Colorful Leftovers Bento

Today's bento looks like this:

A little less childish, but still kinda whimsical.

This bento contains:

• brown rice
• porcupine meat balls
• roast chicken
• lettuce
• red pepper
• black pepper sprinkles
• grape tomatoes
• carrots

Here it is all packed up and ready to go.

Happy bento!

Fish Bento

This morning, my lunch looked like this:

This bento contains:

• roast chicken
• fresh rosemary
• brown rice onigiri
• cajun spices & nori accents
• carrots
• grape tomatoes
• broccoli
• a plum
• red grapes
• a strawberry

I felt that yesterday's strawberry was a missed opportunity for a big grin, so I made that happen today.  Oh, and that plum is out of my co-worker Janelle's garden.  Thanks, Janelle!

I liked how the rosemary sort of looked like seaweed.

That is all.  Thanks for looking.

Happy bento!

Tuesday's Bento

Call it childish if you will, but I love having a lunch that smiles at me when I open it.  

My windowsill is certainly getting more attention lately than it has for a while.

This bento contains:

• porcupine meatballs
• tater tots
• red pepper
• broccoli
• grape tomatoes
• carrots
• lettuce/spinach
• red grapes
• a strawberry
• black sesame seeds
• nori

This is a large strawberry and huge grapes.  Please don't worry that I am not getting enough to eat!

 Here is my lunch ready to be packed away.  I took a blueberry (soy) yogurt with me today as well.

All ready to go in my Thirty-One thermal tote:

Happy bento!

Squirrel!

For those of you who read my blog way back when, you may remember my dog, Dioji:

This bento was made with him in mind.  The lower tier has a dog and the upper tier, a squirrel.

This bento contains:

• brown rice onigiri
• turkey slices
• egg
• broccoli
• almonds
• red pepper & sunflower seed "collar" 
• food coloring / sesame seeds accents
• brownie
• mixed nuts

Here is the dog:

Here is the squirrel:

Hope you had a great Monday.

Happy bento!

First Friday Bento

Hooray for making it to Friday!  I work in a middle school, and the first week back can be a killer.  A student once asked me, "Did you cute your lunch today?"  Yes, today I did.

This bento contains:

• spaghetti topped with parsley, garlic and cajun spices
• chicken my husband grilled, seasoned with a flavorful baja citrus marinade
• broccoli florets
• red pepper decorated with black sesame seeds and a pepper seed
• my aunt's homemade applesauce (in the top tier - not pictured)

I cooked the spaghetti this morning, because I didn't have any left over rice in the fridge.  I am so out of practice at making bentos!  I don't even remember what I like to have on hand and ready.  But I'll get back in the swing of it.

Here is a close up of the little character from my bento today.  I'm calling her "little miss hot lips."

Happy bento!

Colorful Veggies

So, the last time I posted a bento on this blog was in 2010.  Occasionally I will bring my lunch (or part of my lunch) in bento form, I just haven't been good about photographing and sharing.

So, for the second day back to work, I decided to do a little bento for myself.  I brought an individual sized hummus along too and dipped the veggies in that.

Contents:

• red pepper
• broccoli
• lemon cucumber (from my sister-in-law's garden)
• black sesame seeds

I am thinking of getting a bigger bento box that would fit all the food I want to take for my lunch.  We shall see...

Happy bento!

Playing With Our European Food

This summer, my husband and I took the trip of a lifetime and toured around Europe.  We did the Railpass thing with our backpacks, and even stayed in a few hostels along the way.  But the main thing that really stood out to us was the food.  We had a great time trying all the local specialties and enjoying the sometimes novel presentation of favorite foods.  Take a look at a few snapshots from our trip:

These flower shaped ice cream cones came from Amorino.  We loved the fun presentation.

This was a delicious meal in Austria that we ate on a terrace.  You will have to imagine the accordion players in the background.

This was me trying the (surprisingly tasty) lentils cooked in bacon lard.  In my hand is a glass of new wine.  We were in a wine garden outside Vienna.

Here is the special cake the folks at Princess Cruises made us for our anniversary dinner.  Happy 7 years of marriage to us!

This is a waffle that Bryan got at one of the Greek isles.  He said it was delicious.

Here we are outside the vatican with our tremendous ice cream cones.

Pizza was a must in Italy.

We also had sandwiches.

And big sandwiches on crusty baguettes.  This and the next two dishes were in Carcassonne, France.

Bryan's artfully arranged salad.

 My more down to earth cassoulet.

And of course, we had to try the local wine.

And Bryan even got to BBQ for us while we were away.

Hope you enjoyed this little "taste" of our trip to Europe!

Homegrown Goodness

I have been playing with my food again.  Here is a picture of the main part of my lunch today.  Sprouted beans on a bed of steamed rice:

I will dish up some spicy cajun vegetable soup over it, and it will be both filling and yummy!  I love eating something that I have grown right here in my kitchen.  Doesn't get much fresher or more local than that, eh?

And here is another thing that I am growing in my kitchen right now:

You guessed it, sourdough starter bubbling away.  And below are some sprouts that I put on Bryan's sandwich today:

Just thought I would post a few pictures to show you all what I've been up to.  Sprouting and baking, mostly.

Enjoy!

Chocolate Peanut Butter Acorns

So, a little over a month ago my aunt Jackie posted a link to her Facebook page.  I've been wanting to do these little guys ever since:

Today, I finally got my chance.  I assembled the three ingredients:

And got to work unwrapping those Kisses.

Now, I should point out, that this is not a milk-free recipe.  But it was so cute, I had to do it anyway.

As a side-note, you may want to hide the ingredients until the day of the craft, if you have husbands (or kids) that will snack on your blogging materials.  (This is the second bag of Hershey Kisses I've bought for this purpose.)

Slowly my plate filled with unwrapped chocolates.  (Not as slowly as if I could have been snacking on them though.)

Next I poured a small amount of mini chocolate chips into a microwave safe bowl.   The Six in the Suburbs blog where I first saw this recipe says half the bag, but that seems excessive.

You microwave them for 10 seconds or so at a time, stirring well in between.  When they start to get melty like this:

Stop heating them, and just keep stirring till they look like this:

Now dip the flat end of one of your unwrapped Kisses into the warm chocolate, and attach it to a Nutter Butter Bite (or a half of one, depending what look you want).

Repeat:

Now you are ready for the finishing step.

Dip the flat end of one of the un-melted mini chocolate chips into the melted chocolate (you may have to reheat it, depending how long the last step took.)

And place it on top to finish your acorn.

Keep going until they all have toppers.

You are done!  Congratulations on your very cute acorns.

Enjoy!