Crab Linguine Bento

Crab Linguine Bento, a photo by sherimiya ♥ on Flickr.

A simple crab linguine pasta bento for my TinySprite. I tossed the noodles with spinach, roasted baby tomatoes, crabmeat, olive oil, pepper and parmesan. The top tier contains dragonfruit balls, raspberries, sliced persimmon, a bit of steamed broccoli and some Okinawan sweet potato flowers. It probably took 10 minutes to put this bento together, but it still looks bright, fresh and tasty. You don't need to spend hours making an artistic piece of edible art in order for the bento to look good. Colorful, seasonal foods will help you ensure you've packed a healthy and balanced meal that will provide nutrition for your active learner. And most importantly, my little girl gobbled it up. Yay!

Wonton and Dragonballs Bento

Wonton Dragonballs Bento, a photo by sherimiya ♥ on Flickr.

Wontons! That's what my kids shout when they find out I'm making them (see my recipe and method here). The excitement is just as high as with the gyoza. I love packing wontons because I don't have to bother to present them nicely. They're just wrinkly dumplings so all you have to do is squeeze them in however they fit. I think I put 10 in the bottom of this round stainless steel tiffin, along with broccoli, corn, carrot, and a little Okinawan sweet potato flower. In the top tier I arranged some grapes, strawberries, honeydew melon and dragonfruit balls. A few friendly faces make it a happy little bento. Don't you think? ^_^
Shared at What's For Lunch.

Monster Fingers Bento

Monster Fingers Bento, a photo by sherimiya ♥ on Flickr.

The last Halloween bento of the season! Monster finger calzones with almond fingernails. One of them even has a bloody wound, which was unintentional but actually looks pretty real, right? There's also carrots, broccoli, strawberries, raspberries and "diced" dragonfruit. Get it? Happy Halloween from the conflicting forces in our house! Hope you had a safe and scary night with lots of goodies in your candy haul!

Happy Chinese New Year Bento!

Happy Chinese New Year Bento!, originally uploaded by sherimiya ♥.

Tomorrow is the Lunar New Year, when we celebrate the Year of the Rabbit. And since the dragon is a part of the celebration, I've included a dragon cut from dragonfruit in TinySprite's snack bento today. It's playing with a blackberry ball atop a bed of sweet and juicy Cara cara oranges. We didn't have a lunch bento today since we went out for lunch and a window-shopping stroll on this beautiful sunny day. It was a wonderful way to send out the last day of the year. Along with the red and gold decorations I added some garden roses. Four of my roses bushes happened to have a perfectly fragrant bloom open today, so I cut them for display in the picture, and now they are in a glass vase on our table. Strangely enough, even my (normally Fall-blooming) dahlia also had a blossom on it. I think this unseasonably warm stretch of weather we've been having is confusing the plants. I hope Spring weather and temperatures will arrive in the rest of the snow-bound country very soon. In the meantime, Happy Chinese New Year!

Mummy Turkey Dog and Candy Corn Egg Bento

Mummified Turkey Dog Bento, originally uploaded by sherimiya ♥.

It's the last Halloween bento of the season. Yay! I'll put TinySprite's first since i think it's cute. I've seen people make mummified hot dogs using refrigerated puff pastry but I don't have any of that, and really should just get some since you can make all kinds of cool shapes with it. So I went with my standard whole wheat tortilla, which is just as well since TS can put it away just as is. I cut the round tortilla in a spiral, which made it easier to wrap around the cylindrical turkey dog. I melted some cheese, but used two heart picks to fasten it just behind his "head" and "feet". Two sesame seeds are his eyes. The rest of the bento includes broccoli, purple cauliflower, carrots, grapes and cubed dragonfruit. Are you familiar with this fruit? I don't usually buy it; it's very expensive here. But it does look cool.

The other cute thing I want to tell you about is the quail egg candy corn. Isn't it cute? I love quail eggs, as you may notice if you scroll through my past bento. They are so versatile and fun to use. You can even shape themy by hand. To make the pyramid (triangle) shape, just pinch the top between your thumb and forefinger while pressing the bottom flat with your other thumb. You'd do this while the egg is still warm, and it only takes a few minutes. Then, to dye it, just sit the egg down in a bowl of golden beet juice with the liquid level reaching up 2/3. After it's nice and yellow, take it out and place it in a bowl of regular beet juice, up to 1/3. The red will combine with the yellow to create orange. Voila, you have a candy corn. OKAY, I know the purists among you will say "Candy corn colors are white, then orange, then yellow on the bottom", and you are right, but it's more difficult to get the stripes in that order so you'll have to accept this substitution from me.

MisterMan got smoked salmon / cream cheese / baby arugula rollups, the same veggies, fruit and candy corn, but his dragonfruit is a dalmation, playing with a ball. Awwwww.
So that's it for this year, people! Thanks for indulging me!

Oh, and by the way -- if you haven't voted for your favorite Food Ninjas in the contest at La Fuji Mama's site, you should take a look at the very cool entries. My Ninja in the Fruit Bento is one of the contestants in the Photo category. Hapabento and Sonoma Bento are also entered. Happy Halloween!