes until golden brown
flip and cook other side 5-6 minutes until golden brown

Jeon Sauce
1/4 cup soy sauce
1/2 tbsp vinegar (distilled white)
1 stalk scallion, minced
1 clove garlic, minced
1/2 tsp Korean dried hot chili pepper flakes (optional)
1/2 tsp sugar
1 tsp sesame oil


I think tomorrow I'm going to go out and buy some tofu when I'm picking up some fresh veggies. I'd like to try a couple of tofu recipes out.

The Mister and I bought a house - we're moving in a little under a month!
I will be so happy to get out of my tiny apartment kitchen (I have 1 small piece of countertop and two cupboards for food!) and into something with space to move and prep multiple items at once!

Bento #23

A very veggie / fruit heavy bento - I wanted to use stuff up before it wilted.

2 mini sandwiches - blackberry jelly with a penguin cutout and underneath that is a ham & cheese with a bunny cutout.

Cucumber cream cheese salad - which I topped with grape tomatoes after taking the photo.

Snow peas crammed in between everything

Enoki mushrooms sauteed in a little butter with some garlic

And finally, a strawberry, apricot and pineapple fruit salad.

Bento #22

Quickie lunch for Saturday.

Fish shaped sandwiches - one egg salad and one PB&J - we got this really great low calorie jam from superstore, it's pomegranate and black currant. I always loved black currant jam as a kid (it came in a blue plastic tub with a white lid), and I love pomegranate now. I don't normally eat sandwiches, let alone PB&J, and this is the third time this week I've had it, that's how good the jam is.

Meatballs with teriyaki sauce and pineapple.

Grapes
Strawberry
Snow Peas
Grape tomatoes

Outside the box is a clementine and a taro pudding jelly cup
Bringing but not shown - a juice box (apple, orange, peach) and chicken noodle cup a soup.

The Mister's box has an egg salad sandwich - no cute shapes, just cut into 3 pieces to fit in the box. He also gets the meatballs, snow peas and grapes.

He came home and reported that he showed his lunch to his co-workers, because he was so excited about his egg chick.
Two of them thought I was awesome and one of them wishes I was his wife.

Bento #21

Chickeens!

The onigiri are filled with teriyaki salmon (I know chicken would have been more appropriate, but I used it all for dinner) - turned them into chickens with corn, corned beef and nori. I made 3 - one got eaten right away, because it fell apart. The one in the bottom of the photo is starting to fall apart ... I guess it's okay for a first try.

The egg is a deviled egg, the yolk was mixed with mayo and finely diced olives - turned it into a chicken using carrots and black sesame seeds.

The cup has leftovers from dinner - I made a chicken mushroom noodle casserole (diced chicken breast, diced brown and white mushrooms, low fat cream of mushroom soup with a bit of skim milk mixed in, 1/2 a small tub of low fat sour cream, and about a cup of shredded cheese, mix it all together, bake @ 350 until bubbly. I topped it with some dried chives)

used 1/2 a clementine, 2 asparagus stalks, 3 grape tomatoes, the last of my baby carrots, 1/2 a mini cucumber and 2 snow peas to fill up the rest of the box.

The Mister got a plain riceball with a strip of the wasabi nori wrapped around it.
I did give him a chicken deviled egg - his is mixed with chive.
He came into the kitchen, saw it and told me he thought it was awesome. I'm so happy that he likes the odd cute food now and then.
He got more of the casserole (filled the bottom tier of his red bento box), the other half of the clementine, some carrots and some snow peas.

Bento #20 (x2)

Tomorrow's bento boxes - The Mister and I get slightly different ones ...
a) because I didn't make enough broccoli and cauliflower tonight, and I made too many green beans last night
b) because he doesn't like certain things.

Red bento is his:
Pan Fried Risotto cakes
tart green grapes
snow peas
broccoli and cauliflower with parmesan herb seasoning
carrots
hot dog fish
honey mustard (in the yellow bear container)

Blue bento is mine:
Pan fried Risotto cakes
Carrots
Cucumber cream cheese salad
Green beans with honey / soy / sesame dressing
grape tomatoes
hot dog fish
honey mustard (in the green cat container)

I'm lame and I only just discovered that my cheese grater has a slicer on it - use it from the back and you get super thin slices, from the front you get wavy slices. I used it to cut the cucumber.

coming in at a calorie count of around 450

Bento #19

Tomorrow's bento:

Rice mixed with Furikake
Deviled egg
Ham, Cheese and Olives on a toothpick skewer
1/2 an apricot
tart green grapes
grape tomatoes
mini cucumber slices - one with a heart cutout for the cute
green beans with a honey / soy / sesame dressing

This is a very orange and green bento!

The Mister's is almost exactly the same, except I omitted the furikake and sprinkled black and white sesame seeds on his rice instead, he gets an extra skewer, but his doesn't have any olives. I included some honey mustard for him too. Finally, instead of the tomato and cucumber (his two most hated veggies), he gets carrots.

I got the recipe for the green beans from the Kawaii Bento Book, changed out the sugar for some honey and added some chili flakes.
The skewers were a last minute space filler.

I really like cooking stuff for the bento along with dinner - we had green beans tonight, and I just cooked some extra.
Tomorrow will be the big test in that respect - I'm planning to turn two side-dishes from dinner into lunch stuff.

Bento #18

For tomorrow's bento, I made it mostly with the just bento cookbook. I changed a couple of things, because I didn't have some of the ingredients or wanted to try something different, but inspired by her recipes. Some of it came out a little small, so I packed in some fruit and snow peas to fill the rest of the space.

Rice with mixed veggies
Dwarf Bok Choy stir fried with garlic and tossed with a dash of sesame oil (yum!)
tamagoyaki
ham roll filled with chive whipped cream cheese and cheddar
strawberry
grapes
snow peas

I printed out the "weekly meal planner with bento lunch box" from the just bento website and slid it into a plastic page protector. I used a grease pencil, which wipes off the plastic very nicely, and wrote out this week's meals, planning the veggies and sides so I can use them for the bento lunches the next day. I stuck it to the side of the fridge with magnets for handy reference. (the wire basket has index cards with recipes in it)



Let's see how well I follow it!
I'm going to try and remember to take photos each day.

Finally, I went to the farm market and picked up a whole bunch of fruit and veggies for a great price. I want to make it my goal to try something new when I spot it at the market. This time around I got some enoki mushrooms, which I will be using in a bento later this week.
I guess the bok choy sort of counts too - I've eaten it before, but I've never made it myself - and these ones were so tiny!

Garlic Bok Choy Recipe:
large handfull of Bok Choy
1 tsp olive oil
1 clove garlic, minced
1 tbsp beef broth
1 tsp sesame oil

heat oil and garlic, add bok choy and stir fry until leaves just begin to wilt - ensure garlic gets spread evenly . Add beef broth and quickly cover the pan, steam for a couple of minutes until heated through. Drizzle with sesame oil and toss.

Bento #17

This was yesterday's bento - I've been making them a lot more lately, but I just haven't had the time to take photos and such.

Inside is:

1 cup rice - 3:1 mix of white and black rice (cooked together, makes it purple)
1 tuna croquette (recipe from "Good Eats")
Container with tartar sauce
Chicken, carrot and snow pea teriyaki
Broccoli tossed in wasabi and soy sauce

The little packet off to the side is instant miso soup.

This was kind of an "oh no, I need lunch, what's left in the fridge?" bento.
I had completely forgotten that I cut up a couple of chicken breasts and stashed them in the freezer in small portions, it came in handy!

Bento #16

I got a couple of single-tier bento boxes today. They're just the "Lovely" brand from Daiso - a blue 850ml one for the Mister and a pink 550ml one for me.
According to charts I've seen, they're each 50ml too small for our age (the height is quite far off), but that's okay, because we're both trying to lose weight.
Mine was a little harder to pack, because it is smaller (it's only 30ml smaller than my URARA dragonfly 2-tier box, but I'm not used to the single space).

Inside each box is a vegetable stir fry (not vegetarian, but it could be if you replace the chicken stock with vegetable stock):
1tsp olive oil fragranced with a piece of ginger (heat oil, lightly sautee ginger, remove - The Mister is not a big fan of ginger, so I didn't want to leave pieces in)
1/2 tsp minced garlic (I'm lazy and have the pre-minced stuff in a jar)
handfull each of snow peas, green pepper, yellow pepper cut into bite-sized pieces
handfull of carrot, thinly sliced
Sauce:
1/4 c chicken stock
splash each of mirin, rice vinegar and soya sauce
cornstarch (about 1tsp) to thicken

Tamagoyaki with herbs (we each get half):
2 eggs, a generous pinch each of parsley, basil and oregano, and about a teaspoon of finely chopped green onion.

I also made hot dog "jumping fish" - cute! (he gets 1 whole hot dog cut into 4 fish, I could only fit 3 fish into my box, so I ate one right away!). Put in a small container of honey dijon to dip the hot dogs in.

I get 1 cup of rice, he gets 1-1/2 cups - topped with carrot and snow pea flowers to make it pretty.

These ones look a lot more "traditional" than my other bento boxes - I actually really like it.

I'm really looking forward to getting the JustBento cookbook.
I've started a notebook specifically for bento friendly recipes - though I'm thinking of getting index cards and a plastic box so I can organize them, instead of just writing it all down and then having to flip through it all to find what I want.

***

In addition to the above bento boxes, I also bought a Makiyakinabe pan today. It's a small rectangular pan specifically for making tamagoyaki. It was only $2, and I make tamagoyaki often enough that I wanted to get a pan, so I could make them a nice uniform shape for the bento boxes.
People often say it's a single-purpose item, but as soon as I was done the omelette, threw in the hot dog "fish" to cook - they all fit perfectly in a single layer. I'm sure I can make use of it a lot with making various small portioned fried items for the bento boxes. And because it's a nonstick pan, I don't have to use much, if any oil.
Not something totally necessary or for everyone, but I'm glad I bought it.