Longbourn Kitchen Talk: Bentos

Sunday, November 16, 2008

Monday Bento

Onigiri or japanese rice balls with fillings, is so much fun to make! There is no need to season the rice - which is good, if you run out of sushi seasoning. My filling of choice (or rather, what I had in my fridge at the moment) was a tuna-mayo-egg filling; avocado also added to filling for Hub's onigiri. I don't have any of those Onigiri moulds and I have yet to learn to shape "Triangle" ones with my hands. Consequently, my onigiri were little barrel-shaped ones, wrapped with nori strips I had cut up earlier. Another plus for onigiri is that you can control the size of the pieces - I made smaller ones for M & J and larger ones for the Hubs! M commented many times how cute the the rice balls were!

M's & J's bento - 3 pieces of onigiri, carrots pieces and some lavosh crispbread. Fruits were cut up mangoes and gold kiwis (not photographed)

Hub's lunch were 3 pieces of onigiri, carrot-avocado-celery salad and lavosh crispbread. Fruits were mangoes, gold-kiwi, blueberries and cherries. The Celery-fruit juice (yet to be freshly juiced tomorrow morning) will also be included in his bento box.

Cheers!!

Saturday, November 15, 2008

O Bento boxes...

Totoro and Nico Bean boxes...

Totoro, Hello Kitty and Monokuroboo boxes...

Ume-Usagi, Kingyo and Jubako boxes...

Hakoya, Retro and Sakura...

and the cutest Animal food picks!!

Tuesday, November 4, 2008

More Bentos, Please...

Last week was pretty hectic for me - Naturally, a day would come by where I couldn't prepare a proper bento for J & M. So, I drove thru Macs (God forbid!!) bought chicken nuggets and cheeseburgers. I had brought from home the plastic containers and some fruits (mangoes for J and apples for , to cut up in the car! (At least, THAT I was ready for)...

J's lunch - with the finishing touch (he loved it!)

M's lunch

This is Hub's lunch for tomorrow.

Just discovered what the heck EDAMAME is!

Hub's salad: Bed of lettuce, julienned carrots, sengkuang and pickled Daikon. Coriander and mint leaves as garnishes (the aroma was amazing!!). Dressing was Italian (Hub's not a fan of Kewpie mayonaise, go figure!)

Hub's fruit: Cut up mangoes (Did I mention I bought a trayfull of them??) and peaches (these weren't too ripe yet!), quartered strawberries, blueberries and cherries.

Hub's main: Rice topped with Furikake, Pork wonton (with soup doused onto the rice!!), Kumara & waterchestnut fritters and Edamame beans! Yumm....

Tuesday, October 28, 2008

Bentos for show....

Packed bentos all ready to go.....into J's, M's and Hub's lunch bags!

J's & M's afternoon snacks. J's mango and banana chips. M's apples and banana chips.

Hub's lunch - main is sausage kicap ala rosyta beatty, pieces of nandos chicken with rice. salad is sliced baby gerkhins, halved cherry tomatoes, sweet peas shoots, katsu chicken and kewpie mayonaise. Fruits, orange, apples and blueberries.

J's peanut butter sandwich, chicken nuggets, mango/kiwi/strawberry fruits and mango yogurt.

M's strawberry jam sandwiches, chicken nuggets, apples/orange fruits and banana chips.

J's lunch (except the fruits, megan had the same). Chicken katsu sushi, fried fish balls, kiwi/rockmelon fruits (M's fruits were her fav, apples!)

Not a bento but Hub's dinner! Vegetarian vietnamese rice rolls, chicken katsu nuggets and store bought spring-roll sauce.

Monday, October 20, 2008

More Bento days...

I wasn't too diligent about taking pics of my more recent bentos...anyway here are some....

M's and J's lunches today.

Hub's and my lunch today!

M's requested "love-heart" sandwiches. J's boring sandwiches. Tuna/Mayo on rye bread, for tomorrow. No photos of fruits, sorry. But fruits were apples, strawberry and carrot sticks for J.

No photos taken of the Hub's lunch, salad or fruits either! He's having stir-fried capsicum with field mushrooms and boiled pork wonton with rice. Salad were snow peas shoots, grape tomatoes and sliced avocados. Fruits were gold kiwi and strawberries.

Saturday, October 18, 2008

O Bento...

Yes, I have been packing lunches for my kids. BUT it is only recently that I incorporated "art" into it. I DON'T have a real bento box yet (I have my eyes on some really nice ones!), so I bento in my plastic containers! And NO I don't have any of the cute stuff that real bento afficiandos use either! I make do with what I already have stashed in my kitchen!

M's & my lunch (I am so lucky to share M's Dora lunch bag with her!!)
M finishes school at 12pm and J at 3pm. What do you in between? With the lovely Perth weather, I would picnic!

This M's bento was simple. Egg sandwiches, star shaped steamed kumara, segments of Fuji apples and bananas.

Mine was, apart from snatching a piece or two of M's eggs sandwiches, my all-time favourite salad (avocado and mini roma tomatoes) and fuji apples, raisins and macadamia nuts.

M's Dora lunch bag!!

J's lunch

J's lunch were egg sandwiches, sliced kumara fritters, star-shaped steam kumaras and skyflakes plain crackers. Fruits were mangoes, apples and blueberries.

J's faithful lunch bag!

The kids' morning snacks...

I had fun preparing these during the school holidays! This morning snack was simple to make and the kids loved them!! Fuji apples (I don't buy anything else!!) were peeled and sliced! I used my cute cookie cutters to "core" the seeds and "yucky stuff" as M puts it!! Again with my cute cookie cutters, I cut out shapes and their names from sliced carrots. Finally, some SkyFlakes plain crackers and a good sprinkling of raisins and macadamia nuts. I tell you, these snack bento didn't quite make it to 10am!!

Hub's lunch

Hub's lunch was stirfried prawns with field mushrooms, japanese tofu and rice. Salad were baby cos leaves, avocado, baby roma tomatoes and kumara (again out with that star-shaped cookie cutter!!). Fruits were, mangoes apples and blueberries!!