Rudolph the Quail Egg Christmas Chicken and Rice Bento

Rudolph the Quail Egg Christmas Chicken and Rice Bento, a photo by sherimiya ♥ on Flickr.

The nights around here are getting pretty chilly -- down in the 30s -- calling for some comfort food to warm up the bones during the day. I made a big pot of Vietnamese soy chicken drumsticks (method and recipe here). Even though I grew up with shoyu chicken, and the Hawaiian version was a childhood favorite of mine, I really love the distinct taste of this version. I think it might be the fish sauce that gives it that extra flavor punch. Or maybe it's the black pepper. In any case, I'm hooked. I made this batch on the stovetop, and it doesn't take more than an hour to get nice and fall-off-the-bone tender. I packed some in the apple box atop some furikake rice and some broccoli steamed in the same pot. Chicken and rice. It's delicious hot, cold, room temperature, whatever. You know what I mean? The top layer holds a satsuma mandarin, the ever-present sauerkraut and pickled cucumbers, a smattering of blackberries, and a shoyu-dyed quail egg Rudolph. It's Christmas, after all!

Rudolph Calzone Christmas Sistema Bento

Rudolph Calzone Bento, a photo by sherimiya ♥ on Flickr.

Only two weeks to go until Christmas, and I'm happy to present my first Christmas themed bento for the year! Heh. Oops. I should look to my past Christmas bento flickrset for inspiration, I think. Anyway, this one boasts a reindeer-shaped calzone, which became Rudolph with the addition of a red button nose pick. All I did was glue on some nori eyes (with honey) and I was done. Woo! There are a couple of pizza slices underneath Rudolph, packed in one half of my new Sistema Bakery bento box. The box says that the volume of this BPA-free divided box is 630ml, which might surprise you. The tight-fitting (leakproof) lid is domed, allowing extra space for bulky food items. Plus, it costs less than $7~ I love this box! The other side was just right to fit a little satsuma mandarin, a handful of blackberries, a grape tomato and a cup of pickled cucumbers. Toss this box into the lunchtote, and you don't need to worry about anything. TinySprite can see exactly what she has for lunch, and she made sure there wasn't anything left to bring home. ^_^

Minestrone Rudolph Bento

Minestrone Rudolph Bento, a photo by sherimiya ♥ on Flickr.

The recent cold weather has put me in the mood for hot soups and stews. The heavy fog that we woke up to this morning stuck around all day long, which doesn't usually happen. It felt like 6pm all day. So everyone was very glad to have some hearty warming minestrone soup to take the chill off. Just as I always do, I threw in a lot of colorful vegetables to make this soup chock full of vitamins and nutrition. There's also some smoked andouille sausage in there for a little bite. TinySprite loved it so much, she asked for more again tomorrow. In her side dish I gave her the cutest little baby crabapple, steamed broccoli, carrots, grapes, a strawberry, and my first attempt at a Christmas character - Rudolph the red-nosed reindeer. He's made from a shoyu-dyed hard-boiled quail egg, with nori eyes and mouth and a baby grape tomato nose. Are you in the Christmas mood yet? We've just put up our tree and are in the process of decorating it now. The kids love this part ^_^
Added to What's For Lunch.

Rudolph and Misobutterfish Bento

Rudolph and Misobutterfish Bento, originally uploaded by sherimiya ♥.

My favorite fish, butterfish misoyaki. So easy and so yummy! I added some red rice mini-musubi with cherry picks, carved carrots, steamed shoyu Brussels sprouts and a shoyu quail egg decorated as Rudolph with nori eyes, radish nose and ears, and the very versatile and useful bone picks for antlers. There's also a plum. I have no idea where it came from, but it's really not sweet at all. Luckily there are black grapes and satsuma mandarin to make up for it. Here's a closeup of Rudolph. Aww...

Christmas Tree Jook and Rudolph Bento

Christmas Tree Jook Bento, originally uploaded by sherimiya ♥.

Since tomorrow is December first, I decided to make a first Christmas-themed bento set. I made two, in fact! MisterMan gets turkey jook, made using the Thanksgiving turkey carcass to make turkey stock. I tossed the thigh bones in as well, and at the end of the hour of simmering, the meat had all fallen off the bones and the broth was nice and flavorful. I used only half the carcass, so there's one more batch to go. I have to admit I love turkey jook -- much more so than the actual turkey it began with. Personally I like to throw in ginger, scallion and garlic chili paste to give it a tasty kick. For the kids I keep it more mild. I did sprinkle on some chopped green onion before I realized it landed in kind of a tree formation. Okay, I rearranged a little, and added a kabocha star, but I'm calling it a Christmas tree bento.

The fruit and veggie side dish is the top tier of this thermal bento. I gave him a satsuma mandarin, some pan-fried kabocha, broccoli and a grape. It's kind of a small box.

For TinySprite, I turned a char siu bao into Rudolph with carved carrot antler, grape eyes and a radish nose. She also got some pan-fried kabocha, steamed broccoli and sliced kiwi. Happy December, and welcome to the Christmas season!