Time to Plant Yet?

Spring is being confusing this year.  The weather won't make up it's mind.  It is way too cold to be almost May!  Georgia is supposed to be warm and comfy this time of year and instead I'm freezing.  I want to start planting.  When do I get to play with flowers?

In the bento: Two onigiri with scrambled tofu, purple potato flowers, cherry tomato, pistachios, carrot flower, steamed broccoli and chunks of mango.

The potato flowers are decorated with sesame seeds and have cucumber peel leaves.  I used a knife to slice the cucumber peel from the cucumber and then used scissors to cut the leaves.  The letters were cut from egg sheet leftover after making the Cupcake Kitty.  Have I mentioned lately that I adore my letter cutters?  The thought of trying to cut them out by hand sends shivers down my spine.

Making scrambled tofu onigiri is very easy, however since the tofu is colored using tumeric the yellow gets all over the rice when mixing them together.  The end result is not as striking compared to using scrambled egg.

Cupcake Kitty

Remember the Cupcake kitten bento that I did a while back?  It was based on art that A-chan created, but I'm pretty sure her art was inspired by Samantha Whitten's incredibly cute art.  Her booth at Anime Weekend Atlanta is hands down A-chan's fav booth and it's one of mine, too.  We purchase things of cuteness there every year, but we love the Cupcake Kitties the most.   Not long ago A-chan asked me to make one of the Cupcake Kitty stickers for her bento.   The artist was very sweet and gave me permission (Thank you, Samantha!).

In the bento:  Cheese sandwich, purple mashed potatoes, steamed green beans, fried tofu and mango.

The kitty was created with egg sheets, nori, sugar sprinkles and somen noodles for whiskers.  I think that I still need more practice with the egg sheets!  The brown sheets were colored with soy sauce but for the tan and orange sheets I used food coloring. The purple mashed potatoes are from purple potatoes, no food coloring added.  They were a little sweeter than normal potatoes and A-chan has decided that she likes them just fine.

 This kitty was a fun challenge and you should go see the original art at the Sugar Bunny shop.  I can't wait to see what A-chan requests next!

Happy Spring Flower

Once again I'm mixing it up for healthier lunches.  You might think that the little green specks you see in the couscous are basil.  In fact, that's what A-chan thought because that's what I normally put in couscous.  This time it is half basil and half baby spinach, dun, dun, dun!  There wasn't a cry of surprise of a whimper as we ate it last night so I am happy to pack it again for lunch.

In the bento:  Extra special healthy couscous with garlic, basil and spinach is on one side.  The other side has chickpeas, steamed broccoli, mulberries, a strawberry, carrot flowers and soy sauce tofu.

The flower is made from purple potato, carrot and cucumber peel.  The cute little face was punched from nori, of course :) I doubt that A-chan will eat the purple potato - she looked at it very suspiciously this morning.  But that's okay because there's spinach in the couscous!  You can't tell that I'm lovin' the sneaky spinach, can you?  The chickpeas are plain and straight from the fridge.