Box Appetit Review

One of the bento items that I received for Christmas was this curious version of a bento box. It was entitled "Box Appetit". It is quite different from any other bento box that I own and I was very excited about trying it out for the first time. But I felt that I needed to make a special lunch for this unique box and spent some time thinking and planning.

It seemed to me that the box called out for noodles. It had to be a recipe that I'd never made before. And because I rarely get a chance to make food that is as spicy hot as I like it, it's hard for me to settle on one thing because I end up wanting to make everything! Finally, I decided and made a special trip to Earthfare to acquire the ingredients that I needed.

In the bento: The main part of the bento was filled with Spicy curry noodles which had yellow and red peppers, onion, carrots and baby bok choy and had a scattering of peanuts on top. On the left side were three slices of coconut curry tempeh and three fried slices of purple potato. The other side had quick cucumber pickles. In the triangular compartment were two hot pepper and jap chae dumplings, some Z crackers - cumin and cayenne flavored, a halved cherry tomato and a wedge of lemon.

This is a huge box. It actually reminds me more of styrofoam take-away boxes than of bento boxes. In fact, the resemblance is quite striking, right down to the sloping sides! It was easy to fill, but it took a lot of food.

Pros - I enjoyed using the sauce dish that is built into the lid. It was perfect for dipping my dumplings into soy sauce. The triangular containers are neat and fun to use! The lids seemed secure enough that I might try some soup or saucy curry in the large one sometime. The small triangular container is meant for sauces which is really awesome if you're a hot sauce loving person like me :D

Cons - It's huge. And because of the size and the shape I couldn't find a good way to carry it. None of my bags would fit it and none of my furoshiki were large enough to wrap it. So I ended up having to cart it by hand. This wasn't a big deal but it was a bit inconvenient. The special fork holder on the outside of the lid seems like a good idea but actually gave me the heebie jeebies since I didn't have a bag or wrap for it to go into. I could just imagine the fork picking up germs from random things that could possibly touch it while I was on the go.

All in all I think that I will prefer to keep this as a fun dish for eating in at home, but not for using to make bentos. I will also be taking it along whenever we eat out and I know that I'll be bringing home leftovers. Filling it up at the restaurant will save the environment and also make it easy for me to just pull out and dig in the next day!