Pasta Bento for Feb 28

I'm a bit behind on the Reddit Bento challenges - and I'm the one running it!
I really only missed the Chinese New Year one ... but I haven't made a bento in 2 weeks.

This week's theme was pasta - here's what I did:



Linguine with Capers and Green Olive Sauce (recipe here) - this is my go-to pasta sauce, I just use basic tinned tomato sauce as my base (I'm sure I could get fancy and make my own, but I often don't have time). I could eat this for days.

The rest of the box is filled with: blanched asparagus with lemon pepper, grape tomatoes, cocktail sausages (with fish shaped skewers, because why not?), quick pickled cucumber (recipe from the JustBento Cookbook), apple bunnies.

Chicken Tikka Pasties

I took out some ground chicken to thaw for dinner, but then I realized I didn't have all the stuff I needed for the things I usually make with ground chicken. Oops.

I started looking up recipes for ground chicken or beef, and I came across a recipe for these biscuit cup things, which suddenly reminded me of Cornish pasties.

Then I wanted to see what people did with chicken in a pasty.
After a bit of google searching, I found a few recipes for chicken tikka pasties. I had a jar of pre-made tikka masala sauce, so I glanced at the recipe, then decided to come up with my own version with what I had on hand.

I made large ones for dinner using a hand pie press that I picked up a while ago.
Then I made some mini ones - I used a crumpet ring to cut the pastry (about the same size as an egg ring), and then crimped them closed with a fork

Here's my lunch with two mini pasties, some salad, apple, and a deviled egg:



Recipe!

1lb ground chicken
1 large russet potato
1/4 white onion
Jar of tikka masala sauce (I used this one)
1c frozen peas

Peel and dice potato (about 1cm pieces), boil until just done (stick a fork in, or cut it with a butter knife, if it's easy, it's done)
Cook ground chicken almost completely through, drain,
Dice onion, and add to the pan, cooking for a bit longer until chicken is cooked through and onion is soft.
Add enough sauce to coat the meat, fold in potato and peas. Add more sauce if necessary.

This will make about 9 large pasties... and a whole lot of mini ones (I have no idea how many - hah!)

I used this recipe for shortcrust pastry - it makes 3-4 pasties, depending on how thin you roll it. and about 6-8 mini ones.
If you want the pastry to be more golden, you will need to use an egg wash, but because I was doing such a small batch last night, I skipped it.

You can fill the large ones with about 1/3c of the filling, and the small ones take about 1tbsp.

I only made 2 large and 4 small pasties, so I have enough filling left for at least 2 more dinner/lunch combos, maybe more.

If anyone wants to do it completely from scratch, here is the recipe that inspired me.

Mini Tuna Burgers

Yesterday, when I opened the can of soup to put into my bento, my cat came running into the kitchen and sat down at my feet.

She's not a big fan of soft food, and we've only ever given her the kind with the pop-top. What she was looking for was tuna water. Because I'm silly, I told her she could have tuna water later that night.

So, when it came time to make today's lunch, I settled on a mini tuna burger recipe from the just bento cookbook. Sure enough, as soon as I clamped the can opener onto the tin, the cat turned away from her water (from the brita - it's her usual 'treat' she goes crazy for it), and came to sit at my feet to wait quietly for her new treat.

Anyway, here's my bento:

Short-grain rice mixed with plum furikake

2 mini tuna burgers

I filled the remaining space with 1/4 of an apple, and some veggies. There are cucumbers under the tomatoes (tiny, tiny tomato <3 p="">

Pasta Salad and Cocktail Sauages

I've been on a Greek salad kick - cucumber, tomato, pepper, onion, olive. So simple, so delicious.
Yesterday's lunch was packed in 15 minutes in the morning, and it was a full-sized version of the salad I had on Thursday, with the tomatoes cut in, and some olives added.

Today's bento incorporates the same flavours into a pasta salad, dressed with a feta salad dressing.



The pasta is one of those 'smart' ones, fortified and all that jazz.
The main protein today comes in the form of cocktail sausages (weiners!). I did 3 cut in half, and a 4th cut into an octopus, because it's hard to resist doing. There is a grainy mustard and mayo dip in the container.
I also have a tamagoyaki in there as a secondary protein. I didn't season it with the usual soy sauce and sugar - I used seasoned pepper instead, which is amazing on eggs.
Filled the space with 1/4 of an apple (not bunnified today, the other slice is hidden), broccoli and matchstick carrots.

Salad Bentos and a Cat

I forgot to take a photo of yesterday's bento, but it was just leftover taco fixings arranged into a salad, with some tortilla chips on the side. Yum!

I wanted to take a photo of both mine and my husband's bento boxes for today - they're essentially the same, but you can see where I've changed things up to accommodate our slightly different tastes.




Mine is on the left, his is on the right.

The main component in each is a salad - the base is spinach and romaine, then I've topped it with various other veggies. I get cucumber and red pepper, he gets snow peas and matchstick carrots.
I have salad dressing, but he likes his plain.
We each get a deviled egg, 3 chicken nuggets, and 1/4 of an apple - sliced into bunnies, because I can.
For the space filler, his is entirely broccoli, and mine is tiny grape tomatoes and broccoli.
Aren't the tomatoes so cute?

I take my photos on a bamboo slat placemat set on our kitchen table.
When we're not using the table, the cat likes to sleep on the edge of it up against the windowsill, so when she spotted me over there, she had to come see what I was doing:



Thankfully she doesn't like people food.

2 x Bento

Bento #62



This one was leftover sloppy joes made with ground turkey.
Served with slider flatbread rounds, green onion, and shredded cheese
For veggies we have celery and carrot sticks
And 2 chocolate covered macadamia nuts for a treat.

Sloppy Joe Recipe:
1lb ground turkey
1/4 c green pepper, diced
1/4 c onion, diced
1/2 c. ketchup
1 tbsp yellow mustard
a few dashes Worcestershire sauce
Spices to taste (I used chili powder, cumin, cinnamon, garlic powder, onion powder, pepper and a dash of salt)

Brown meat, breaking it up as you cook it. Drain. Add onion and green pepper and cook until just soft.
While meat is cooking, combine ketchup, mustard, Worcestershire sauce and spices. Add about 1/4 c water.
Coat the meat with the sauce (add more water if necessary), and simmer to reduce the sauce.

Serve on your favourite bread or buns (we used whole grain sunflower & flax bread when we had it for dinner) with toppings of your choice!

A lot of the recipes I found for sloppy joes called for brown sugar, and little to no spice. I didn't have any brown sugar on hand, so I skipped it, and added some of my favourite spices. This recipe had a nice slight sweet edge (ketchup already has sugar in it, and cinnamon is sweet), and just a touch of spice.

If you've never tried cinnamon in a tomato sauce, I highly recommend it. It adds such a rich flavour to the sauce. It works really well with meat sauces, but I often have it with just plain sauce. You only need a dash.

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Bento #63



Sorry, this photo is a bit blurry, I was in a rush that morning.
We have 3 round onigiri (l to r: Salmon Furikake, Plain (lightly salted), Umeboshi Furikake)
1 hotdog cut into 2 octopi and 2 crabs (black sesame seeds for the octopus eyes)
Mustard in the little blue container
Deviled Egg
2 apple bunnies

yum!

I haven't made onigiri in so long, and I forgot just how delicious they are - even just the plain ones!
I picked up some more furikake today: Veggie, Bonito and Egg.

I've never actually had an umeboshi ... I will admit that even though I'm all for trying new things, a pickled plum makes me hesitate. I like the umeboshi furikake though. I'm sure if the opportunity presents itself, I will try one someday.

Bento Backlog!!

I haven't been as on-top of this as I wanted, but ... I'm still doing it!

First off, The Mister's co-worker was asking him to find out how I make miso soup at home. I thought I'd share ...

Let's start with the supplies:



Hon-Dashi granules
White Miso
Extra firm tofu (optional, not pictured)
Green onion (optional, not pictured)

Make Dashi stock as per instructions - 1tsp to 3cups water, bring just to a boil.
Add as much or as little Miso paste as you want and mix well. Reduce heat and keep warm.
Cut tofu into small pieces and finely chop the green onion - place into a bowl.
Pour dashi/miso mix over the tofu and green onion.
Ta-da!

Anyways ... on to the bentos!

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Bento #58



This is leftovers from one night:

Egg noodles
Veggie stir fry
Tofu in oyster sauce
Mini oatmeal muffin
Chocolate coins

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Bento #59



Egg noodles
Wontons
Wonton soup mix (in the blue strawberry)
Mini Bok Choy with sesame oil
Mini smokies cut into various shapes.

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Bento #60



Omurice (mushroom rice wrapped in egg), topped with HP sauce
Snow peas
Carrots
Hot dog octopus and fish (under the octopus)
Corn

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Bento #61



More leftovers - from dinner tonight!

Egg noodles with sesame oil and soya sauce
Sesame tofu (tofu fried crispy with sesame oil, soya sauce and sesame seeds)
Edamame
Miso Soup ball (just add water!)
Carrot sticks
Apple bunny
Cheese
Taro mochi

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Phew!

Bento #35

Curry Rice
Deviled Egg
Hot Dog jumping fish
Carrots
Snap Peas
Snow Peas (hidden under sauce container)
Apricot
Black Grapes

Presentation isn't great on this one - I was a bit rushed and I'm sleepy.

You will notice a logo painted on the egg - I was originally going to try and do egg sheets to put over the rice, but it didn't come out properly, so I did the next best thing. Tomorrow night is Game 7 for the Stanley Cup - so I thought I should give The Mister a break on the cute stuff and give him the (old) Vancouver Canucks logo.
I'm not a sports fan in general, but it's hard not to get into the excitement.



I'm down to the bare bones in my kitchen and I have to finish packing, so I won't have time to make bento lunches for the next few days. Moving on Saturday, so life should be back to normal shortly after that.

Curry fried Rice Recipe:

Brown rice cooked in chicken stock
Imitation Crab
Scrambled egg
Corn
Green Beans
Yellow Curry Paste
olive oil

stir fry away!
I just kind of threw this together with whatever I have on hand - it's not bad.

Bento #6

I had oatmeal crisp (triple berry - yum!) for breakfast - 1-1/2 cups with 1/2 cup skim milk (I don't like milk and milk doesn't like me). It was pretty good.

I didn't specifically get to go for my hour walk this morning, but I did get at least an hour of walking done while picking up veggies and cleaning supplies.

I was starved when I got back home, so I had a sandwich (portugese roll, ham, turkey, garlic & herb cream cheese, havarti, lettuce)

Then my bento box this afternoon.
I included an apple bunny, an octodog, carrots, cucumber, snow peas, 3 chicken nuggets (blue label from President's Choice) with homemade jalapeno jelly for dipping (thanks to my grandmother) and I made onigiri stuffed with a bit of tuna salad. Oh, and a toffee for a treat.
The Mister got the same thing, minus the cucumber (he doesn't like it, so I threw in more carrots to compensate) and with an extra nugget. He liked the octodog.

Dinner was a new rice mix I wanted to try - it's also from the blue label line. It's called "Bayou Blend" with 3 kinds of rice, black eyed peas and red beans. I added some cajun spice to add a bit more kick, but it was pretty good. The leftovers are going in the bentos tomorrow.
I served it with maple smoked sausage (1 for me, 1-1/2 for the Mister)

***

When I was at my doctor's today, I was getting a prescription re-filled for migraine medication. She asked how that was going, and I let her know that I pretty much stopped getting them (my prescription had actually expired with several refills left). I used to get them monthly, but hadn't had one for a few months. One hit and it was a doozy, but I've been fine for a few months since.
She asked if I could think of anything that may have changed to cause this, and really, the only thing I can think of is ... my diet and activity level.
Hooray for all around health!