Hello Kitty Egg Bento

Just a little one for the TinySprite. Shoyu chicken furikake, hapa rice, hard boiled egg, tomatoes, carrot, corn, honeydew melon and grapes. Happy Wednesday!

Shoyu Chicken Magic Round Bento

Shoyu Chicken Magic Round Bento, a photo by sherimiya ♥ on Flickr.

You know how you had a favorite dinner when you were a kid? Mine was shoyu chicken. If my mom ever asked what I wanted for dinner, that's what I requested. To this day I still think of shoyu chicken and rice as my ultimate comfort food. My kids like it too, but I omit the rice since they're not big fans of plain rice. They are happy to have steamed broccoli with this meal, to dunk in the shoyu sauce. To the Magic Round Bento I've also added corn off the cob, carrot, strawberry and cubed (unsweet) honeydew melon. This box is so called because all food looks good in a round arrangement. Try it yourself and see!

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.

Skull Quail Egg Bento

Skull Quail Egg Bento, a photo by sherimiya ♥ on Flickr.

Continuing on with the skull theme, today I made a quail egg skull on black rice to accompany some shallow-fried panko chicken, broccoli and roasted kabocha. There are also carrot flowers, corn, strawberries, grapes and honeydew melon. All packed up in my supercool slim double decker Zen box from Bento & Co. I love this box so much it was hard to entrust my boy to take it to school with him, but it's proven quite sturdy and impervious to normal 8-year-old boy wear and tear. So far. You all ready for Halloween? One more day...

Skull Sandwich Bento

Skull Sandwich Bento, a photo by sherimiya ♥ on Flickr.

We're taking a break from jacks today because I just found this skull and crossbones cutter that a dear friend sent me last Halloween. I should have marked out the skull and bones shapes to more clearly delineate the image, because when MisterMan saw it he said "Oh, a gingerbread man!" Whatever! Come to think of it, I guess skulls and crossbones are more pirate-y than Halloween-y. Oops. I lightly pressed the cutter partially through the sweet potato bread top slice of his sandwich, which fit perfectly in one side of my Sistema box. The other side is just right for a selection of colorful fruit and vegetables: carrot, corn, broccoli, Okinawan sweet potato, strawberries, honeydew melon and grapes. I used a few grapes to cut out the face for the skull, which I sealed in place with plastic wrap. Scary or not?

Candy Corn Quail Egg Bento

Candy Corn Quail Egg Bento, originally uploaded by sherimiya♥.

I strayed from the jack-a-day series today because I wanted to make a little candy corn quail egg, and it took so long that I didn't feel like trying to find another food to carve into a jack-o-lantern. First of all, I didn't shape it triangularly enough, and then I didn't have time to soak it long enough to keep the colors dark. But then, if you've dyed eggs before, you know that the color tends to fade pretty quickly anyway. To dye this egg I used golden beet and regular beet juice. I first let the egg sit halfway in a cup of golden beet juice, then placed it 1/3 of the way into a cup of red beet juice. I had nice sharp lines of color demarcation at first, but then they bled out and faded. I had made these cuties before (in the two bentos here) and I think they looked better then. Oh well! This bento contains butterfish misoyaki (see my method here), homemade oven roasted "potato chips", steamed Okinawan sweet potato, corn, tomatoes, carrots, and a fruit assortment (pluots, honeydew melon balls and grapes) -- all packed up in my favorite Lunchbots Trio. Have a sweet day!

Gyoza and Frankenstein Bento

Gyoza and Frankenstein Bento, a photo by sherimiya ♥ on Flickr.

I made gyoza. Yay! That's the response from the kiddos every time. I made, as usual, a double batch to last us for bento lunches the next day (see my method here). I packed as many as I could in here, and then filled the other section with carrots, grapes, and a honeydew melon Frankenstein. Muahahah! I cut the features from grapes and Okinawan sweet potato. I made ears with raspberries and I know that the carrots look like earrings but whatever. He's the new Frankenstein. But he's still a monster! RAWR!