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.

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.

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 #28

Salad Bento - I made it last-minute in the morning, using the water from boiling the egg to also boil the hot dog.

Bagged salad with mushrooms and mini peppers added
grape tomatoes
snow peas
black grapes
hot dog cut into an octopus, a fish and a crab
deviled egg
rice crackers
honey mustard and salad dressing in the containers on the side (they fit into the box over top of the hot dog and grapes)

I used the Mister's large bento box so I could pack a lot of salad.
My manager at work loved the octodog - her roommate has a small child and they are trying to get him to try hot dogs, but he won't. She thought fun shapes might work, so I drew up a quick cutting guide to make one hot dog into the 3 sea animals and gave it to her :)

I haven't really had time to make lunches this week, because we've been so busy getting ready to move. We're almost done packing, so I hope next week will be better.

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 #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 #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 #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.

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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.

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!