Didn't go fast did I?

Ok, ok, I'm back to blogging. It's been a long time, and I blame it on not being able to figure out "Gimp" my picture fudging software.

Truth be told, I was a little burned out on talking about food. I work for Weight Watchers, I cook for a hobby, I do bentos for the fun of it... food food food! So I got lazy, and a little heavy, and here I am! Back to my bentos. I missed them!

This doesn't mean I didn't do ANY bentos. I did, but generally they weren't very good looking, or I didn't have the camera around, or it was in the living room and I didn't want to walk that far (AH!) you know...

Here's the bento from April 24th. They were my last "custy" bentos made with the leftovers from the Chicken Wrap with Mango, Basil, and Mint that I had made the previous night.

So I had the chicken/mango mixture, with I think brown rice, steamed peas, cut pepper and raisins. Simple, and I remember it being very good as a cold leftover. :o)

My husband had the same thing exactly.

The rest of April and all of May were very sad "bento-wise" so I won't bore you with any of it. Fast forward to this week:

Monday June 8th:

I have discovered that our favorite Indian place, Great India on Geary st at 25th Avenue, not only makes great food and delivers for free, but they also will sell you a full Tandoori chicken for less than 15$! The half is 10$, so for 5 more you get double! AH!

Tandoori chicken is perfect bento fare, so that's what I did. Tandoori chicken with cucumber and tomato salad (also leftovers from Great India). I cut some extra cucumber because I didn't have enough food.

The little bottle has extra dressing from the salad which I didn't need.

I would have done better with some grains to be honest, but there wasn't enough rice left, and I didn't really have time to make anything. I was working in Santa Rosa that day. At 7:45am!

In case you didn't notice, my box is brand new! From Daiso, it's the same as my "basic boxes" but square! I can't wait to play with foods in there. Monday's lunch was more about throwing the food in there, than about making it cute.

Since I was out all day, I also made a snack box:

Blueberries on the left, cantaloupe on the right, and the two little containers have honey. I ended up using only one. It was plenty!

I don't use my snack box very often, but I love it. Isn't it cute? It's very small so it fits pretty much anywhere.

Dan had more to lunch with than I did, and it gave me the occasion to use my other new box. I've been drooling over that set since I first looked at the Lunch In a Box Blog. I couldn't find it anywhere. This weekend we went to Ichiban Kan and there it was! But it was 22$.

I promised myself a while ago that I would not put more than 10$ on a box, and even that would have to be a really special one. I was totally torn, but my enabler husband told me to get it since he could see that I really liked it. So I did!

Here's his Indian Bento:


In the insulated container (middle) he has Chicken Makhni with a "rice lid". I've seen other Bento-makers do that and wanted to give it a try. As you can see, seepage occurred, but I think it still kept the curry from drying up.

In the little containers there is the rest of the Jasmin rice (left) and tandoori chicken (right).

See how it all packs up perfectly? It ends up packing quite a bit of food, but it looks tiny. I love it!

And all closed up and everything, it's very cute, but not "girly" so my husband can use it. Not that it bothers him, happy to say that he's confident enough in his "manhood" to take my custy attack with patience if not enthusiasm.

Today's boxes:

We didn't have any leftovers, though I did soak some bulgur last night to use today.

Left: I have bulgur (simple with salt and pepper) with tomato-cucumber-lettuce salad, and clover sprouts.

If you made a face reading sprouts here's something to think about: Alfalfa sprouts taste like you're chewing on the lawn. That's the one that turns off most people to sprouts. Clover sprouts are a lot tastier and sweeter. Taste different kind before you write them off!

Right: Steamed lentils (TJ), a boiled egg (showing only the good side of it, I can't cook eggs... how lame) and a mix of strawberries and blueberries.

My husband has the same foods, just a little more of it:


He has bulgur and salad (minus the lettuce and the sprouts, he's not crazy about either) on the left side. On the right he has lentils, an egg, strawberries and blueberries. I added a Mini Babybel cheese as always.

So that's that. I'm excited to be bento-ing again. It doesn't take much really, it's to get started that is the hardest.

Happy Bento Everybody!!!!