Second day of school lunches and snacks:)

I feel like I am always making the kids the same things over and over again. And for these boring repetitions, I appologize. But they like what they like and the whole point of all of this work is to get them to eat. So once again I bring you: Spam Musubi!


Musubi with cherry tomatoes and edamame in the top tiers.



And even more Spam Musubi in the second tiers (because they LOVE it).




In my personal bento (which was considerably larger in size today) are peaches.



And a rather sloppily arranged second tier of Spam Musubi.





Here are the cute boxes used today. Devin's pink one actually has a handle.





















Mine has a handle too and you can tell how much bigger it is when all three are placed next to eachother.







Here are their snack bentos.










Salami skewers and grape with swiss cheese skewers.











And their snack bento boxes:)

First Day of School!!!!

Yay!!! School has officially begun:) My kids are in a new school which starts almost an hour later than their previous school, which means? I don't have to get up at the crack of dawn to make their lunches!! Double Yay!!!!

Moooooo!!



Lunches consisted of their favorite, salmon, a cow rice ball, two quail egg chickies, and cherry tomato lady bug and some green grapes:)

Whoops! The chick's eyes got a little lopsided.




We also broke in some new, awesome bento boxes...LOVE!


Appologies for the excessive use of exclamation marks!

summer bento

My favorite part of summer is the availability of fresh local produce. This summer marks my second participating in a CSA (community supported agriculture). If you're not familiar, you pick a CSA farm, pay in advance for shares, and get a box of produce from the farm every week. It can be risky. Some natural disaster might make the crops fail and then you're just out of money. You don't get to pick what comes in your box so it's probably not the best choice for picky eaters. The other side of that coin is you'll probably be introduced to some new veggies (I ate kohlrabi for the first time last year and saw my first-ever lemon cucumber). The veggies couldn't be fresher and you support your local economy and local business owners. Many farms will let you visit too.

Just look at this produce! So pretty.



1. zucchini flowers, 2. purple cauliflower, 3. purple cauliflower, 4. zucchini flowers


Some photos from a June visit to my CSA, Dunlooken Farms in Glencoe, MN.



1. farm, 2. chicken, 3. asparagus, 4. goat, 5. chicken, 6. chicken, 7. horse, 8. guinea hen, 9. ducks, 10. asparagus, 11. chicken, 12. where people die, 13. chick14. Not available15. Not available16. Not available


And finally, here are some bento I've made with CSA produce.



1. bento 7.17.09, 2. bento 7.20.09, 3. bento 7.22.09, 4. bento 7.23.09 -- vegan, 5. bento 7.27.09, 6. bento 7.28.09, 7. bento 7.30.09, 8. bento 7.31.09, 9. bento 8.3.09 -- vegan!


What's been in your bento this summer?

Onigiri Bento

Today's bento features onigiri made with salmon furikake, grilled/flaked salmon, corn on the cob, and edamame. The second tier has watermelon:)

Close up of the onigiri.

And the bento boxes!

Bye Bye, Ichiban Kan

So sad that our favorite and most affordable online bento (and other things) store is closing shop. According to their blog, this will be an indefinite closure although there is hope of re-opening. So goodbye Ichiban Kan! We will miss you:(

On a more cheery note, Bento Crazy is back and she is stocked up with some pretty neat things. Check it out!

Angie, she's got that Pokemon bento!

Hello

Sorry for the lack of posts. I have moved and am still unpacking all of my stuff (wow, I have a lot of stuff!) School is out for the summer so there hasn't been a need to pack their lunches, but I am getting rusty. So as soon as I can get myself situated, I will do an occasional bento and come August 17th, it's back on!

pickles in 24 hours

A few years ago, I saw a recipe for miso-yogurt pickles in a (manga) cookbook that I own. I remember thinking that it was weird at the time, but I decided to try it out. And they are DELISH. And so easy. And they don't taste overly miso-y.

Traditionally, you'd make the pickles by sticking them in straight miso, but the miso flavor can be overpowering and it's hard to submerge the veggies in there because the miso is so thick.

miso yogurt pickles
1 c miso
1 c plain yogurt
veggies

Mix the miso and yogurt together. Submerge veggies overnight. Remove veggies, rinse, and eat.


Putting napa cabbage into the mixture.




Doesn't it look like Russian dressing?




So far, I've used carrots, zucchini, radishes, celery, and napa cabbage, all of which turned out great. And the pickling mixture can be re-used until the yogurt goes bad. Every few days, add a few teaspoons of salt to the mixture, since the veggies soak up the salt and it gets less salty over time. You can also use it as a fish marinade. It works best on salmon and firm white-flesh fish. Soak overnight, remove, rinse, and broil. Though if you marinate fish, you can't put veggies in there after that without the risk of food poisoning.


The miso yogurt pickles were part of my lunch yesterday.



top: white rice with yukari
bottom: local duck sausage, carrot, zucchini, and celery miso yogurt pickles; marinated and grilled tofu and radishes; kiriboshi daikon with abura-age

Long time no post!

Hi Y'all! I'm still alive...barely. Here are a few until I get around to taking more pics. :)

My personal bento. Greek salad...mmmm!

This one's for Rick. Rice, filet mignon wrapped in bacon and sliced, and veggies.

For the kiddos. Onigiri, sliced pork roast, and celery in the first tier. Grapefruit slices with a little sugar sprinkled on top in the second tier.

And a teddy bear bento. The bear is made out of brown rice with some soy sauce. I rolled it in bonito flakes to give it that fuzzy look. Also in that tier are edamame, and breaded chicken. Second tier has watermelon.

New Tiffin Bento

I got some new stainless steel bento boxes, otherwise know as Tiffin, or Tiffin style.

I have a triple tiered one and also a double tiered one.

This is what the tiers look like.

I packed pan seared Sockeye salmon, and a lemon wedge in one tier.

A salad in another.

And fruit in the last.

Hello Kitty rice

I finally got around to using the Hello Kitty rice mold and nori puncher that my mom got for me. It's hard to pick up the little pieces of nori! I ended up using a dampened toothpick to pick up the pieces.



top: brussel sprouts and Hello Kitty rice
bottom: pancetta and chard; lamb, carrot, onion, green bean, red pepper tomato-harissa sautee; Hello Kitty rice

Whoa....backlog!

I know, it's been forever since I have posted. I have been packing, but time restraints have kept me from posting. I have put together a backlog. While it's not everything, it's something, right?

Here I made a mini sub sandwich, cucumbers (marinated) and some Girl Scout cookies (Thin Mints).

Here is a Nightmare Before Christmas sandwich bento box.

In it, I packed chicken salad sandwiches, cheddar bunnies, and carrot sticks.

Here is a healthy grilled chicken lunch with sauteed snow peas, brocolli, and rice with a tiny pickled plum.

Top tier of a bento filled with watermelon.

Bottom tier filled with steak, brocolli, rice crackers, and Lauging Cow cheese.

Another top tier with fruit.

And bottom with grilled fish and rice with furikake.

And here is a BLT sandwich bento with grape tomatoes. And the lower tier has string cheese, mandarin oranges and spicy rice crackers.

Jang Jorim Bento

This was probably one of my favorite foods as a child. My mom would make it for me. It is a really salty beef that you shred and eat with rice. Here is the link to the recipe from Korean Cuisine. http://korean-cuisine.blogspot.com/2008/09/jang-jo-rim.html My children LOVED this.

The Jang Jorim is in the silicone heart. There are some sliced marinated eggs that were cooked with the meat, vinegar and soy marinated cucumbers, baby carrots and rice.

The same in Bryce's box.

Here are the bento boxes I used.

I have to tell you, my bento box buying reprieve has ended. I have a really great new stash of boxes that I will be posting soon.

Easter Bento

Today was the last day of school before Spring Break, so I thought I would do an Easter themed bento. They didn't come out perfect, but still kind of cute, right?

I used tarako (cod roe) sauce for the egg-shaped rice balls and decorated them with nori and imitation crab meat.

I made a sunflower with a sheet of egg and a slice of hot dog.

I added some slices of crabmeat, baby carrots and put everything on top of some baby lettuce leaves.