Category: bento


Bento for 2-17-09

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February 17, 2009

Today’s Bento

I’ve been taking pictures of my lunches for months with the intention of posting. Well, dammit, today is the day. Today’s lunch, packed in a square 600mL Lock & Lock (from Walmart. Ugh. WalMart), features:

  • Soboro with whole wheat couscous instead of rice (I ran out of precooked rice. I let Tico use the last bit in his lunch today).
  • Chicken dumplings from a recipe in Bento Boxes cookbook I got from JList.
  • A hardboiled piggy egg (hardboiled egg molded with an ice cream sandwich maker.)
  • Strawberries
  • Blackberries

What I learned from this bento:

  • If I pack my lunch the night before, I can stay in bed that much longer the next day. 🙂
  • DON’T PACK YOUR LUNCH ON A FULL STOMACH. There is not nearly enough food in this bento to last me until I get home at 9:30 tonight. A regular day, sure. But I have a class tonight. I’m gonna starve (hah!). I also packed a smoked salmon and cream cheese onigiri.
  • Soboro with couscous instead of rice is surprisingly good.
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New Year, New Shit To Try

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January 5, 2009

This morning, I pondered “what shall I take for lunch?” I did not make any mini quiches, the lunchmeat had organized and formed it’s own colony, there were no leftovers since I haven’t cooked in a couple of weeks. I saw Tico grab a soup (lunch, snack, no idea) and I cast my eyes towards the top shelf of the pantry. A box of organic soup gazed down upon me. “I need to try new things” I thought. “And I don’t want more crap for lunch” so I took it. It is a box of Organic Butternut Squash Soup made by Pacific Foods. I grab the box (only 90 calories per serving! two servings in a box!) and head to work. Lunchtime rolls around. I heat my soup and think “oh man if this tastes like ass, I will be very hungry.” It’s about 35 outside right now and drizzly. I hate going out to lunch in a) shit weather and b) around here. I take my soup out of the microwave and smell…warm pumpkin pie….I am not a fan of warm pumpkin pie. I am also not a fan of sweet when I want savory. I wanted savory, this promised to be sweet. Yuck. I taste it. Not…too bad. I take a larger drink. Oh…my. No sir, I don’t like it. Not one bit. But I ate it. Because it was my lunch. And that’s what I brought. So now I have the smell of pumpkin pie lingering in my nose. Ick.

What did I learn? I still don’t like butternut squash. Not roasted, not roasted salted and buttered, and most definitely not in soup form.

Never again.

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Poorly Crafted Bento

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September 9, 2008

Lunch

Originally uploaded by topenga dent

Metal lunchboxes can probably be used to create neat bentos. I, however, have not managed to achieve this. This was last Wednesday’s lunch (9/3). It’s a sandwich, a juice box, a small container of feta stuffed olives, two mini quiches, and a bowl of pears. The sandwich was actually for the drive to class. The idea of bento is to pack a healthy, appealing meal that doesn’t move (fill all gaps). This…looks like I tossed a bunch of stuff from my tupperware cabinet into a lunchbox. I will admit, though, that it has saved me quite a bit of money. I haven’t gone out to lunch in a week.

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More Bento

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September 9, 2008

Food jar

Originally uploaded by topenga dent

This is a food jar. These come highly recommended for those times when you a) don’t have access to a microwave (Tico and I do) or b) the line is unbearably long because even though there are two microwaves, only one of them works (me). This little guy is 16 oz., keeps cold things cold for up to 9 hours, hot things hot up to 7 hours (not…at the same time….), and comes with a collapsible spoon. All for the low low price of $13.08 at Target. I think I got the last one. So, this morning’s experiment: leftover beef and bison stew, and rice from last night. I filled the thermos with hot water (to prime it) while I heated up the stew to scalding hot. After dumping the water, I put the stew in the jar and closed the lid at approximately 7:45am. We shall see how hot it is by noon or noon-thirty (I had a good breakfast).

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I has a cow egg

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September 3, 2008

Cow egg

Originally uploaded by topenga dent

My breakfast. A Cow Egg. What is a cow egg, you ask? It’s a hardboiled egg smooshed into an ice cream sandwich maker mold. I heard about it on www.lunchinabox.net. Neat site about bento boxes and making lunches fun for kids. And adults apparently. Because I hadn’t eaten a hardboiled egg by itself in ages. I make it into a cow (or piggie) and I scarf them up.

So why the egg? My new job (yay!) is about 10 miles from my house. No big deal. Unless it’s rush hour. So a 15 minute drive in the morning turns into 45 minutes. From there to San Marcos is an hour and from there to Round Rock is…also an hour. Not the same distance. At all. ANyway, there’s nowhere to really eat that’s close out here on 360. There’s stuff near 2222 but it’s a pain in the ass to get there and come back. Everything else is just too far. Gas is too expensive and I just don’t like to eat out all the time. So, I have started packing my lunch. Yesterday, a sandwich. Plain old sandwich. That’s boring. Today: spinach and feta mini quiches. Hells yeah. My next step, using proper bento boxes to help with portion control (HAH!) and cuz they look cool. Also, I figured, since I’m cooking my lunches for the week, I might as well cook for Tico. He scored 6 single serving shepherd’s pies in the snack sized HEB brand disposable plasticware. It worked beautifully. I hope to keep this going and keep a nice variety of food for me (Tico can eat the same thing over and over. bleah).

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