Looky, looky - New title!

Ah hah! The first of many changes: a new title picture, yay!!

There was absolutely no reason to make bentos today because we were staying home all day. It was just fun to make them anyway and play with the new letter cutters that I got from Jbox. I'd been drooling over letter cutters for about a year or so but just never could commit to getting them. But when I started making bentos for my daughter to take to school...well...I was already buying stuff for her bentos and it was the perfect time to get them cause they could piggyback on the shipping with the other stuff...and they weren't very expensive! (They were definitely worth it!)

Jasmine rice topped with carrot letters makes up the bulk of the bento. On the left side: one half of a veggie hot dog (I actually made a veggie hot dog look kind of elegant, woot!), some steamed broccoli, a baby tomato and mozzarella cheese sandwich on a star pick, a cute mozzarella and nori kitty, apple flower petals and one tiny fruit chew flower.

When we sat down to eat our bentos my daughter stole all the carrot letters from mine and ate them in about ten seconds. So I think maybe she's going to enjoy eating words in her own in the future!

Her bento had stirfried tofu and baby corn on jasmine rice, raw carrot slices in a heart container(apparently not nearly as fun or tasty as the carrot letters...), black olives on a heart pick, baby tomato, sweet pickle, and a hunormous mozzarella cheese butterfly. I had originally wanted to make the butterfly fancier and prettier, but she just wanted it plain so I complied :)

Hello Kathy

A school bento made in the wee hours of the early morning with loving care and with much attention to my coffee mug.

Top layer: two small square onigiri with carrot flowers on top, a triplet of baby corn, some Morningstar Farms chik nuggets cut in halves, a purple pig filled with soy sauce and a Lady apple.

Bottom layer: Hello Kathy onigiri with carrot flower, more baby corn, a baby tomato, udon noodles with peanut sauce and carrot flowers.

My favorite part of this bento was the tiny apple which actually fit into one of the smaller bentos we own. The bunny onigiri was made by my daughter with a mould! Her favorite part was all the carrot flowers.

I'm really enjoying making her school bentos, though some are definately coming out better than others. I think it depends of the amount of prep work I have done the night before and the amount of sleep I get :)

Alien attacks UFO!

This was one of a series of bentos that I made for a panel on bentos that was all about how to make cool and cute bentos without any special tools. Since I tend to use the tools on a regular basis, it was a very neat challenge and got me thinking outside the box. I have to say that I love the alien, absolutely love him!!

On the very bottom is a well-packed layer of jasmine rice covered with a sheet of nori to create a space background. In the near corner I created a shaped 'bowl' of white rice, filled that in with a mound of curry and made a 'roof' over the curry with blue rice. I topped off the UFO with a black olive and some edamame.

In the other corner is the hungry alien with a croissant body, tortellini pasta and black olive eyes held together by red toothpicks, green baby spinach hair and yakiudon tentacles. The mouth is a tomato flower with a nice pickled ginger tongue - the best use of gari that I've made yet!

I couldn't wait to get to this bento after dance class, it's definately going on my list of favorites. It was so much fun and really tasty, but mostly just plain hilarious. If I ever need a good pick me up, I'm going to recreate this one :)

The box I used was just one tier of a three tier picnic box. I would generally fill it all the way up with food for a multi-person picnic. Since there was a lot of blank space (yes, it's a pun) in this bento it was perfect for just me.

The Flowery Bento Walkthrough

Flower Pie Bento

Another Greek bento, this time with an adult flair. The experimental greek veggie and fruit pie with carrot flower petals on top was excellent! The fruit (apples and pears) added just enough sweetness to make it different and the feta just kicked it into high gear. There are also Keftethes (greek meatballs except using my meatless recipe) a greek baked potato, some steamed broccoli, cherry tomato flowers with cucumber leaves, a rolled up soy turkey slice, blueberries on a flower stick, and garlic bagel chips. It was perfect.

As fall begins to really turn cold I'm starting to feel more in the mood for heavier dishes and spicier dishes. Scottish flatpie is a fall family favorite, as is Shepherd's Pie. But while everyone else starts getting out soup recipes...I am again reminded of how much I don't like 'american' soups. I love greek soups, asian soups, Indian soups, but the generic american vegetable soups are too bland for me. It may just be that my mom made veggie soup way too often when I was growing up? Anyway...I've never really been a fan of Mr. Bento...mainly because I love the cuteness of my bento boxes and he's just too adult for my asthetic taste. But I want soup and he's perfect for soup, so he might get added to my Christmas list this year.

In Spring it is the Dawn: Introducing Hello Japan! - a mini-challenge about Japan

In Spring it is the Dawn: Introducing Hello Japan! - a mini-challenge about Japan

Check this out! Seriously. If you want to have a fun way to learn more about Japan and Japanese culture, this is awesome!

Happy Halloween!

My 'Halloween' bento is to honor the "Hello Japan" challenge that I found earlier in the month. It's a fantastic site that has a different challenge each month to celebrate Japanese culture and encourage people to learn more and maybe try some things that they wouldn't otherwise. That was definately the case for me with this month's challenge: Read spooky Japanese horror stories. Horror stories are something I don't often read, but I took the plunge and went to some of the links provided. I learned a lot about japanese ghosts and 'monsters', including things about Tanuki.

I learned two surprising things about Tanuki. First that they are a real animal. I saw pictures and they are so cute! But I had always thought they were mythological. Second was about their um...robe/weaponry which is not at all what it seems and is a bit surprising.

Also I truly enjoyed reading the stories by Lafcadio Hearn who compiled Japanese ghost stories in the late 1800s. One of the most fascinating things for me was the similarities to the Celtic fairy tales that were compiled in Scotland and Ireland by Joseph Jacobs during the same period. It was mainly the narrative style that reminded me of the Celtic stories, however it struck me that the stories in both areas had similar aspects. The fact that they were trying to have some understanding and control over scary situations by explaining them in terms of 'otherworldy' phenomena was clear. And it brought to mind the fact that no matter what culture you grow up in, all humans basically fear the same things and our imaginations run in the same direction when given the opportunity by the things around us.

Now back to the bento! On the left there were one large pumpkin onigiri and one small, both with broccoli stems. Some Morningstar Farms chik nuggets, carrot maple leaves, a cherry tomato, and some baby corn spears. On the right was a large amount of udon noodles in peanut sauce with broccoli and a tanuki on top. Mr. Tanuki was made of bread, fruit roll-up and white cheese with a huge carrot hat behind him and an udon noodle hat-tie. He looks kind of silly instead of scary, but I'm not good at the scary stuff! I did want him to have that hat straight behind which is a traditional depiction.

Thank you, Hello Japan! I enjoyed this challenge so much and I can't wait for the next one!

The rice colors aren't showing up very well in the photo, but the Jack o lantern is orange rice and the robot head was yellow rice. Nori was used for the faces, a broccoli stem for the jack'o'lantern's stem and whole cloves for the robot's antennae. Carrot ribbons were a great addition to the bento for fun! A-chan loves to eat carrot ribbons. There were also some garbanzo beans in a half moon shaped tin with a feta ghost on top. The feta had a hole in it just where the ghosts's mouth needed to be!