Bento catch-up

Teriyaki Rice with Spam
Papaya
Edamame beans
Homemade mochi cakes with red bean in the middle



Spaghetti with parmesan cheese and butter
Fruit salad
Tomoto, black olive, and cucumber salad with dressing
Ham and cheese cubes



Sandwich
Plum
Carrots

As you can see in this last photo, bentos don't have to be made from exotic ingredients. It is totally adaptable to what foods you and your kids will eat.

Ham and Cheese Bentos

Here are two bentos, the left one is from last week and the one on the right is from today.

Left: Pepperoni, Provolone and Canadian bacon with crackers, fruit salad and carrots
Right: Ham cubes with cheese cubes on toothpicks, green peas, rice with a nori star, and fruit salad

Assembly time for 2 of each bento was less that 10 minutes both days. All fruits/veggies had been cut earlier in the week and I bought the ham already in cubes. The cheese was actually cheese (the lower fat version to be healther) sticks that I sliced into 1/2 inch pieces. The rice and peas were leftover from dinner the night before. Easy peasy!

So do you like seeing bentos on my blog? I don't want to inundate you with all things bento. I could make a new blog for bentos only, but having just this one blog would be easier. Leave a comment and let me know what you think.

Sumo Nigiri Bento and more

I was taking pics of the bentos and Arick requested I take his picture. Such a cutie patootie!

Arick's bento:
Sumo (kind of looks like a Sumo wrestler) Nigiri Rice
Sliced carrots
Black olives (Arick wants this is every bento from now on)
Homemade fruit salad with peaches, pineapple, cherries and bananas
Boiled egg
Soy sauce in a fish bottle

Brianna's Bento:
Flower shaped carrot slices
Black olives
Nigiri rice with teriyaki sauce in a bottle
Same homemade fruit salad
Imitation crab meat with a mini ice pack to keep it cool

I took pictures of the bentos today the way they looked just before I put them in the lunchboxes. I used saran wrap on the fruit salad so it wouldn't leak and I put saran wrap on the crab so as not to affect the flavors of the other food. The fact that the inner containers are not watertight is the one thing that I don't love about my 'bento' boxes. The box itself is watertight. The mini blue ice comes from an ice blanket from Target that cost $2.xx. You can cut the rectangles of ice off individually which works great for the bento system. Although I didn't picture it, I did put one next to Arick's egg. I learned this trick from http://www.lunchinabox.net/. It has tons of great tips.

I also wanted to mention a tip on how to pack bentos. You should have 4-5 (5 is optimal) colors in your bento. This makes it look pretty (which is key to getting picky eaters to eat) but also it usually means that it is healthy as well. Of course I am not perfect at this, so if I can't get all the foods to be different colors I try to add color with the picks and other bento decorations. Here are some suggestions to help:

Reds: strawberries, red grapes, cherry tomatoes, sliced red peppers, watermelon, cherries (pitted for little ones), red tortillas, salsa
Orange: carrots, dried apricots, sweet potato, cantaloupe, peaches, mandarin orange segments, yellow cheeses.
Green: peas, cucumber, green grapes, broccoli, spinach, green peppers, edamame beans and asparagus, spinach tortillas.
White: rice, Asian dumplings, pasta, bread, potatoes, flour tortillas, boiled egg
Black, dark purple or brown is the fifth color group considered in Bento lunch making. Here are some suggestions for this: Black olives, black sesame seads, seaweeds, eggplant

Fried tofu and onigiri bento

Here is today's lunch for the kids.

Fried tofu with teriyaki sauce in a pig-shaped bottle
Edamame
Onigiri (shaped rice covered with furikake seasoning) and teriyaki sauce
Frozen pineapple chunks

Believe it or not, the fried tofu is yummy with the sauce. Arick has loved tofu for a long time and I wanted to try and incorporate it into his lunch. Arick is my fussiest eater, so getting some variety in his lunches is a special goal of mine. This was my first attempt with frying tofu and he seemed to really like the sample I gave him. We'll know for sure if it is a big hit or not when he comes home from school.

I got my replacement parts for my rice cooker finally, so now I can prepare ahead some other rice based bento meals. Today I will be making more musubi and freezing individual portions of rice.

Bento #3

Mini waffles w/rasberry jam
Twizzlers (the sausage I planned on using was too spicy, so the kids got a little treat)
Edamame
Pineapple

This one went over well with the kids, Arick just left a few edamame uneaten. It took about 10 minutes today, but that includes the sausage fiasco and trying to find a subsitute for it.

I won't post all of our bentos, just the cute ones!

Bento update

Included in the bento:
Musubi
Butterscotch cookies (homemade from scratch by Andrew)
Grape tomatoes
Teriyaki sauce in a teeny tiny bottle
Flower shaped carrots
Cucumber slices,
Edamame beans
Time to put together was approximately 3 minutes because everything was done before, just had to make it look cute and reheat the musubi (I cut all the veggies for the week on Sunday night).

Included in the bento:
Noodles with Parmesan and butter
Pepperoni slice
Fresh Mango
Edamame beans
Carrots
Grape Tomatoes

Time to put together was approximately 7 minutes. I had to cut the mango, reheat the noodles and thaw the edamame.

The containers are made by Lock&Lock and can be purchased at Target for about $3. The lids are watertight and easy for kids to open. As you can see, the little inside containers are removable. Each cup can hold about 3/4 cup of rice.

Lunchbox wars

Have you seen the commercial for Staples where the parents are taking their kids shopping for school supplies at their Back-to-School event? The parents are having a great time while the children are frowning all while the song "It's the most wonderful time of the year" is playing. I am that parent. It isn't just that I love getting my daytime routine back with Brianna and Arick gone (I do enjoy the lack of fighting), I also love the planning, the shopping, the anticipation of the unknown, etc.

School starts on August 1, although we will be missing the first few days for unky Dave's wedding, so I have been busy getting things ready. The kids have uniforms now, so the clothing shopping is very easy and inexpensive which I love. That leaves shoes, backpacks, and lunchboxes. I will have to get shoes in Utah since I can't seem to find what I like here. The kids have already chosen their backpacks, and today we picked up lunchboxes. The lunchboxes though were the most complicated out of the entire lot and were my favorite part of this whole preparatory process. So fun! Why? First, let me preface you with the lunchbox disaster of last year.

This past year Brianna had a cute, pink insulated backpack. I learned that cute and pink does not equal effective or efficient. So many times Brianna's lunch got squished, or because of the size/design, not everything would fit well. Arick's lunch box was less of a disaster but it too was more about the character on it than about doing its job well. Add to the fact that the kids began to hate the foods I put in their lunches and you can see things didn't go so well on this subject.

So this year I was going to win the lunchbox wars. To do this the lunchbox had to fit certain requirements. It had to fit our food containers with all lids facing up and it had to be hard to squish. The kids were a little sad that there would be no decorations on it, but I told them that we could gussy them up on our own and that seem to satify them. I also knew that I would need a new menu.

I began my search for the perfect lunchbox at the store and left with nothing, so then I turned to the Internet. That is when I discover 'bento' box lunches and I knew that I was on to something. The picture to the right is from a blog on bento box lunches called The Bento Corner. How could you not want to eat that? Hmmm, how could my kids not want to eat that? Lots of healthy foods disguised in cuteness, I am totally going to do this!

So as not to punish you with my poor writing skills, I am going to give you links to other sites that explain bentos better than I can. They also have incredible photos that will make your mouth water. Some of my favorite sites are

http://www.lunchinabox.net/

http://www.cookingcute.com/

Bentos also usually mean using special bento lunchboxes, but I can't afford the really cute ones right now. So I went to Target today and found Lock&Lock food containers that are pretty good for bento. I was also able to find lunchboxes that fit those containers and that are hard to squish. All for half the price so it will do. To the left is a pic of one of the cute sets on Ebay.

Brianna is especially thrilled because she won't have to stomach a pb&h sandwich again. Her top requests for her bento include: musubi, meatballs, noodles with dipping sauce, onigiri (kind of like rice balls with filling inside), seasoned rice, and veggies. Not your average kid, that one.

I bet you didn't think that someone could right this much about lunchboxe, did ya? I will end here but I am sure you will hear about it again. Maybe with photos of a few of the bento's I make around here.