Tae Kwon Do Bento

As I am sitting at the Dojang and watching my girl do her second Taekwondo class of the day (woohooo!) I am delighted to be putting up this bento that she had for school lunch recently. She is so enamored of TKD and wants to start entering tournaments. She recently got her third green stripe on her yellow belt and will soon be testing for green belt. I love watching her practice, it's funny sometimes and just plain awesome other times.

Left side: Sauteed tofu heart, cheddar cheese blocks, purple grapes, cherry tomato, sweet gherkins, baby corn and carrot letters.

Right side: Jasmine rice covered by sesame carrots, green peas and corn. Mozzarella cheese dobok (uniform) with cheddar cheese belt, parsley sprig green stripes.

I got the appellation of "good, good, good mommy" for this bento, lol. Warms my heart so, it does. I'm going to have to start thinking up extra excuses for making bentos this summer. I've gotten spoiled by schooldays!

MomoCon Bentos

It's that time again! Yes, Spring is here and we celebrated mightily by our annual attendance at MomoCon. We had a fabulous time with 6, 998 good buddies :) A-chan and I made our first origami turtles together in a workshop. I learned how to do kanzashi flowers in wonderful class. We both indulged our love of shopping for cute things. And I had a reason to put together some bentos, yay!!!Since A-chan was going to be wearing her Mokona backpack all day I was inspired to try a Mokona bento. My main problem was that I made Mokona waaaaay too large. I had originally intended to have Mokona take up only one half of a tier, haha :) There was no way that A-chan could eat the huge rice ball but she enjoyed the other smaller parts (ears and feet).

Top tier: Tofu heart sauteed with soy sauce, Lemon bowl with chickpeas, huge strawberry, curry rice, carrot flowers. Before putting in the curry I made a barrier with rice - building it up high on one side to keep the curry in place.

Bottom tier: 5 rice balls, one huge, 2 medium long ones, 2 smaller round ones. Huge lettuce leaf underneath, halved baby tomato for the forehead jewel, soy bologna inner ears and mouth, nori eyes and smile, pickled ginger cheeks and carrot flower.

My bento was a bit more sober and not as fun. It was yummy though! More fun with my letter cutters which I love soooo much.

Top tier: Curry rice with all the rice hidden under the curry. Carrot letters, yay!

Bottom tier: Tofu heart sauteed in soy sauce, slice of lemon, two huge strawberries, baby corn on picks, carrot flowers and heart, veggie gyoza.

The large carrot flowers in both bentos were cut from the humongous asian carrots from Super H Mart. The bits of tofu that were left over from cutting out the hearts were also sauteed and are hidden underneath the hearts. Not as lovely so they were hidden, but still tasty!