Very Japanese Bento

I woke up in good time this morning to prepare today's bentos, so I really have no idea why I ran out of time and we ended up leaving late for school.

From left to right: jasmine rice with furikake, seaweed chicken, tamagoyaki, cherry tomatoes and fruits. Same thing for both kids.

Workflow (which should have worked out): Total 30 min

1. Set seaweed chicken to toast (15 min).

2. Set rice to steam (10 min).

3. Wash and cut apple (5 min). Wash and peel clementine (1 min).

4. Take tamagoyaki out of fridge and cut into pieces (1 min).

5. Set rice and chicken to cool in front of fan (10 min).

6. Pack all in (5 min).

I think I really bungled up at the packing part. Couldn't decide which boxes to use, so ended up changing from one box to another. Plus the tot woke up (which only took less than 5 min to settle him down again).

The box would look much better without the barans (silicone dividers) but I preferred to keep the crispy chicken apart from the moist rice and tamagoyaki.

Wish it was Friday Bento

This week has been another tiring week, all beginning with my kueh lapis legit obsession, and the aftermath. And the bentoing must go on! 

I'm thankful that we have some fried chicken wings from my Mother-in-law to cover the "protein" portion of the bento, because frankly speaking we're all sick of seaweed chicken. For this week. I threw in some sultana biscuits (fav from my childhood and now the kids' too), plus his usual fruits.

Soba and soup Bento Lunch

Today would have been a crazy day if the kids had not volunteered to make life easier for me by agreeing to take lunch bentos. This is one of their favourite meals at home - soba or udon in soup with pork shabu shabu slices and broccoli.

No cutesy wootsy, I just arranged all the food in neatly and added the toppings (sesame seeds and nori strips). Here's Takoyaki's box close up.

The little chick is holding the Japanese spice mix nanami togarashi ("seven flavour chilli pepper") for them to add into their soup or noodles, if they want to.

Kueh Lapis Aftermath Bento

I spent yesterday making Kueh Lapis Legit, and by the time all was completed I had no energy nor heart to think much about today's bentos. So the kids just got lots of Lunar New Year goodies plus fruits.

I am going to take a short rest, and then I'm going to go get another batch of eggs to make a second batch of the blessed cake.

Simple bentos to end this week

Mama's experiencing burnout from the last couple of bentos, so last night I made some simple pork jerky sandwiches, washed some fruits and dumped them all together into the boxes. Both Takoyaki and Roast Meat are pretty satisfied - they LURVE bak kwa (肉干)!

Valentine's Day comes early

Everything is heart-shaped for Takoyaki's lunch today - onigiri (made with my new rice mould which works like a dream), sausages, tamagoyaki, and strawberries.

She has since requested a flower theme for her V-Day bento. We shall see my dear, we shall see.

Attack of the Ninjas

"Take that!" said the first ninja.

"Ouch!" went the second one.

"And that, was for saying I'm fat!"
"Wah..." went the frogs.

 

Attack of the Ninjas bento

Starring:

Plain onigiris wrapped in seaweed as The Ninjas

Noritama (made in my new tamagoyaki pan) as Shurikens

Cocktail sausages as The Logs (for the Frogs)

Cherry tomatoes and grapes as Background Props

Tamagoyaki Pans Revisited

I previously shared about my Tamagoyaki Pan from Daiso which had been serving me well once I got the hang of the temperature control. Well, I'm sorry to say that after about one and a half months of shelving it (school holidays, didn't make tamagoyaki), it RUSTED. 

Because the silicone coating is unbelieveably thin, I scraped through it in a few areas, and over time, the exposed iron underneath (I certainly do not believe it's steel) rusted. So much for a $2 pan.

You'd think I'd have learnt my lesson but NO! I got another one, the same, from Daiso again... because I need a rectangular pan to make my tamagoyaki!! And I can't go back to round pans.

Thankfully, before I had the chance to let history repeat itself, I found a better one (although still not perfect, as I shall explain later) at Isetan today. And here are the two pans, side by side, for comparison.

Tamagoyaki pans of opposite quality and price

The ASD pan cost $10.90 (offer price from $29.90), which I chose over an Endo one that was $13.90. I'm cheapskate, I admit it. I've already tried it this evening, and the result is below.

Lovely Noritama made in my new pan

I certainly didn't have to fight so hard this time to get it right! My only grouse is, and it's important, that it's standard teflon-coated. However, I only make tamagoyaki for bentos about once in every two weeks, so I'm telling myself that the PFOAs are only very occasional. The only other teflon-coated cookware I have is my muffin pan, which only sees the light of day once in a blue moon.

My dream tamagoyaki pan would be ceramic-coated nonstick, but unfortunately, Japan hasn't really caught up with the nonstick ceramic technology yet (I may just be ignorant, please correct me if so). Meantime, is anyone going to Japan? Please carry back for me a copper tamagoyaki pan d:)

The tamagoyaki in the picture above has been packed into tomorrow's bentos.

Starry Starry Day

I was really exhausted last evening, so this bento took much longer to make than I'd expected. It didn't help that the tot kept coming into the kitchen to fool around with my stuff and also to hang onto my leg.

Roast Meat's box is made of two moulded star buns, each topped with a seaweed laver star (made with my new seaweed punch), and there are also corn kernels (in a Star cup), and sausage flowers.

Starry Starry Day

Takoyaki very kindly agreed to bring some fruits today. That's all.

Worried Onigiri

This was Roast Meat's lunch as he had supp classes today: A plain onigiri, seaweed chicken, leek scrambled egg, two cherry tomatoes and fruits. In the other Peanuts box I got from the toothpaste purchase.

Cabbage soup

We had this soup for dinner last night, thanks to my dear friend Yee Fun who shared her recipe on our Facebook Bento group. Takoyaki's hot lunch will be pork rib cabbage soup over rice, and fruits. I added a couple of cherry tomatoes as an afterthought.

Cabbage Tomato Soup Recipe

Ingredients:

500gm pork ribs

1 clove of garlic

1 handful silver fish or ikan bilis

1 large tomato, chopped into large chunks

half a head of cabbage, chopped into large pieces

salt to taste

Method:

Bring a big pot of water (about 3 litres) to boil. Add silver fish (place into a stock bag if desired).

Once water boils, add pork ribs, garlic, tomato and immediately turn fire to low. Set timer for 1 hour.

After 30 mins of simmering, add cabbage.

At the end of cooking, add salt to taste, stir and serve hot.

Pocket sandwich in a new Snoopy box

Cute new Snoopy box

The evils of advertising... A box like this comes free with every purchase of two boxes of Darlie toothpaste. We got two boxes d:)

It's a good size, 600ml, one which I've been wanting to get from Daiso for quite some time, for packing bigger stuff such as pocket sandwiches and toast. Love the headroom on this one, same as my Lock&Lock boxes, which means longer picks can stand upright. There's a steam vent for microwave reheating (which we won't use, of course), but there's no silicone or rubber seal, so the box is not watertight.

Roast Meat brought a Nutella-filled pocket sandwich, some seaweed chicken, cherry tomatoes and grapes to school this morning.

New tools plus Nori Puncher Review

Found some cute rice moulds, and got two nori punchers, $2 per packet. I set the punchers to use right away.

These punchers are made of plastic, with a metal spring, and are much bigger than the Daiso ones. What I like best about them is - they're dismantleable (is there such a word?). In the picture below, I've taken them apart for washing, and the various nooks and crannies are waiting to dry.

Now for the actual usage. As long as the nori is crisp, the cutters punch clean and sharp about 9 out of 10 tries. (To make soggy nori crisp again, simply toast a single layer in a toaster oven for about 2-3 min.)

It should be noted that the punchouts are about 1.5 times bigger than the Daiso ones, which is especially obvious in the face punch. But that's no problem for me.

Overall, I give these punchers 5 out of 5 stars.

Just in case Snack Bento

Mr Roast Meat will be out with his friend's family till the afternoon, but I'm not sure if they will bring him for lunch, so I packed this just in case (since I don't want to say or insist on anything to them).

Pinwheel crackers, oreos and a small clementine.

Friday of the longest week ever Bento

This week seemed more like a month, mostly because I was waiting for some results to happen, and we all know what it's like to wait for something that takes quite some time but you can't do anything to hasten it.

Takoyaki's long day again (poor girl, three times a week now she's in P6), and I hope this box will keep her in good cheer - some rather peppery chicken fingers with mayo to take the heat off, pineapple pies (another CNY goody), strawberries and longans.

Roast Meat didn't eat the beef stew yesterday, so he's having it over rice for recess. What a sad-looking picture after his sister's bright, colourful box.

Imitation Tiger thermal bento set

This bento is my cheapskate, low class version of the Tiger Thermal Bento Set (below).

Beef stew bento

I was very pleased to prepare and deliver this to Takoyaki (who had supp class) at lunchtime today, when I went to pick RM up. Thankful I didn't have to pack it early in the morning, phew!

 

Beef stew, macaroni, mango and grapes. I came up with my own recipe for this stew, because I was in a hurry and didn't want to bother with using the computer. I used fresh herbs from my container garden.

Lulu's Beef Stew (revised)

1 kg beef muscle, cut into bite-sized pieces
5 tbsps plain flour
1 large onion, finely chopped or sliced
3 cloves garlic, minced
1 sprig fresh rosemary (or pinch of dried)
1 sprig fresh oregano (or pinch of dried)
1 sprig fresh thyme (or pinch of dried)
1 bay leaf
1 litre beef stock
2 large carrots, chopped into large chunks
1/2 cup red wine
dash pepper

Method:
Heat a tablespoon of oil in a Dutch oven over medium heat for about 1 min. Toss beef in flour and dump into pot. Try to brown all sides of beef, about 3 min.
Add onion, garlic, herbs (including bay leaf) and continue frying for about 2 min.
Add all the rest of the ingredients, and bring to a boil, stirring constantly.
Lower to gentle simmer, simmer at least 2 hours, or till beef is tender and tendons have turned into "jelly". Taste and adjust seasoning.
Remove herbs and serve hot.

Jiajiangmyun

I ran out of energy and food varieties (for some reason I'm having a mental block), so it came down to instant noodles for Roast Meat (whom I'm sure will be ecstatic once he opens his Foogoo) and his imitation crabmeat.

Featuring Korean style jiajiangmyun (soybean sauce noodles).

First moulded bread of the year

I just realised I have not made moulded buns for the longest time. Unfortunately, one of the cars had too much kaya, which got squeezed out in a few places (so it looks horrible). Thankfully, the other one (cream cheese) looks good.

So Roast Meat will be having moulded car buns with baked chicken wings, clementine and a chocolate treat.

At the last minute, I managed to convince Takoyaki to bring a box of fruits to share with her friends. Hello Matryoshka!

Lotsafood Bento!

Roast Meat said yesterday's bento did not have enough food. So here goes today's Lotsafood Bento!

Imitation crabmeat, corn kernels, peanut puffs, grapes and M&Ms.

It's Monday already?

Roast Meat's onigiri (on the left) has the seaweed sheet wrapped directly onto it, partly because he doesn't mind soggy nori, but mainly because he doesn't know how to unwrap an onigiri wrapper (shh, don't tell him I said so). This wrapper is much easier because all he has to do is tear it down the middle and he can start eating.

Takoyaki's onigiri, on the other hand, has the seaweed sheet wrapped separately from the rice, so the nori stays crisp. I did a video on How To Use An Onigiri Wrapper here. Takoyaki's also got a thermal jar of last night's Fish Maw Soup, because her bento's for lunch, so this will be more filling.

Have a great week everyone~

Dinner Rice Bento for me

I had to go to school this evening for Takoyaki's Parent-Teacher-Conference, which would be followed with the Parent Connection Committee meeting (Parent Volunteers) so I quickly packed this box for myself and hoped I would have some time to eat it before the meeting began. 

It's a very small portion as our Chairperson had informed us that she would be providing some light refreshments (so I was planning to go and help to eat up the stuff, ahem). The same rice, roast chicken, some blanched 菜心 (choy sum), cherry toms and oooh... homemade sauerkraut. The rice is topped with some homemade salmon flakes to up the protein content. And all packed in my beloved Urushi box.

Occasional Rice Bento

From last night's dinner: Freshly cooked rice, roast chicken, veggies, cherry tomatoes and fruits, all packed in pretty much immediately after cooking. The packed boxes went into the fridge overnight, and will warm up slowly from the time they leave for school, till recess time. No reheating this morning. (Nice, means I get to wake a little later.)

Week Two's over!

"New Fridge has arrived!" Bento

My new (bigger but cheaper) refrigerator freezer arrived yesterday, earlier than expected, which really made my day. So what do I do? Go grocery shopping of course!

Roast Meat will be really happy to open his box today. He's got Chinese pork jerky (aka bak kwa), longans and a packet of Hello Panda biscuits. I won't be doing anything fanciful yet since I'm having a pretty tough time adjusting to the new schedule (which excludes a mid day nap for me, necessary since my sleep is interrupted the whole night long). Let's just keep things simple for now.

"New fridge will be here today!" Bento

I'm almost at the end of my sanity, worrying over food spoilage and the state my kitchen is in. Thankfully, the kids are not fussy, and are willing to eat most things.

Everything's dry from my pantry stash except for the fruits, which were in the cooler box (topped up with fresh ice cubes from the convenience store again). This was a really chopchop bento.

I gave myself some retail therapy and bought a new white light bulb to replace the yellow bulb in my kitchen. So my bento photos will no longer be yellow!

Unfortunate circumstances but must still Bento

My Fisher & Paykel refrigerator has given up its ghost, and the new Sharp fridge will only arrive earliest Wed but more probably Thursday. Meantime, I'm living out of cooler boxes (with neighbours helping to store some stuff. But the bentoing must go on! *cue maniacal laughter*

I managed to cop this together for Roast Meat today.

Seaweed chicken, peanut butter sandwiches, grapes and cherry tomatoes (the last two of which are stored in the cooler boxes. I can't very well go and knock on my neighbour's door for ingredients at 5.30am).

Workflow:

1. Toast seaweed chicken and spread peanut butter on sandwiches. Cut and emboss with cookie cutter. Pack into box.

2. Place seaweed chicken to cool in front of the fan.

3. Wash grapes and tomatoes, and stick picks into them. Pack.

4. Clear all the baskets of condiments (from the dead fridge) off the kitchen island and wipe the counter surface.

5. Attend to tot who woke up asking for milk. Put him back to bed asap.

6. Pack chicken in and take photo.

Week Two Day One - worse than last week

I am completely zombified. Was up till late last night baking a spinach mushroom quiche for a birthday potluck today, and my Fisher & Paykel fridge has died, so it's a frantic rush to sort out which foods can be kept for a bit and which ones must either be eaten up chopchop or chucked. There'll be a number of seaweed chicken bentos this week d:)

Seaweed chicken, salmon onigiri and clementine.

Workflow:

1. Steam rice plus salmon flakes (about 7 mins).

2. While rice is steaming, toast seaweed chicken (10 mins).

3. Prepare clementine and pack into box.

4. Let rice cool about 5 mins, shape into balls and pack into box.

5. Take seaweed chicken out to cool about 10 min.

6. Pack in chicken and take photo!

Total time taken = 20 mins

Last Day of Week One

I have survived! We tried out the new (later) timing today, so the kids don't get to school way too early before school starts, and I got to wake later to bento. That's a plus, even if it's only 15 min later! However, things just went haywire because the tot woke too. Thankfully, we managed to head out the door on time.

The box on the left is for Roast Meat, consisting of leftovers from our KFC dinner last night and grapes. Takoyaki is bringing a "fruit platter" to share with her friends. She'll be buying her main meal in school.

Day two of school

We're still trying to get the feel of things. Left on time this morning but kids got to school 40min before school begins. Must adjust timings.

This is Roast Meat's bento. Cheese sandwich crackers, leftover roast chicken, rose apple and a Happy Hippo snack. Did this last night. Slept a little later this morning.

1st Bento of 2013

And so the new year begins. Today is the first day of school for Takoyaki and Roast Meat, who are both in the morning session (for the first time). I will have to bento many more times in the morning before getting them ready for school, and then chauffeuring them to school. Don't wanna think too much ahead, I'll just take one day at a time.

It will be the same food for both as far as possible, which will be really tough to plan since they have such opposite likes and dislikes. For today, I'm thankful that both accept kimchi soup with pork, multigrain rice and apple.

I've decided that I will add a workflow to my posts just to give an idea of how the whole thing got done. For today:
1. Steam rice (leftover) - 10 mins.
2. While rice is being reheated, carve apple and place in bowl of slightly salted water - 5 mins.
3. Place apple into boxes.
4. Boil water to pour into thermal jars. Leave for 5 mins.
5. Place rice in front of fan to cool for about 5 mins.
6. Boil up kimchi soup, pour away hot water in jars, pour soup into jars.
7. Pack rice into boxes, top with seaweed strips and take photo!
8. Close up all boxes and pack into bento bags.
Total time taken = 25 mins including photo taking

Happy New Bento Year!