10-2010- Veggie Burger pseudo bento

Sometimes I like to just take a simple lunch. This is one way to make a veggie burger and chips lunch into a bento-appropriate one.

Contents of bento: Condiments in the glasslock, blue corn chips in the small container. A frozen veggie burger is in the tinfoil, and a frozen pita bread is in the paper towel.

Everyone has their favorite ways of packing things, I like to pack frozen bread products in paper towels so they don't get soggy. I'm lucky to have a toaster oven at work, so I can just heat everything up there. I really don't like microwaved veggie burgers, they're much better when they're crispy. The burger is wrapped in tinfoil so I automatically have a little "pan" to use in the toaster oven. If you don't use the office toaster oven tray, you don't have to clean it. (And in some places I've worked, I seemed to be the only person that ever cleaned it....bluh)

Here is a detail of the condiments (which is actually the only strictly "bento" part of this lunch.)
Contents of Condiments box: lettuce, red pepper strips, tomato slice, a little silicone cup of cheddar, dill pickle slices, and a teeny-tiny container of bbq sauce. This little container originally held wasabi in a container of take-out grocery store sushi. Thanks, HB's mum, for saving stuff like this. I'm just thrilled because it actually fits in the glasslock. It's a pretty shallow box, so it's hard to find lidded containers that will work in it.

Back from Silence!

Hey all of my now nonexistent readers. I am going to start posting again! First will be the sorry clean up of bentos that I've done this fall that I never posted. Not too many, sadly. Our set up right now is just not very conducive to bento-making. But I will persevere. My new goal is to try and have something to post once a week. At least that will keep my blog from looking like some kind of desert wasteland.

My little bbq sauce container believes in me! Look at that knowing smile on his tomato face. He's just thrilled to be filled with bbq sauce instead of ketchup.

SWAG!

Ok, so we live in CT now, and I was bound and determined to make some bento with my new swag so that I could post something in celebration of winning the contest. But our temporary kitchen is not really conducive to bento-ing. I will need to think about my plan of attack for it....

I began by laying out everything I got in the awesome box of great stuff:

Despite the bizarrely "artfully" alignment of the picture (I'm not exactly sure what I was thinking...I think I was just trying to get everything in the image....) Behold, my SWAG!--lots of boxes, picks, shapers, baran, all kinds of amazing stuffs.

But what is really crazy is when you realize that it pretty much DOUBLES the amount of bento things I own. I mean. Really. Double. So, storage is kind of an issue, but it's ok. I put out all of my other stuff into the array, so the awesomeness of my bento collection can be seen...

the only thing missing from this image is my metal tiffin box for HB. Somehow it got left on a chair. But you can see that I now have quite the array of bento supplies!

As I make lunches with them, I will post the sizes of the new boxes. I'm a little intimidated by the yellow onigiri bento--I think I might be able to pack a sandwich in it without too much trouble. :D I'm not sure how to keep it closed; the top section doesn't fit all that tightly onto the bottom....:shrug: I guess I need to play with it.

Back from Silence!

So, yes, this blog has been VERY quiet for a little while. Mostly because HB and I were in the process of moving 100s of miles away. We are now settled (or as settled as we're going to be for a little while...) and I've got some posting to catch up on!

Here is my darling ELPH box that I got as a present for myself when I finished my Masters degree. Yay for tiny elephants!

And here's what it looks like all spread outs:

And with the lids on:

It came with a tiny fork and I also got some cute ELPH chopsticks in a keen little case to go with:

In case you can't tell, the lid says: "Wow, there are so many mushrooms" which is hilarious and cute.

For CB who likes scale...

ELPH box and quarter

and

ELPH box with ruler. As you can see, it's pretty little. I think it's around 450 ml for both sections.

My inaugural bento meal in this box will be the next post. Woo!

4/19/2010-Japanese Leftovers

Again, no traditional bento here. And looking at the picture of the contents, it looks very-not-bento. But anyways...

HB and I had Japanese food last night with our friend S. We went to Hyashi, a local place near where I work. HB decided that we should go out to eat since I had finished the draft of my final exit portfolio. (My degree program has an exit portfolio, instead of a thesis. It's a fairly comparable amount of work.)

Wrapped in furoshiki- I am hiding my Styrofoam takeout container with Japanese leftovers. My tiny chopsticks are stuck in the knot, hiding under it is a small container of soy sauce.

Here's how I arranged the leftovers. Veggie yakisoba, edamame, and sushi: spinach, oshinko, cucumber, ume-cucumber, inari. Very tasty and satisfying. I was too tired last night to arrange this in one of my bentos, but I think it looks pretty tidy and nice in this take-out box.

Everything was great at by lunchtime. This one went in the fridge at work, since it was just in a take-out container and not in my insulated lunch bag.

I've been thinking about what to get as a treat for finishing up my degree...any suggestions? They have some awfully cute bentos over at Japanistic: like this one with a tiny elephant on it or this one with tiny elephants in love. In case you didn't know, I'm kind of into tiny elephants...
Regardless, I think my next bento will be a double-decker, elongated style. I think being able to pack different shapes of bentos is an important part of being into bento. :D

3/12/2010- Onigiri and Assorted Okazu

This is the first of the bento-rama bentos (from my spree yesterday evening). I'm really excited, because I took "process" pictures while I was making this. One of the first things I want to show off is what I use as a mini-steamer. It goes to show you, you don't need a fancy Japanese one.

Here is the bottom part: a small, round bowl from Target. Broccoli and purple cabbage with about a teaspoon of the vinegar-based dressing I used in the cucumber salad from yesterday. Quarter is for scale.

And the top part, another bowl from Target, this one is larger and slightly flower-shaped. It's so perfect for bento-sized steaming. I just make sure that there's a little liquid in the with whatever I'm steaming and stick it in the microwave for about 30-40 seconds. And it looks so cute! Like a little mushroom/flower thing!

Bottom layer: onigiri with umeshiso paste inside, red pepper on top. Roasted asparagus, baby carrot, cut to add some lift to what's going on top of them.

The final thing! (Onigiri and asparagus and carrot from the previous picture) + 3 Okazu: vinegar-steamed broccoli with red cabbage, saffron/lemon Spanish chickpeas, soy-roasted portabello mushrooms with carrot flowers. Also, a cup of frozen sour cherries.

You can see the quarter peaking out there for scale. This box is also the one that I took pictures of while holding it in this posting, so long ago. It's pretty small, only holds 450 ml, if my memory serves me correctly.

I had a lot of fun with this bento, I actually made little portions for it, instead of just using little bits of what's in the fridge already. The asparagus and mushrooms were roasted with a little olive oil and salt in the toaster oven. When the asparagus was pretty and bright green, I took it out, and poured a little soy sauce over the mushrooms. Then they got turned once and cooked until brown and the soy sauce was all glaze-y.

It was also fun to use my little onigiri press. It makes the process soooooo easy. The only complaint I have is that it's hard to fill tiny ones, but I prefer tiny onigiri to the bigger ones because I can eat them in one bite without stuffing my face like a chipmunk. Also, I usually use 2:1 white to brown for my rice blend and I have to say that having more brown rice makes for less cohesive onigiri. What price fiber...

By lunchtime, though, everything was still great. Delicious and great and filling. I'm not totally sure how much rice 6 mini onigiri is in cups. Maybe I should measure that. Anyways, I was nice and full after lunch. Hooray!

2/24/2010- Leftover Sushi

I know it's been a long time since there's been a new posting. Things have been very, very hectic at our house recently. Fortunately, things should be calming down a little bit this weekend.

The other night HB and I decided to get take-out sushi from the grocery. Of course some of it had to find its way into my bento for lunch.

Contents of Bento: Seaweed salad, darling little lady apple, soysauce packet, inari sushi, and some vegetable maki rolls made with brown rice. The four around the outside have a little dab of wasabi on them.

I'm not sure if this counts as a "pretty" bento, but I figured that some posting is better than none. The inari sushi looked nice and full and pretty in the container they were sold in, but when I flipped them over, I saw that they had all been woefully under-filled with rice. I'm not sure what that's about. The nice thing about a sushi bento is that I can eat it at room temperature and it doesn't feel weird or unsatisfying. I'm kind of picky about lunch foods-- I much prefer a hot lunch to a cold one.

I've been eating lady apples like crazy. HB found a HUGE box of them at work and brought them home. They have a crisp, creamy sort of flesh and an almost floral-apple flavor. They also fit into bento boxes of all sizes because they're so tiny, which is, of course, a selling point all its own.

1/18/2010- Bento-sized Calzone

Another try at a pretty bento. Our housemate had a "Make Your Own Calzone" dinner, so I made part of mine into a tiny, bento-sized one. This is a good technique to use to fill your bento. Are you making something for dinner? Cook a small serving of it especially for your bento. Making burgers? Make a mini-burger for your lunch at the same time. (or what have you) It saves time and makes for a cuter way to take leftovers.

Contents of Bento: Mini Calzone, sitting in foil, steamed broccoli with carrots below, carrot sticks, and green salad with mushrooms above. There is a tiny foil cup with a marinated artichoke cut into little pieces (garnished with an olive). The elephunt has balsamic vinegar for the salad. The small side car has sauce, and a strange garnish pattern. Patterns are pretty, right?

I heated the calzone a little bit when I went to eat it so it wasn't so cold. Cold cheese makes me a little sad. I had packed this bento on Sunday night, but it was fine when I went to eat it on Tuesday. The calzone has cheese and artichoke hearts inside. Deeeeeelicious.

Here's what it looks like all packed up in my kinchaku bag. See my awesome, new, tiny chopsticks! I love thems :D they are so tiny!

1/15/2010- Pizza for Friday Bento

When I was a kid, the elementary and middle schools I attended would always have pizza on Fridays in the cafeteria. I always had a packed lunch. I didn't have a bento, but it was an attractive, tasty, and healthful assortment of foods. My little mama packed my lunch for a lot of my youth and then helped me to continue to pack a great lunch as I got to be an adolescent (Thanks, little mama!). But sometimes in middle school, the peer pressure was too much and on Fridays I would forgo eating my lunch and buy the crappy school pizza. Man, was it terrible. But it was pizza, so how could a 12-year-old say no?

In that tradition, a pizza-for-Friday bento!

Contents of Bento: Steamed broccoli with olive garnish, balsamic vinegar in elephant bottle. Banana bread man, frozen sour cherries. Two mini pizzas with 2 wing-a-lings behind flanking 4 cut out stars of bread and 1 of Parmesan cheese. Side car of sauce, with olive and broccoli garnish. Not pictured: side car of tortellini (just a few).

So, the banana bread man was an experiment. I should have cut out a more recognizable shape from the banana bread (he looks a little indistinct) but it was the only cutter I had available that fit the strip of banana bread I had cut. I suppose I could have cut out a banana bread pepper or something, but that seemed even sillier than a banana bread man.

(Run, run, run as fast as you can, you can't catch me, I'm the banana bread man! But actually, a man made of banana bread would have squishy little legs and wouldn't be able to run very fast at all. That was the case here. He was deeeelicious.)

I ate my lunch with my new tiny chopsticks. Hurray! They fit inside the leaflet tight box, too, which is also super awesome. I didn't really use the fancy orange pick I packed, since the chopsticks were so perfect. Also, the pick was inadequate for eating the tiny broccoli. I really cut it down to doll-house size, almost.

Also, this lunch was packed on Wednesday night and stored in the fridge until Friday morning. I have to report that everything fared pretty well, all things considered. The pizzas were a little soft, but I stuck them in the toaster oven to rewarm. The wing-a-lings had also started to separate from their breading, but that wasn't a big deal. Interestingly enough, the texture on the banana bread man was perfect and the bread stars were also fine. Wednesday night was when I had time to make pretty lunches, though I suppose it's a little against bento-principles to make a bento lunch a few days ahead. Well, too bad. That's probably how my bentos are going to have to go this spring. :D

Retro-posted from 12/25/2009- A bento for my Little Mama

My little mama made the mistake of expressing some passing interest in bento-making. So I got her her own set (with some stuff to start her out).

Here is the set all wrapped up in its matching kinchaku . Next to it is a tiny Bonne Maman jar, which matched the box. However, it is too tall to fit in either tier, but it's often nice to have a little extra jar to take salad dressing or what have you.

The box looks like this:
Sorry the picture is a little out of focus. Two tiers with rubber lids on both tiers.

Under the lid, a little storage area!
You can see the elastic band in the front and some tiny cocktail (bento-sized) forks in the back. One plastic and the rest are bamboo. This set also came with some darling bento-sized chopsticks. But little mama doesn't do chopsticks so her darling daughter got them instead :D. I guess I should take a picture featuring them...they really are a great size, about the length of my hand, and plain white. Now you know what they look like.

Inside everything...
Top tier has two lift-out trays in classic 2/3 - 1/3 proportion. Bottom tier has a sliding barrier. Obscured by the barrier are 2 little fishes for sauce. Also featured: 4 silicon mini-cups (2 blue and 2 red) and a little 40ml container from Japan. Seriously, I love these guys. I'm going to have to buy some more if I keep giving them away...

The box is micro-safe with lids off and also dishwasher safe. These are key elements for my little mama. It has yet to be used, but someday soon! I was supposed to pack her a starter lunch before we left, but that didn't happen. It's a little bigger than I thought it was going to be, but a very nice set all in all. I got it from jBox. And even though I ordered it in late November, it arrived before Christmas. The shipping and whole process was very smooth.

The Bear of Salt is Dead- Long Live The Bear of Salt!

The Bear of Salt has served me well, but he is sadly no longer whole.

As I hope you can see in this picture, his little neck is broken, which means he leaks salt all over my lunch bag.

Tragedy.

A moment of silence for The Bear of Salt, please.

The Bear of Salt is Dead!

*--------------*

Long Live the Bear of Salt!
Just like the British Monarchy, the job has to be filled and life goes on. Please welcome the new Bear of Salt.

Actually, his coloring matches the salt a little better, but I shouldn't speak ill of the dead...

Onigiri Post- new stuff!

Among the things that I got at H-Mart earlier this month was a sweet onigiri mold. I used it to make a whole bunch of the little guys the last time I made rice. This rice is mixed short-grain brown with short-grain Japanese white rice. The ones on the right-hand-side are all filled with umeshiso paste, which is deeeeelicious. Umeshiso paste is very sour and salty tasting.

I needed a place to put all the little guys, so I thought of my totoro bento box. I trust the seal on it much more than I do on regular tupperware.

The onigiri were a SNAP to make. Seriously, so easy. And they held up well and stayed edible (though not at peak awesomeness) for a whole week. I'm totally converted. I also like the fact that the press makes such small ones. I like tiny foods better. :D

11/11/2009- New Bento Box and Pupusa Bento

Last weekend I was in Alexandria and while I was in Northern VA I took the opportunity to go and hunt up some awesome stuff at Super H Mart in Fairfax. This Korean grocery store carries all kinds of awesome international foods AND bento boxes. So, of course, I got a new bento box. Now I have three. Which is how it begins...

Leaflet Tight Box: came with a little green bag. Awwww, how cute! It is 500ml and has three lift out trays. One holds 175ml and the other two hold 80ml each, so with the trays it's a good size for me for lunch.

And here's the inaugural lunch I packed for it:
Contents of Bento: Pupusas with Zucchini and delicious cabbage salad with tomato sauce from South of the Border. In the big compartment: pineapple slice and frozen sour cherries, sungold cherry tomatoes (the LAST of the season), baby carrots, green olives, a prune, and a purple carrot cut up and stacked all pretty under the prune. The little side car has some hummus in it for the carrots.

Everything was delicious. The pupusas are not very good at room temperature, but I was too lazy to pick out all the little pieces and reheat. Eaten with the cabbage it was alright. Even though the box got tilted around a little bit, the pupusas did not get wet. There was some vinegar from the cabbage salad under the two containers when I washed it, but somehow it worked. The two pink cups are new from Super H Mart as well, they are heart shaped. I think they're going to be really awesome since they fit so nicely into corners. I also picked up a tube of Umeshiso paste so I will have umeboshi in my future!

10/7/2009-Soba noodle stirfry- with Japanese bean treat

I was up in Northern Virginia last weekend (otherwise known as the Land of International Grocery Stores). Anyways, I picked up some stuff I'd wanted, but was unable to find umeboshi (to be honest, I didn't really search). But I did get some interesting things, which I will be taking for bento lunches and eating in general.

Contents of bento: plum, mini-pepper stuffed with garlic and herb La Vache Qui Rit, frozen sour cherries. Carrot sticks; soba noodle stirfry; plain, reheated rice topped with broccoli; and a Japanese bean pastry thing. Also:

A "suit case" full of furikake. This kind is pretty simple: sesame, seaweed, salt. But it still tastes a little weird to me. I wish I had included something to show the scale of the "suit case." It's actually a little pill case, about 1" x 2" x 1/4". Sometimes I can fit it inside the bento, even, but I didn't want the furikake to get soggy.

Everything was tasty except for the reheated rice. Bleh. Man, I really need to quit putting old rice in a bento. It's already hard and dry and even though I reconstituted this stuff in the microwave the night before (with a little water) it was still dry and horrible when I ate it. Oh well, live and learn. It might also be the grain. I haven't tried it with the shorter-grained Japanese rice. Needless to say, the furikake did not improve the taste of the terrible, dry rice. Oh well.

The Japanese bean pastry thing was a little strange. I guess I was expecting more like a mochi bean cake, but the outsides of this thing are like styrofoam (actually, EXACTLY like those little ice cream cones? You know, the "cake" ones?). The insides are not red bean, but fruit-flavored bean goo. I'm not doing a great job "selling" them, but they are actually pretty tasty.

10/1/2009-Soba Noodle Stir-fry and HB bento

This posting is a kind of exciting posting because it features pictures from the first photographed HB-Bento! Woo! The very first bento I made for myself (long, long, ago) was accompanied by the very first HB-Bento (i.e., the first bento for HB). Well this posting contains the illustrious SECOND HB-Bento (the first one to be photographed). Back when I started I thought it was a little weird that people take pictures of their lunches. But then I got into reading bento blogs. Man, are those pictures key.

Contents of my bento: plum, 2 mini-peppers stuffed with garlic and herb La Vache Qui Rit; soba noodles stirfried with edamame, sweet-soy simmered tempeh, and topped with broccoli and turnip.

I simmered the tempeh with some kombu and dried black fungus (mmmmmm fungus) in soysauce, mirin, and a little rice vinegar. I also added in a big spoonful of brown sugar. Deeee-licious.

The whole reason why HB got a bento today too was because I bought him this swank new bento box. It's a tiffin-style container from World Market. And it's dishwasher safe, which I have tested out. Mostly, though, it holds a lot of food and doesn't look plastic or girly, which means there are more places he can take it. It also looks like it would hold up to some beating, which is also crucial.

Tiffin! Metal (stainless steel), Indian bento-style container. This one has two compartments and it snaps together nicely. It's pretty waterproof, though I haven't really tried testing the limits of that. The outer surface of the compartments has this nice dimpled pattern in the metal. It's really quite an attractive item. Purchased from World Market for the low, low price of $10.

And here it is filled with foods.

Contents of HB bento: on left, mini-pepper stuffed with La Vache Qui Rit (garlic and herb), some baby carrots, a plum, 2 toothpics of edamame, packet of miso soup, and a silicon baking cup filled with homemade spicy, salty cashews (I do them on the stove top with curry powder, salt, and cayenne). On the right, soba noodle stir fry (same as I got, just in a huge, HB-sized portion).

A closer view of the bottom container.

I did pack this the night before and stuck it in the fridge, as is my wont.

The verdict was very positive. Hooray! And he said he didn't mind the container, so I think there will be more HB bentos in the future. Excellent. The term that I found in this book I got from the library (The Food of Japan: Authentic Recipes from the Land of the Rising Sun, by Takayuki Kosaki and Walter Wagner) is aisai bento, or loving wife's lunch. Essentially, it's the lunch that a wife packs for her man, which may or may not embarrass him in its decorativeness. The book is, to my estimation, so-so. But it does have some nice narrative in the beginning about different areas they cover in Japanese cuisine.

9/22/2009- Pesto Pasta and Mini Pizza bento

I usually pride myself on making homemade food, but I've noticed that lots of my bentos have had "convenience" items in them this month. Little hors d'oeuvres just make such nice bento additions. If I take homemade leftovers, often I just put them in a tupperware and don't bother to make up a bento. That's also because I love my Totoro bento box and don't want it to get stained with tomato or tumeric (which feature prominently in the cooking in our house). I know the solution is to use my glasslock box. But, meh, the Totoro one just has such awesome dimensions. The taller sides make it much easier to pack things in it.

So here's another bento that uses some convenience food. Tiny pizzas from Trader Joe's! Man, they're just so CUTE, how could I resist?

Contents of bento: Pesto pasta (storebought pesto, sorry) with kalamata olives, pine nuts, and Parmesan cheese. Left side: A little spinach salad on the top, two sweet corn tires, two mini pizzas separated from the corn with a baking cup folded in half. The side car at the top has a molasses cookie cut in the shape of a maple leaf, in honor of the first day of fall :D

So, you think I would have learned my lesson a few short days ago, with the pasta salad debacle. My bento got kind of jostled around a little bit and I guess the pesto oil got siphoned along the rubber grommet...again. It was all along the edge and flowing down the side by the pizza. Bah! Oh well, nothing ruined. Corn tires are fun to eat. And I love my new tiny side car. (I have three, they came with four, but I sent one to a friend.) They are 40ml, polypropylene, and completely watertight. I got them from here: this ebay store with bento stuff . They shipped out pretty fast, and were packaged with all the original Japanese packaging. Totally awesome.

6/10/2009- Onigiri and other stuff bento

So the other night when I made the thai-basil sort of eggplant dish, I made Japanese short grain rice to go with it. And I made a few onigiri, using the plastic wrap method, which I stuck in the fridge. I have made them by hand before, too, which is fun and painful (a little bit), but since I wasn't going to use them the next day, I thought I would use the plastic wrap method so they'd be prepped to not dry out. Two days later, here they are in my lunch, with a strange assortment of some other things. I left the onigiri wrapped in their plastic when I packed up my Totoro box, so they wouldn't lose any moisture into the box (no soggy cheese).

Contents of Bento: two plain onigiri on left; baybel cheese with heart cut-out (the heart ontop of the onigiri is the wax from it); under the cheese is celery and carrot; also celery and carrot at the bottom of the box.
In the middle is some leftover orzo salad from going out dinner the other night, with pine nuts and red pepper added, garnished with basil, in a red silicon cup. It needed some serious help, it was quite bland.
The blue silicon cup has 3 artichoke hearts and two olives; under that is one prune. I lined the bigger compartment with a lettuce leaf.

You may ask, why is there a big, honking space in the top right corner? Well, it was waiting for one of those mushroom "meatballs" from Trader Joe's to cool down from the toaster oven.

Voila! Finished bento.

Well, sort of. I needed some serious sauces, since most everything was dry. So, I brought some of my containers:

Sauce bottles!

The two fishes have soy sauce in them. The panda bear is filled with Balsamic vinegar (for the artichokes and meatball) and the tan bear is The Bear of Salt. He always has salt in him. :D I love these little sauce bottles, they're such a boon to bento packing. All the sauce bottles were just jammed into the box wherever they would fit (not very pretty) so there's no picture of the whole thing as it looked like when I went to eat it.

Everything was tasty, including two-day old onigiri. The pasta salad stayed in its cup and there was no leakage. Hurray!

6/10/09 Bento- mushroom meatball

Number three, also in my glasslock container. Man, I do love that thing, though it is seriously heavy. I can't imagine how much heavier the larger ones are...

Bento contents: in a layer on the bottom on the left side, baby carrots and cucumber sticks;
red silicon baking cup with regular and red pepper hummus on top;
steamed broccoli in the middle with a sliced strawberry as garnish;
on the right-hand side, in a foil cupcake liner three mushroom "meatballs", one olive, and three pieces of cheddar cheese;
fishy of BBQ sauce at the top.
Not pictured: 1/2 whole wheat pita bread in plastic bag.

The foil cupcake liner had a piece of paper towel in the bottom to absorb moisture. I drained the olive before hand so it didn't get messy (of course, it was also on the paper towel). To put the foil in, I just flattened it and mashed it in the end to fit. Seemed to work pretty well. I ended up making a mini "meatball" sandwich in the toaster oven, and if I were to do that again, the cheese should be in smaller pieces.

I also had a tough time manipulating baby carrots and cucumber sticks into the hummus with chopsticks. I have a nice pair of chopsticks that I keep in my lunch bag and I do like eating with them. (I think it's probably because it's such a fiddly thing...I like fiddly.) But I think the baby carrots are almost too big to grasp and dip.

The little fishy container is from a great online store called www.from-japan-with-love.com. I ordered a couple of things from them, including the bear container in previous postings. The service was prompt and my order form was packed in this pretty, Japanese foil envelope. Lovely! For those of us who don't live near San Fran, finding Japanese bento things at a reasonable price is difficult. (I can only give my father-in-law so many requests when he's traveling before I feel like I'm taking advantage.)

6/8/09 Bento- Curry

As promised, I am retro-posting my previous bentos. I looked around on all the places I keep such things and I only have 4 pictures of the 35 I made this summer. Boo! Well, at least 4 is better than none.

This bento is from June 8th and featured leftover Indian food made by my housemate the night before. I packed it after dinner and stuck it in the fridge overnight (my favorite way to speed-bento in the morning).

Contents of bento: brown rice with strawberry garnish, Turnip and Greens curry, Indian garlic pickle in blue silicon baking cup, and the little bear is filled with yogurt. This is in my 400ml Glasslock container.

Side dish: dal in a Ziplock twist container.

I took out the strawberry, bear, and garlic pickle and popped it in the microwave to heat a little bit. Everything was great, but the bear was a devil to clean. The bottle has little shoulders which trap viscous liquids. I think yogurt is better served in a different container. I also noticed that the silicon baking cup absorbed some of the intense odor of the garlic pickle. Several washings and letting it air out solved that problem. The silicon baking cups are from Wilton and are a great boon to having little side dishes all separated out.