Bento #8 May 28, 2008

Today’s bento is more “homestyle” than the one from yesterday. I made it this morning w/ leftovers from last night’s dinner a couple other little extras. I went ahead and added another little container with salad for today because I got hungry yesterday afternoon after I had eaten my bento.

There’s corn, peaches, banana on the left; vegan mac and cheese and a fortune cookie on the right. And of course salad on the bottom. It has spinach, tomato, baby carrots, vegan ranch dressing and a couple crackers.

Bento #7 May 27, 2008

I’ve been really busy the last few days and my lunch has been provided, hence me slacking with the bentos. But I’m back at it today! I made this bento this morning and it only took about 10 minutes total putting it together. I used a piece of cloth that I hand dyed for my psychology of clothing class last semester.  It’s a cool technique where you rubber band marbles in the cloth and dye it. I put it in blue then red dye to make it that color. I still need to finish the edges, but I thought it would work well for today. Now onto the bento!

On the left there’s some cut up celery, baby carrots, cherries, a fortune cookie and a few peaches from our tree. For some reason the peaches were really small this year, but they fit perfectly in the bento!

On the right I have some mushroom flavored udon noodles I made. They came in a package similar to ramen. I added some miso paste and sesame seeds into it to add some extra flavor. I haven’t eaten the bento yet, but I tasted the noodles and they are yummy. Adding miso to asian style noodles is a new way of flavoring noodles that I came up with a few weeks back. It is an easy way to change up the flavor.

Papas Rancheros May 27, 2008

There’s a restaurant near my apartment in San Antonio that was named “The Best Tacos in America” by the Food Network. It’s called Taco Taco. They have a couple tacos that I can have there, including the papas rancheros tacos that I normally get. The other day I decided to try out making my own papas rancheros tacos and they turned out pretty good and tasted very similar to Taco Taco’s. Here’s a picture of one of the tacos.

Papas Rancheros

Ingredients
1 medium sized potato
1 medium sized tomato
1/2 jalapeño
1/2 small onion
salt and pepper to taste
tortillas

Wash the potato and poke it a few times with fork. Cook in the microwave for 5 minutes or until done. While it’s cooking, dice the tomato, jalapeño, and onion. Once the potato has cooled some, carefully peel it and chop it into big chunks. Heat up a medium sized skillet, spray with cooking spray and add potato, onion, and jalapeño. Once they have cooked a bit, add tomato and salt and pepper to taste. Once potato is browned and onion is cooked, warm up a tortilla and add the potato mixture. Enjoy!

Bento #6 May 21, 2008

Last night I made bentos for my boyfriend and me. The other day I found a cool tutorial on how to make onigiri with cookie cutters, and since I don’t have any rice molds, I decided to try it out. I have a star shaped cookie cutter that I had never used before and figured it would work well. It did! Here’s a picture of all the onigiri I made last night. The one w/ some pink on it has a jelly filling, and the rest just have sesame seeds and nori on them. I think the little faces turned out cute. I wanted to make more but my boyfriend didn’t want his coworkers looking at him weird. My boyfriend forgets to shave sometimes, so I even made a little “afternoon shadow” on one of them! (Its the top left one)

Here’s a picture of the bento I made for my boyfriend. I had an avocado leftover from when I made sushi the other day and thought it would go well with the onigiri. I also added a fortune cookie, some rice candy, and some nori maki and a soy packet. He just got done eating it and said it was pretty yummy. He normally has asian noodle cups, so this was a nice change.

Mine is a little larger because I didn’t get to have breakfast today. It has onigiri, avocado, peanuts, nori maki, rice candy, and a soy sauce packed in the left layer. On the right there’s more onigiri, a mushroom w/ the stem placed into the cap (to be eaten w/ the onigiri), the jelly onigiri, grapes, and a fortune cookie.

Bento #5 May 19, 2008

Yesterday it was one of my friends birthdays. She had to work today, so for a special after birthday treat I’d make her a nice bento for her lunch at work. I’ve been wanting to make some of my udon noodles for a bento so I used those and some other fruits and veggies I had around the house.

First here’s hers

On the right you can see the mushroom flavor udon noodles, pan fried tofu, and grilled yellow bell pepper and onion. On the left there’s strawberries, blackberries, grapes, raspberries, pretzels, a fortune cookie, and a mint.

And here’s mine

Mine is basically the same, but I have blanched asparagus and no fortune cookie and mint.

I stopped off at her work and we had lunch together. She enjoyed her meal and it was nice to make her something yummy since she has been eying mine!

Bento #4 May 18, 2008

Yesterday I got my new bento box in the mail. I was very excited about it, so even though I still had a bit of food left over for lunch today at work, I thought I’d go ahead and make a snack bento in my new box. I found that my new silicone heart shaped cupcake baking cups worked great in my new box and fit the theme perfectly!

Here’s a picture of the bento box with a pencil to show how small it is.

I think I’m getting better at making the bento attractive, but I still have a ways to go before I’ll be doing beautiful charaben. I also read up on food safety and found foods that will help keep everything fresh and safe throughout the day. That’s why the little key lime is added in there with the fruit. I also thought the lime juice would be good on the strawberries or in the tea.

In the bottom layer: jasmine tea, fortune cookie, a mint.
In the top layer: soy crisps, nori maki, a key lime, strawberries, raspberries, and grapes.

Bento #3 May 17, 2008

I made this little snacking bento for work today. My Mom made lunch for everyone so I didn’t need a lunch, but wanted some little snacks for later on when we aren’t busy. I only used one layer this time, because I also brought down all the rest of the leftover sushi.

It has some nori maki, soy crisps, pretzels, a fortune cookie, and a couple jasmine tea bags.

Bento #2 May 16, 2008

I made this bento last night with some of the sushi leftovers from dinner. I had work today so I had to make one, since I actually needed it this time!
I just got finished eating everything and it was yummy. It was a nice little meal that turned out to be pretty filling. It’s amazing how little the bento boxes are, but how much food you can fit into them.

Left: veggie sushi, wasabi (in the little container), nori maki, and soy crisps.
Right: baby carrots and mango, a soy sauce packet, and a fortune cookie (it’s kind of hidden).

Vegetable Sushi Dinner Extravaganza May 16, 2008

Last night I made a bunch of veggie sushi for Jason and I. It included asparagus, carrot, avocado, and yellow bell pepper made into different kinds of rolls. I tried out making spiral rolls, regular rolls, and inside out rolls. Out of the three I would say the inside out rolls gave me the biggest problems because the rice was so sticky! I also made some tofu sashimi which turned out pretty good. I soaked the tofu in some soy sauce before I made it to add a little extra flavor.

Overall I think the meal was pretty successful. I tried to focus on presentation more and even made little carrot flowers to make the sushi even cuter.

Bento #1 May 15, 2008

Yesterday I bought another bento box. I went to the local Japanese market to get bento accessories and found some snacks. When I was checking out I saw a cute bento box and decided to get it. My other one that I ordered is still en route so I needed something to tie me over…
I decided to make a snack bento so Jason and I would have it after we started drinking last night. It’s not that fancy, but it did the trick!

In the bottom layer is has brown rice, kimchi, and spicy sprouts. The other layer has nori maki, rice crisps, and a little fruit bar.

I am excited about making bento for my lunches at work. I get pretty bored sometimes, so a cute lunch might be the pick me up I’ve always needed! I’m going to work on the presentation some more, but I think this bento isn’t too bad looking. I’m also still looking for bento accessories (soy sauce containers, rice molds, separators, etc.) but I’ve started saving little items that would go great in a bento, so stay tuned to check it out.