6/22/2011- Stuffed Shell Bento

Ha! I am back! This time I had a legitimate excuse for not posting: a move! We're now in upstate NY and HB has a new job. (I have my same job, just now over the phone/internet. It's funny; in a previous post, I called it a temporary gig. It has definitely transitioned into a more permanent one!)

It's been a long time since I have posted or bentoed or both. A move will do that. I also work from home now, so there was less incentive to bento. BUT! I decided that packing myself a bento lunch is a great way (as I've said many times before, blah, blah, blah) to do something nice for me. And I like taking pictures and having things to post, so there.

Here is my (very small) lunch for today:
Contents of bento: Stuffed pasta shell, strawberry, 2 Ratatouille skewers, salad, tiny tomato. Side car (bowl?) of Cadbury Roast Almond Chocolate Pieces.
(Not Pictured) a piece of nice bread from Red Hen Baking Company in Burlington (soooooo delicious. And organic!)

Sorry about the terrible picture. I took it with my phone. HB has stolen my camera for work. Maybe I will find myself a new camera, so we don't have to pass my ancient one back and forth.

2/3/2011- Potato Monster Bento

Potato Monster! I think he looks pretty fierce.

Contents of bento: Potato half decorated with cheese, olives, carrot, snap pea, and celery leaves, on a bed of salsa. Side car of carrots, tomatoes, celery, snap peas, and a little silicone cup of hummus.

I heated the monster up for maximum tasty-ness.


Here is a close up:


I am pleased to say that the side car was well-packed enough that it did not shift around at all. :D

PS: I went back and counted. As of today, I have 66 bentos that I have made posted on this blog. For almost 2 years, that is not bad.

2/2/2011- Happy Groundhog Day

Apparently in one of the communities where they traditionally view the ground hog, they had the unfortunate happenstance of having their ground hog die of old age a little while ago. They couldn't find a replacement, so they are using a stuffed one this year. No foolin', read about it here: http://www.pennlive.com/midstate/index.ssf/2011/01/groundhog_day_2011_in_eastern.html

All's I gotta say is that's pretty sad. I know it's hard to find a groundhog; but a stuffed one??

Anyways, my bento today has nothing to do with groundhogs and everything to do with leftovers.

Contents of bento: chili mac with chips and cheese, a small stripe of salsa, delicious refried cumin-and chili canellini beans. And a snap pea flower garnish.

Our area right now is covered in snow and ice several feet thick. (Several feet of snow, the ice is pretty thin, all things considered.) So, more flower-garnishes are in order, I think.

11/13/2010- Snack Bento

Sometimes I will take a plain ol' container of leftovers. Most of the time, in fact. But this time, I also packed up a little snack bento that was better than nothing :D

Contents of snack bento: olives, carrot sticks, hummus. Pretty straight forward. It was actually too many carrot sticks, but that's ok. I just ate them later.

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.

09/2010- Summer pasta bento, take 2

I'm not sure when I took this for lunch. I know it was sometime in September. I apologize for the terrible quality of the picture. I know I'm not exactly an artist-photographer, but I feel that at least people can *see* the things in my pictures. This one, not so much....

Contents of Bento: mini penne with pesto and sungold tomatoes, two olives, a mini baybel cheese. The salad is spicy asian greens and spinach with a small container of homemade tomatillo salsa in the middle which will act as dressing.

In the summer I often like to use salsa as a dressing for salad greens. It adds flavor and interest, without me having to make up dressing. (We don't really use the pre-made kind). I always pack dressing separately for salad because otherwise you end up with a soggy mess. Yuck.

9/4/2010- Leftovers Bento!

Even though I'm a working girl again, I don't have a whole lot of time for bento-ing. Or maybe it's just that our kitchen set up is not conducive to being creative. Anyways, excuses aside, I do have a bento or two to show you for September:

Leftovers in bento form! I think this was eggplant parmesan (from a restaurant) on the left and I know that the right was sauteed string beans with eggplant, onions, and balsamic vinegar. The garnish is a celery leaf.

This is in my glasslock box, which is so crucial for hot lunches. I'm very leery about microwaving plastic (as I've mentioned before). There are times, however, when I wish I had a more bowl-shaped glass container. Ah well, I will have to keep my eyes peeled. This is a good example of how to arrange leftovers in an attractive way. So always remember, you don't have to make special stuff for you bento. (This is a note to myself as much as anyone else!)

Retro-posting from our last week in VA

This was a bento I made at S&A's house our last week in VA. Tasty, nondescript, but a bento picture!

Contents of bento: fried rice with decor, sliced strawberry, and mini-babybel cheese.

Retro-posted from 5/27/2010- Peanut curry and rice

A really simple bento:

Contents of bento: peanut curry with all kinds of vegetables (none of which are visible), basil, rice (mixed white and brown) and some steamed carrots cut-out with the veggie cutters I also got in celebration of being done with my Masters.

The carrots were steamed and then had a little soy sauce put on them. Really simple. The whole thing went in the microwave. Not too bad. Not very fancy, but that's ok.

4/28/2010- Lemony Spanish Chickpeas

Once again, the lemony Spanish chickpeas recipe makes an appearance. This time I actually consulted the recipe, from Moosewood Restaurant Celebrates, and it came out pretty good. The first time I made it, I cooked them for almost 3 hours at really low heat after caramelizing the onions really thoroughly. I have not had the chance to repeat that process, but the quicker-cooking version I made for this dish came out very tasty. It's basically a saffron and garlic-flavored tomato sauce with chickpeas and lemon juice. I like it because it satisfies my never ending craving for tomato sauces, but it's not Italianate. A little something different. If you would like to know how to make lemony Spanish chickpeas, you'll have to buy the book or check it out at your local library.

Contents of Bento: mixed short grain brown and white rice (2 parts white to 1 part brown) topped with a takuan sun. Festive! Spanish lemony chickpeas garnished with an asparagus spear.

So, a pretty plain bento, sun deco aside. But I wanted something I could nuke at work, and this seemed to work really well. Of course, the takuan stained the rice yellow, but that's ok.

3/16/2010- Orange Bento

This bento was so overwhelmingly orange, I just had to put a little piece of broccoli in it to give it some green.

Contents of Bento: winter squash, cooked in the oven, mixed with a little molasses and salt; mixed white and brown rices; those Spanish lemon chickpeas. Carrot and broccoli decor over everything.

I'm really pleased with how the carrot flowers came out, don't they look great! Also a quarter for scale. This is by far my smallest box, holds only 407ml and is really shallow. But it's glass, which means the whole thing can go in the microwave, and when it's packed full like this, is a surprising amount of food. This is the last bento from the bento-rama of a few days ago.

2/3/2010- Assorted Curries Bento

More Curry! This was stuff that was sitting in the freezer. The rice is fresh though...

Contents of Bento: Potato and pea curry, carrots, kala chana masala with takuan star, broccoli-red onion-red bell pepper stirfry with green Thai curry. In side car: basmati rice, takuan star stuck to lettuce circle (for contrast!).

The star on the rice is "glued" down with a little dab of yogurt (which is what was handy.) I hope it doesn't taste too weird with the takuan. The stir-fry is also fresh made. I always steam the broccoli in the microwave and just throw it in in the last minute. I never can cook broccoli in a sautee without it getting kinda washed out and terrible looking.

1/14/2010- Indian curries bento and Bento Resolution

There haven't been a lot of postings recently because I've not been packing a bento lunch, just stuff in a bag. Although it's been tasty, it's not really interesting to look at, and also outside of the scope of this blog. ANY-ways.

Lots of the blogs I read have been talking about New Year's Bento resolutions: make bento lunches for the first time, make bento lunches every day, try to post every day, stuff like that.

I decided that I, too, should have a New Year's Bento resolution. I know that my schedule will keep me from packing (and photographing) a bento lunch every day. I'm just too busy between work and school and life. But I decided, after reviewing my blog, to take more time in how the bento looks. I resolve to make "prettier" bentos this year. Maybe not charaben or anything like that, but with a stronger eye towards visual appeal. It has never been a challenge for me to pack a tasty lunch. I'm a pretty good cook (IMHO) and like good quality food. But I do tend to disregard how things look. No more!

The first bento of the resolution features Indian foods made by my housemate, who makes delicious Indian food. It's turmeric-heavy, so I busted out the old glasslock box. MAN, is it tiny. (407ml, baby)

Contents of bento: Kala Chana masala with potatoes, topped with a takuan star, steamed broccoli to keep the sweet things from being curry-ified, frozen sour cherries, and two small pieces of banana bread, curried green beans. The side car has basmati rice in it.

It may be tiny, but this was a very filling lunch. It ended up being more rice than I had thought. I pulled out the two silicon cups and microwaved everything else for max-tastiness and hotness. The takuan star was a little strange on the curry, but not unpleasant. The broccoli barrier also kept the banana bread dry. Sadly, I think my silicon cups will be stained with turmeric tie-dye for a little while.

I tried to use my new, awesome, bento-sized chopsticks (thanks, little mama), but they are white and I didn't want them stained yellow on their first use. I'll have to wait, I suppose.

In my effort to make "prettier" bentos I think I may need to build some kind of light studio. I had a heck of a time trying to take a decent picture of this last night. And I still think it looks weird and dark.

6/12/09 Bento- veg gyoza

The last of the four previously photographed bentos. I'm going to need to start packing a bento lunch again so I can get some more photos. It's kind of disappointing I only took four pictures. Some of them were really cute...

Bento contents, in glasslock: Four vegetable gyoza (steamed in the microwave--fast and not too bad for texture); three stuffed mini peppers-orange and red, with parsley and scallion hummus;
steamed broccoli; cucumber and strawberry gap fillers; and two dark chocolate covered cashews in a foil piece at the bottom.
Not pictured: two fishes filled with soy/rice vinegar for the gyoza (they just didn't fit in the box).

The gyoza are from Trader Joe's. I have, in the past, fry/steamed frozen gyoza, but this time I just microwave-steamed them. They were a little stuck together, but tasted fine. I would also like to note that it's bad luck to serve them in groups of even numbers, five is the standard serving. (I did read this somewhere, that five was a lucky number for gyoza, but I can't seem to find a link/reference.) But four were what fit, so that's what I used. I would like to note that nothing terrible befell me that day, at least as far as I can remember!

The foil under the cashews was to prevent the chocolate coating from getting soggy. It only worked somewhat. They were a little damp, but still tasty.

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.)

6/9/09 Bento- asiany noodles

My second photographed bento of my summer project:

Bento contents, left to right: bean thread noodles with sesame oil and rice vinegar,
mini pepper stuffed with scallion and parsley hummus,
sesame tofu and eggplant stirfry with fresh edamame and marinaded shiitake mushrooms over top (in a metal cupcake liner to keep it separated from the noodles),
steamed broccoli, and cucumber slices.
The green package at the top is miso for miso soup.

A great bento, the noodles got a little dry, because the oil and vinegar drained all the way to the bottom. The stirfry did also not stay separated, but leaked out. Fortunately, all the flavors were harmonious, so it wasn't a big deal. The mini pepper with hummus was totally awesome, but I have learned to keep bentos with hummus chilled, otherwise the hummus gets a little zippy. Food safety, anyone?

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.