A couple of bento from last week. The first had pork in black bean sauce, rice and sambal green beans. (Sambal is a type of Southeast Asian chilli paste.)



The other had couscous in the top tier, and grilled chicken, grapes and roasted red peppers in the bottom tier.

Here are two from last week that actually managed to get photographed. Ah... the difference between crappy kitchen lighting and lovely natural daylight...

A typical stir fry bento: pork stir fry, rice, vegetable and mushroom stir fry


Breaded chicken nuggets, edamame and peppers salad, container of soy sauce, red pepper strips and inarizushi.

Today's lunch had two stir fry dishes: Vegetable and mushroom stir fry, rice, and pork with ginger and spring onion.

Another lunch for the hubby today. (I am meeting colleagues for Shanghainese food. Yum.) He is having steamed broccoli, cherry tomatoes, pork with ginger and spring onion on top of rice.

I had a lunch appointment yesterday so this bento was for hubby's lunch:

Beef soboro on rice, cucumber divider, stir fried spinach and heirloom cherry tomatoes (they are so pretty! I seldom buy them unless they are on offer - so expensive...).

A lunch from last week: couscous with coriander (cilantro), roast chicken breast and edamame. I ran out of cherry tomatoes, which I normally add for a pop of colour. Oh well.

This was lunch from a couple of days ago. I had a hankering for spam musubi and decided to make some for dinner with leftovers for lunch. Thanks to the lovely vampyra1 for sending me a musubi mould! Instructions for making musubi is posted on Soy and Pepper.

Lunch consisted of spam musubi, inarizushi, grapes and cherry tomatoes.

Wow it's been a long time since I last updated. Sorry for having disappeared for a while. I still read the updates in here but have not been posting or commenting much. As I have recently mentioned on my food blog, I pretty much went 'off' food for the past few months while dealing with morning (read: all-day-and-night) sickness and the exhaustion typical of early pregnancy. I did very little cooking and not many bento lunches were packed. Even when I did pack lunches, they were not very inspired and I did not bother taking any photos. I am feeling much better now halfway through my pregnancy (I am due at the end of April 2010) and it's been really good to get back to cooking and bento again. Here are a couple of them that made it to photos:

Chicken rice, cucumber slices, steamed chicken breast, char siew (Chinese bbq pork) and kai lan in oyster sauce.


Tuna pasta salad with sundried tomatoes, sliced red peppers and hummus


I am looking forward to getting back to more regular bento-making in the new year. I know that most people are probaly busy with holiday festivities now. Merry Christmas to you all and have a great new year ahead. Cheers to more bento ideas and may your Christmas stockings be filled with lots of bento kit and goodies!

I've been missing in action for a while. Bento are still being made, just not photographed. I have gotten lazy, I'm afraid! But here are three from last week. I am sick at home this week so it's much more mundane sandwiches and soup and bread for the hubby's lunches.

Potato salad, sausage, edamame, cherry tomatoes


Chicken teriyaki, rice, cherry tomatoes, baby bak choy


Spinach with garlic and ikan bilis (anchovies), rice, black sesame seeds garnish, ginger and spring onion pork

This is quite a common bento that I tend to pack whenever we have chicken for dinner. The top tier holds couscous topped with a parsley leaf. The bottom tier holds roast chicken breast, grilled courgettes/zucchini and red peppers.

We had oden for dinner last night and leftovers went into lunches today. In the box is stir fried noodles, mixed fish cakes and fish balls from oden, and baby bak choy.

Two rice bento from this week's lunches:

Mushroom rice, stir fried asparagus and cherry tomatoes




Rice, teriyaki chicken, cherry tomatoes and kailan in oyster sauce



Linked to recipes posted on my website, Soy and Pepper.

A lunch from last week: chicken fajita, cherry tomatoes, small container of sour cream and two rolled up wholewheat tortilla. This was packed in a Laptop Lunches box. The green inner container has a lid that goes on after the photo so there was no leakage.

This was today's lunch. I have forgotten how much I liked making soboro for bento. Easy and delicious. I was about to put the soboro on top of the rice, as one would for a soboro donburi (rice bowl) but then figured that it looked nice on the side so that everything was clearly presented.

Pork and mushroom soboro, rice with black sesame seeds garnish, vegetable stirfry (asparagus, Chinese leaf and carrot)

Bento making continues but few photos have been taken. Sometimes they don't look all that inspiring (or inspired), or different from recent ones, or I just got plain lazy. In any case, here is one bento from last week and one for lunch today.

Roast chicken legs leftover from dinner. I deboned it before packing, for easier eating the next next. With cherry tomatoes, grilled asparagus and sundried tomato couscous.



Grilled courgettes (zucchini) - I love getting both the yellow and green ones for colour, cherry tomatoes, cherries and chicken vermicelli salad (more leftovers)

We are experiencing a heat wave here in the Pacific Northwest. Max of 31-36(!) and min temperatures of still 20 degrees C at night. Coupled with high humidity and little or no wind = Bleah. This is set to last for this entire week. Eeks. Of course, there are folks who enjoy the high summer and make the most of it with picnics and outdoor dining, swimming and plenty of iced water and ice cream.

I much prefer last week when it was warm and sunny but at a decent temperature (around 22-25 in the day). I packed two picnics last week, one for lunch and one for dinner; both were eaten at parks. The first was much more simple than the other, since that was made a day after a long plane ride and I was all jetlagged. The second one took more time and effort and looked better. Both were delicious though and we certainly enjoyed the fresh air and fresh food.

The first picnic: blueberries, cheeses (applewood smoked and swiss), cherries, honey ham and Turkish bread. Local blueberries and cherries in season are THE BEST.


The second picnic:


( Details under cut )

I could never fill up all 3 tiers of this jyubako box for two person. I used the third tier to hold chopsticks, soy sauce and some napkins.

I suppose my point of this post is to encourage people to pack a healthy and delicious picnic, using a variety of colours and food groups, and enjoy the summer. Even if you don't have the time to do cute cut-outs and pretty arrangements, it can still be a healthy, delicious and enjoyable. Using regular containers or your bento boxes also help reduce waste, compared to grabbing sandwiches and salads packed in disposable plastic containers or wrapping at most supermarkets. Just remember to keep perishables (e.g. cheese, ham, salads) cold in a cooler or insulated bag, and with cool packs. So go on, pack a picnic, whether simple or more elaborate, and enjoy the summer :)

Here are two lunches from last week that I have not managed to post until now:

Vegetable stir fry, cherry tomatoes, chicken rice (rice cooked in chicken broth with garlic, ginger, and screwpine/pandan leaves), chicken topped with spring onions and coriander


Inarizushi, cherry tomatoes, edamame, onigiri and cherries as space fillers.

This was a lunch from last week, using leftovers from a roast beef dinner: coriander couscous, roast beef, asparagus, strawberries and grapes.



( Recipe for another dish under cut )

I was going to cook more chicken to go with this meal, but having made extra chicken cakes a few days ago, I decided to use them instead (they were made with frozen chicken mince so I don't want to freeze the cakes again). Today's lunch is chicken rice (rice cooked in chicken broth, minced garlic, ginger and screwpine leaves), chicken cakes, cherry tomato, pork and chive pan-fried dumplings and bak choy in oyster sauce



The chicken rice and bak choy were leftover from dinner. I just added the chicken cakes (leftovers from another meal) and dumplings from my frozen stash.

A friend gave me a much-treasured jar of sambal belacan (Indonesian condiment made with chilli and shrimp paste) and I used it in a spicy stir fry of okra (lady's finger) and peppers. Leftovers became today's lunch: rice, chicken cakes and okra and peppers in sambal belacan. Hot stuff!



I hope the husband remembered to remove the grass dividers prior to reheating in the microwave! I have been working from home most days for this month and I have found that a bento works really well even at home. It saves me time from thinking about what to eat for lunch and putting things together. Being able to just have my lunch and then get back to work (just like in the office) also improves my work flow. Highly recommended.

A little late, but here is yesterday's lunch: Beef stirfry with sugar snaps, mushrooms, peas and sweetcorn (basically an all-in-one), short grain rice and a (big!) cherry tomato.



Packed the night before and reheated in the microwave. I ate the tomato before heating up the contents, just in case it explodes, heh.

I often pack dinner leftovers for bento but sometimes store bought food provides a nice change and still saves us money from eating at cafes. This one had a sausage bun in the lower tier and the upper tier had mixed salad leaves, cherry tomatoes and a container of garlic parmesan salad dressing.

Today's lunch is kai lan in oyster sauce, cherry tomatoes and claypot chicken rice. Claypot rice is a traditional one-pot dish popular in Malaysia anad Singapore. The rice and other ingredients (such as chicken, Chinese sausage and mushrooms) are baked in the claypot on top of a charcoal stove. No claypot or charcoal stove involved in this one. Just a wok and rice cooker.

Thanks for the kind comments on my previous post regarding my thumb. The stitches are out now and the wound seems to be healing well. Here is my first bento after the incident (I made a couple of sandwiches but nothing fancy): parsley couscous, grilled asparagus and chicken with sundried tomato and mustard sauce. Just about everything was leftover from dinner. I just cooked about double the amount and packed the rest into bento boxes. They were in the fridge overnight and then ready to eat the next day without reheating. I placed them in insulated bags during the day and that worked well.



Recipe for the chicken is posted at Soy and Pepper.

This was yesterday's lunch: Chicken and mushroom chow mein with a side of steamed broccoli florets. As usual, they were dinner leftovers and I just packed the noodles and added the broccoli when the husband was washing up after dinner. Recipe for the chow mein can be found here.



This second bit is not bento-related but might be useful information for anyone who cooks. There has been a distinct lack of bento and just general cooking since I cut myself quite badly with a knife a few days ago. I now have 5 stitches in my left thumb. Hopefully this will not happen to you but cooking does have the risk of cuts and burns. Making bento while bleary eyed in the morning is not the best, but no matter how careful you are, accidents can still happen. It is important to have a good first aid kit at home and know what to do. I have written up an article over at Soy and Pepper in case other people will find the information useful. I am ok now. The wound is healing nicely although it looks very ugly with the black stitches. My tummy still do a little flip though whenever I replay in my mind that moment when the knife went into my thumb...