American Bento

In honor of Halloween, I have made a harvest themed bento.  Tonight we had a lovely dinner that was remade here.

Layer 1:  An appetizer plate of veggies and cheese with a jack-o-lantern pepper.  Dessert is a spice muffin and fresh fruit. 


Layer 2:  Roast pork with onions, apple butter, acorn squash, and pumpkin pasties. 



You will need:

• pie crust (either store bought or home made)
• a can of pumpkin
• 1/4 cup brown sugar
• 2 eggs
• cinnamon, clove, nutmeg, and allspice

Combine the pumpkin, 1 egg, brown sugar, and spices in a bowl.  Mix in spices to taste.

Beat the second egg with a tsp of water.

Cut rounds or other shapes of pie crust and fill with the pumpkin mixture.

Paint the edges of the shape with the egg and water and press the shape closed.

Paint the top of each shape with egg and sprinkle with spices and brown sugar.

Bake at 350 degrees until brown.

The other evening, I made a low carb beef stew.  That means I left out the carrots and potatoes and didn't thicken it.  Then, I boiled those separately for DH and DD.  This allows me to eat the same as they do but slim down a bit in the process.  This bento is leftover beef stew (among other things).  I hope you enjoy!


Layer 1:  Crackers, cheese, veggies, gold fish, and a little something special: a white chocolate truffle.  I don't usually keep truffles in the house.  If I did, I would be a chunky lady indeed!  :)  But, DH and I celebrated 12 years married recently and my sister sent us the most decadent basket of goodies as a gift.  There were some truly lovely truffles in there that I decided to make part of this bento.  It was a cold morning and I wanted to make sure the bento itself was hearty.  So, I went heavy on protein and light on fruit. 


Layer 2: Beef stew.  This is a big portion.  I added a bunch of potatoes and carrots and then topped it with the "low carb" beef stew."  I made this at night so that the flavors of the two elements could mingle as they cooled.  The result?  DD shared some with a friend and he thought it was "perfect!"  :) 

Her teachers have started speculating on her lunches these days.  One has made cracks in class (when she pulls out a snack) that I have too much time on my hands.  If only they knew how little time this takes!

Have a wonderful day!

The other day, I commented that I was out of bento basics.  This is one of the last bentos I made with basics in it.  In fact, I think this is where I used up the meatballs and the mini quiches.  :)  It was a quick, OMG I have nothing in the fridge bento.

In honor of a link from Nikki and her site Fascinating Womanhood Alaska, I would like to renew my bento challenge!

Thank you, Nikki, for encouraging others to visit here and consider making their own bento!

If you would like to try your hand at bento making and share your endeavors with others, I always welcome bento contributions.  Please email me a picture or two of your bento and a description.  I will share your work with my readers.  Hopefully, together we can encourage more people to make lunch memorable with a bento meal!  My email is fontevrault at comcast dot net.

This challenge is open to anyone, anywhere in the world!  It does not have an end date.  Just shoot me an email and I'll post your work!

Did you read that correctly?  Yes, I really did say "hot pocket."  I did not throw a hot pocket into a bento box and call it good - I promise!  :)  I made soup for dinner last night and am out of some of the basics I usually make.  Gone are the meatballs, the terrine de volaille, mini quiches, preroasted chicken breasts.  I have used them all up and need to make more.  This morning, that just wasn't going to happen.  Indeed, I'm in a bit of a holding pattern until this weekend when I should have more time to make bento basics.  I am still getting caught up on adoption paperwork and other little things I've neglected along the way.  So, I took out some leftover pie crust I've had in the fridge for a bit, some sliced ham, and some cheddar cheese.  Viola - easy homemade hot pockets!


Layer 1:  Cheese and veggies for an appetizer/snack and fresh and frozen fruit for a dessert.  As far as fruit, I've got orange slices, plum slices, peach slices (all fresh) and some frozen strawberry and pineapple bits.  DD loves pineapple, so when I found I had some holes in this bento, I stuffed it in. 

DH and I have been working on adopting for 3 1/2 years and hoped to travel in November.  Last week, we received a request for more paperwork.  As you can imagine we were frustrated beyond belief.  We ducked down and finished the paperwork in the hopes of travelling before Christmas.  That's why there were no updates here.  I made some lunches but was more focused on getting through paperwork and dealing with the emotions associated with this project than anything else.

I am sorry!

There are few pleasures in life like a snow day in October.  Waking early, looking at the snow falling against the moonlight, feeling that anticipation of an entire day spent doing absolutely nothing that you were supposed to do, all these wonderful sentiments crept through my head at 4:30 am and then came to smashing and terrible halt.  Poudre School District schools are open, which means that DH and DD need to go out in weather better suited to reading by the fire.  What's more, DH has parent-teacher conferences tonight!  It is going to be a very long day for both of them. 

In honor of snow day disappointment, I give you my bento - full of hardy, warm food meant to fill them up and get them through a day of utter disappointment.  It is comfort food - fast and easy - but comfort food nonetheless.

Layer 2: I had some leftover rice in the fridge that needed to be used.  I also had some leftover sauce from beef stew the other day.  There were three tiny pieces of meat left for my lunch yesterday but massive amounts of veggies and yummy sauce.  So, here I've combined the sauce from our beef stew with some meatballs I had in the freezer.  It should be hot and filling for a cold afternoon.  I've sprinkled some of the herbs I used in the stew on top of the rice as well.

I hope your day is warmer than mine.  Our high, here in Colorado, will be around 34.  My bet is that we don't quite hit 34.  Overnight it will be in the teens and tomorrow the snow will all melt away. 

DD had a lot of homework last night, so I made her favorite meal: dim sum!  That got remade into a bento box that should be really filling.

Warning: This bento is **not** truly healthy.  It was fun to make though.  Portion sizes are at least small - on everything but the rice.

Layer 1:  Veggies with no dip, soy sauce for the next layer in the cup, and a dessert of almond cake, plum and peach.


Layer 2:  Rice with peas and peppers, dim sum, and General Tso's chicken. 

DH made a lovely dinner last night - just for the two of us.  Indeed, I'm typing this after some wine and thus am a little toasty.  :)  Luckily, DH is here to proofread.  This bento is a replica of dinner. 


Layer 1:  Veggies and cheese, as usual, along with goldfish (the snack that smiles back).  Dessert is plum, peach, and grapes along with a single piece of dark chocolate. 

The other day, I had a kitchen disaster. I didn't set anything on fire.  Nothing expensive shattered.  But, it was a disaster all the same.  I had made chicken cacciatore.  We had a lovely dinner and then I saved the rest for another meal.  When I went to warm the chicken, I pulled out some of the sauce to toss with pasta.  Then, I went to pop the rest into the microwave.  The only problem: I missed.  How do you miss?  I have no clue!  I think the container was moist along the sides.  Maybe my hands slipped.  It was terrible!  I dropped chicken cacciatore all over my kitchen floor.   What a mess!  I had guests coming for coffee and a meeting at my house and the floor and I were covered with dinner.  With 30 minutes to spare before people started to arrive, I was in a bit of a state.  What did I do about dinner?  We had Subway.  DH purchased sandwiches while DD and I cleaned up the mess and I cried a bit.

Remember that somewhere in the story I had pulled out some of the sauce?  Well, I salvaged that into this bento.


Layer 1: Veggies and cheese, leek quiche, and fresh fruit: plum and orange slices, and grapes.

Perhaps I am easily amused.  Well, I guess that's obvious because I'm having so much fun packing lunch.  :)  This morning, I decided to play with circle shapes.


Layer 1: Veggies and cheese, some crumb cake, slices of orange, and chocolate.


Layer 2:  Onigiri interspersed with meatballs and green beans.  The meatballs and green beans have been tossed with a light sauce.   The only real problem here is that I cooked a mixture of white and brown rice that wasn't quite sticky enough to hold together well.  For some reason, these onigiri worked just fine but when I went to make some for DH's lunch, they just fell apart.  I don't know what I did wrong . . .  

Just over night, the air has turned crisp, the leaves have begun to change color and fall is certainly in the air. I harvested pears from my trees this week and put together an Autumn bento. 


Layer 1: The first course is the usual cheese and veggies.  I've added a miniature leek quiche as well.  Dessert is a small piece of a free form pear pie I made last night (from our own pears) and slices of plum and orange.

Layer 2: I started with about 1/2 cup of rice in each bento.  I then added pork cooked with thyme, garlic, onion powder, salt, and pepper.  Once it was done, I deglazed the pan and simmered it briefly in sherry.  I then took butternut squash and tossed it with the sherry pan drippings and a little butter. 

The other night was date night in our house.  Usually, we'd go out but we just took delivery of a freezer full of meat from Town & Country Foods.  We're stocked for the year and it seemed silly to pay someone else to cook steaks that I've got in my freezer.  Well, I didn't really notice the size of the steaks I took out - until I thought about portions.  We ate one of the two steaks and cooked the other.  It turned into a rather substantial lunch for 2. 
Layer 1: The first course is the usual veggies and cheese.  There are more mini peppers here than usual.  I had a package that needed to be eaten and I usually only use 1 a day.  Today each bento contains 3.  Dessert is sliced peach with miniature grapes.  These grapes are the cutest thing I've found at Walmart in a while.  They are lovely sweet grapes but tiny enough that they seem scaled for the bento.  Ok...  They were a little pricey for grapes, but they are cute!!!  :0) 


Layer 2:  Here we have steak, sliced so that it is easy for DD to eat in the middle of class.  I've combined the side dishes: potatoes and green beans that are tossed in brown butter with rosemary and almonds.

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.