Shoyu Chicken Froggie Bento

Shoyu Chicken and Rice Frog Bento, a photo by sherimiya ♥ on Flickr.

TinySprite's bento today contains my old childhood favorite: shoyu chicken and rice. I used the Secrets of the Red Lantern recipe again, with a whole bunch of drumsticks.

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Soy Chicken Drumsticks Recipe (adapted from Secrets of the Red Lantern, By Pauline Nguyen, Luke Nguyen, Mark Jensen)


4 and a half pounds chicken drumsticks
3 Tbl fish sauce
3 Tbl shoyu (I used gluten-free tamari)
1/2 cup shaoxing Chinese cooking wine (I omitted)
1 cup coconut juice
1 Tbl sesame oil
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 Tbl cracked black pepper
1 onion, diced
8 cloves garlic, minced
1 Tbl ginger, sliced
2 cups chicken stock
2 scallions, sliced, for garnish
cilantro, for garnish


Marinate drumsticks for 4 hours with the rest of the ingredients, except the chicken stock, and use only 1 Tbl each of the onion and garlic.
Remove from marinade, pat dry, then wok fry on all sides until golden brown. Place into crockpot.
Fry the remaining onion and garlic until golden. Add to crockpot with reserved marinade and chicken stock.
Cook on high for 3 hours, or until meat is cooked and tender.
Remove lid, turn to low for an additional hour or so, to reduce sauce. Mine didn't reduce much.
Once cooked, the chicken should fall off the bone.
Transfer chicken to serving platter, boil the sauce to reduce further, then pour over. Garnish with scallions and cilantro.


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I like making this in the slow-cooker, and especially on busy afternoons, because then I can run in and out of the house while the meat gets more and more tender all by itself. To make things easier for my preschooler, I pulled the meat off the bones (really, it fell off) before I packed it into this two-tier froggie bento, layering it atop a white/black rice mix alongside steamed broccoli. It's even better the next day, after you skim the fat off the top. I added a radishroom for a pop of color, and the top tier holds chunks of cara cara oranges, blackberries, carrots, and a perfect little baby white peach. So good!

Happy Little Bento has been getting a bit of press lately, which is pretty exciting! A few months ago, I got an email from an educator who wanted to use my bento pictures for a passage she was writing for a 5th grade reading workbook by ECS Learning Systems. I can't show you the passage, but it's been published and I suppose some 5th graders are now learning about "Lunch Art". Last week, a high school classmate of mine talked about bento as an art medium, using my creations as an example, for her advertising/marketing company website. Then today I saw my radish star tutorial get a plug at Dotcoms for Moms, along with other cute ways to make mealtime fun for kids; and also today another plug over at MentalFloss, in a piece on What Kids Eat around the world. More exposure means meeting lots more people, and I often get emails from parents who tell me they look here and realize: "hey, I can do that!" I just got a couple today, and that always makes my day ^_^