American Bento

Dear Friends,

It has been quite some time since I've posted and with good reason.  Four kids will keep ya hoppin'.  But, I really wouldn't have it any other way.  DH is back to teaching after a lovely, lazy summer replete with 5 weeks on the Cote d'Azure.  OK it was only 4 weeks in France; one week was spent in Tuscany in a lovely villa.  The trip was wonderful and the food . . .  AMAZING!  (Did I mention that my mom's a French chef?) Needless to say, we overindulged a little bit.  So, to send DH back to school, I've tried to make meals a little lighter.  He doesn't mind and it is a bit healthier.  So, here is a lighter bento with just a little indulgence.


Layer 1: Ham roll-ups (I was going to alternate ham and turkey but DH wanted just ham).  They have an herbed Neufchâtel cheese in the middle.  There are almonds, stawberries, Greek yogurt, and a special indulgence: some of the candies we bought in Perugia (in the Perugina factory - as yummy and fun a diversion as it sounds BTW).


Layer 2: A simple spinach salad with carrots and tomato slices.  There's homemade vinaigrette in the little bottle.

Fun tip:  I love the Magic Bullet.  I know, it's a cheesy infomercial product . . .   But the thing is a real work horse and can make food on a small scale.  That makes it perfect for bentos.  Homemade vinaigrette is super easy with it.  Most people just swirl together oil and vinegar with some herbs and call it good.

That's not the way my mom taught me to make a vinaigrette.  She always puts a teaspoon or so of mustard in a bowl.  Then she adds red wine vinegar and oil in a 1:3 ratio.  You start with the vinegar and whisk constantly while adding oil in a small drizzle until it's all fluffy and creamy.  Now, this takes a fair bit of stirring and I've got better things to do.  So, I put the mustard and vinegar in my magic bullet and add about 1/3 to 1/2 of the oil I want to use.  Run the magic bullet.  Then open it up and add some more oil.  Repeat until all the oil is incorporated.  What you'll get is the thickest, creamiest vinaigrette you've ever seen. Add salt, pepper, and any herbs you like. You might need to add a fair bit of water to thin it enough to pour.

The baby bullet has a blender attachment that makes this even easier, but I've packed up my baby bullet and put it away (our little guy is eating normal food - time flies by so quickly!).  The magic bullet is on the counter . . .  Setting up the baby bullet takes time I don't always have. (Yes, I'm that lazy.)

Just a thought folks:  A bottle of salad dressing is at the very least around $2.  The ones I like run $3.50 - $4.  Making your own costs almost nothing by comparison.  You have a teaspoon or so of Dijon mustard (cost maybe $0.10), a little red wine vinegar (I make my own with leftover red wine we're not going to drink, but even if you bought it, it wouldn't cost much - maybe $0.25), and some oil (I use canola and that's pretty cheap so $0.30 max for the amount used).  The salt, pepper, and herbs are hardly worth mentioning.  So, at the most you've spent $0.65 for enough salad dressing to last my house of 6 two weeks (and we eat a lot of salad).  Even better: these ingredients are things I usually keep in the house anyway.  I don't really spend anything "extra" on this the way I do when I buy salad dressing.

Economical and easy!  How often do those two combine?  Did I mention it's tasty too?

Hope you have a lovely day!

As I've said, I am out of standard "stash" items and am throwing together bentos based on what I've made recently for dinner.  This bento is a mixed bag - a little of just about everything.


Layer 1 contains a salad of grated carrot, some smoked Gouda, and nuts.  Dessert is Greek yogurt, strawberries, grapes, and slices of white peach.

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!

I have begun putting together bento lunches for the kids.  It's a slow process because they take a lot of my attention.  :)  Here is my first attempt.

Greetings all!  We are back from Russia with three beautiful children!!!  They are wonderful, bright kids who will certainly keep me on my toes.  I wanted to do a bento this morning for their snack - just to see what they thought of it.  Here are the results.

I love it when DH cooks!  Tonight he made a very manly meal:  steak, rice, and grilled asparagus.  It tasted fabulous.  We actually had a piece of steak leftover and that got remade into this delicious bento box.


Layer 1:  The first course is some rather predictable veggies and some gold fish.  Dessert looks decadent although it's really healthy.  It's 0% fat Greek yogurt mixed with a little Truvia.  I topped it with fresh raspberries (a gift from a good friend) and a little more Truvia. 


Layer 2:  I cut up the steak and the asparagus.  Then I added some green and red pepper chunks and a champagne vinaigrette.  The steak salad is separated from the onigiri with a piece of celery - just to keep things neat.  The onigiri look a little different today.  That's because they are made out of a blend of white and brown rice with some minced onion and butter mixed in. 

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.