Totoro Char Siu Bao Bento!

Totoro! I was thinking about him this past week because we happened to find the My Neighbor Totoro picture book in the library. It's a little jarring to read the story and descriptives since watching the film is more of a stream of flowing imagery washing over your senses. But it is fun to look closely at the detailed illustrations. In the scene where the sisters are eating cucumbers fresh from the garden, you can see the chewed-up bits of vegetable in Mei's open mouth while she's talking about bringing corn to her mother. Anyway, here is my tribute to everyone's favorite "cross between a bear and a raccoon and an owl." Have a magical adventure today!

Also in the ECOlunchbox Solo Rectangle: grapes, cucumbers, carrots, strawberry, lettuce. Details made from fishcake, nori, soba.

Year Of The Horse Chinese New Year Bento 2014~!

Year Of The Horse Chinese New Year Bento 2014~!, a photo by sherimiya ♥ on Flickr.

Tomorrow is Chinese (Lunar) New Year! So today TinySprite brought a horse bun to celebrate the Year of the Horse. I didn't bake it (only decorated with cheese and nori for the face), but she was pretty excited. There's a hot dog in there, and it fits diagonally perfectly inside the EcoLunchBox Solo Cube. I packed some satsuma, tomatoes, and pickled veggies, plus a little cup of sunflower seeds in case the horse gets hungry. Gung Hay Fat Choy!

Roadtrip Jackolantern Bao Bento

tiffin
Roadtrip Jackolantern Bao Bento, a photo by sherimiya ♥ on Flickr.

Yes, we took a roadtrip this weekend, which called for a picnic-style tiffin bento set the two kids could share in the backseat. It was the perfect chance to make Jack-O-Lantern baos, don't you think? If you haven't tried it, you'll find that char siu baos are super easy to "carve" -- I've done it a lot. You can either slice off the top layer of brown to reveal the fluffy white bread underneath, or (much easier), simply push in the cut areas to suggest a 3D effect. Cool, right? Each kid got their own tiffin with their own personal Jack, plus I added a couple of tiny carved cherry tomatoes, a broccoli "stalk", carrots, and Okinawan sweet potato slices. The third tier is packed with corn and fruit for the two of them to share. The best thing about these car trip bentos is that everything is finger-friendly and basically mess- and waste-free. Love that. Hope you all had a wonderful weekend and Columbus Day!

Hello Kitty Bao Bento

Hello Kitty Bao Bento, originally uploaded by sherimiya ♥.

Yes, it's another Hello Kitty bento... but I'm just so excited to be making cute girly bento now for a change! I hope you can bear with me. I'm sure the novelty will wear off sometime soon; after all, I can't possibly think of many more HK ideas. Luckily there are lots of other girly characters we can try. This one looks kind of strange because the steamed chicken bao is pinched on top and there are onions or something on top as well. She looks like she was playing outside and needs a bath soon, hehe! You can use a bao to make her yourself -- it's really very easy and quick. All I did was cut some radish ears, a strawberry flower, grape eyes, yellow pepper nose and then added spaghetti whiskers. Voila, you're done! On the side I added some kiwi flowers, sliced peaches and cherries. I also get to use my Hello Kitty fork that is embossed with her image and name (there's a matching spoon too). Yay!