American Bento

Well, I haven't posted in FOREVER!  Luckily there are good reasons.  Since my last post, I had bronchitis and sinusitis for 2 months straight, we found a brain tumor in my father's head while he was visiting and meeting the grandkids, and . . .  I am pregnant.  As of this post 22 weeks pregnant (plus a few days).  So, as you can imagine, I've been pulled in 100 directions at once and not nearly as attentive to cute meals as I could be.  But, all that is past us now.  Well, except for the whole pregnant thing.  I'm due in November but as long as I'm feeling good and not waddling around the kitchen, I might as well play a bit. 

Today DH is taking the little kids to the park for a picnic - well those little kids who behave properly anyway.  I am in the process of packing lunch for everyone involved.  I hope to have some quiet time to get work done around the house while the kids get quality time with Dad. 

This is installment one of the picnic bentos.  Today is Friday, so usually, we go meatless.  The littles are eating chicken while DH is eating fish.  I haven't done his bento yet but here are the kids' bentos.

Here it is, all closed up. As you can see, I've added a slice of banana bread (miniature of course).

Everything in this bento is a leftover of some kind.  The Greek yogurt is breakfast food that I keep on hand.  The plum preserves were made last summer and frozen.  The veggies are leftover from salads this week.  The chicken was baked 2 days ago for dinner.  The potatoes were part of breakfast burritos yesterday morning.  Even the banana bread is something I pulled from the freezer: back when my mom and dad were visiting, mom made lovely loaves of banana bread one of which I found in the freezer today.  I thought we had gobbled it all up, but this lone, little loaf was hidden away for a surprise treat!

Last week, my husband and I went out to dinner with some relatives from out of town.  It was a lovely evening filled with conversation and good fun.  But, at the end of the evening, we had leftovers to take home.  In the morning, I tried to hand off a plastic container from the restaurant filled with jambalaya.  Would you believe he actually pouted and said it wasn't the same as taking a bento to school!?!?!  So, here's the jambalaya bento.

And here's the jambalaya.  It looks rather boring but just the simple act of putting it into a bento container made DH smile.

Ok.  I have a confession to make: I just went grocery shopping last night and the options in my fridge are looking rather slim.  I have no leftovers to use in bento making.  Indeed, we had "breakfast for dinner" last night (because it was quick and easy) and I was scrambling to make this bento.  :)

I happened to have some ground beef in the fridge that I was planning to make into meatloaf, so I decided to try "mushi" again.  Please, dear readers, help me come up with another name for this dish! I can't believe I'm using DD's name for it!


Layer 2: I've got ramen noodles tossed with butter, Parmesan cheese, and rosemary.   This is topped with carrots and broccoli tossed in more herbs and butter.  (It sounds like the meal is dripping with butter but I think I used 1 tsp of butter for 2 people's lunches here folks.)  The "mushi" is on the right. 

As you can see, it looks very different from the last time I made it.  Indeed, I don't think it turned out as well.  At least it smelled good while I was cooking it.  I used black forest ham and lined it with a cabbage leaf.  I then put in the ground beef, some pepperjack cheese, and some green onion.  The cabbage leaf kept the ham from sticking to the beef and this made the whole thing difficult to cook.  I may try an egg wash on the ham next time to see if that helps in terms of structural integrity.  The cheese slices posed another problem.  They were rather brittle and kept things from forming a proper roll until they started to melt.  I might try a cheese stick next time, if I decide to do cheese again at all.  I miss the pop of color the carrot provided in my last attempt and I still think I might try this with turkey or chicken.

Thursday morning, I woke up at 2:30 am and worked on paperwork for our adoption until about 7 am.  I then worked all day on other stuff.  Needless to say by the time dinner rolled around, I didn't care what the family ate; I just wanted to get through the meal so that I could go to bed.

Under such circumstances, making bento would not have been a good idea.  So, I waited until this morning.  There's only 1 problem with that plan: I'm still tired.  I told DH that I made this with my eyes shut.  Indeed, I skipped breakfast and will be heading back to bed here shortly. 



Layer 2: A rather uninspired tuna sandwich with carrots and tomatoes. 

DD's lunch was essentially the same.  She had a ham sandwich though. 

Now, my husband likes to eat.  Since I started using the larger bentos, he hasn't wanted an afternoon snack at all.  He says his lunch stays with him longer.  I do wonder if this smaller bento will do the trick or if he will be snacking all day.  I'll report on this tomorrow.                                            

The larger section of the box contains red leaf lettuce with tomatoes stuffed with tuna salad.  I've topped that with green onion, tomato, and carrot.  The bottom contains green beans, carrot, and zucchini tossed with butter and rosemary and a tortilla filled with roasted red pepper hummus and lettuce.  I am willing to bet that between the mayo and the butter this bento is around 500 calories, but I am not entirely certain on this one.

My lunch is lighter and much lower calorie.  It's mostly veggies.

The larger section contains a salad  of romaine lettuce, cucumber, and tomato topped with a hard boiled egg.  There's a little container of dressing.  The lower section is just crackers, salsa, and some slices of apple.  Easy . . .   like takes 2 seconds easy.    But, also about 200 calories.  Not bad for something that should be around 500 calories.