Top Left: veggie stir-fry, carrot slices, and greens #1

Top Right: greens #2, kinpira, greens #3

Middle: salad with radishes, carrots, pot roast, and tomatoes

Bottom: cookie-brownie slices

Last week?

I found this salad bento on my camera. It's from a week or 2 ago. A hardboiled egg, a cheese quesadilla, and salad. Nice and simple, and in my new collapsible box.

Bolognese

Top: Mini Farfalle with bolognese and parmesan, pickles, and broccoli and bean salad.

Bottom: more of the baked apples, and a sliced carrot.

I'm looking forward to this bento because A) it has bolognese in it and B) it has my new salad in it. Hopefully I'll be trying some of maki's kinpira recipes from Just Bento tomorrow, since I have celery and broccoli stems.

Baked Apples

Obviously, I love me some baked apples. Of course, I probably should come up with something else to do with the apples I get in my CSA box, but I like my baked apples.

On the bottom is more of the panfried noodles with beets, greens, and carrots, some grilled flap or skirt steak that found its way out of the depths of the johbisai in my freezer (it needs some marinade or sauce or something, I discovered), and some broccoli salad.

Actually, the broccoli salad is a hybrid between broccoli salad and kidney bean salad. Traditionally (or at least in my family), broccoli salad has broccoli, raisins, red onion, bacon (or in this case prosciutto bits) and then a mayo-red wine vinegar dressing. Kidney bean salad has a similar dressing but has kidney beans, celery, cheese, and I think red onions. Not sure. It's funny, I actually had the kidney bean salad recipe out this morning, but the one I can remember is the broccoli salad. Anyway, I took my favorite parts of both and made a single salad. Broccoli, celery, kidney beans, raisins, and prosciutto bits with the dressing. Mine actually subs a large part of the red wine vinegar with champagne vinegar, but I think it was a minor mistake. The champagne vinegar is not as subtle as the red wine vinegar - I wouldn't expect to say that, but there you have it.

Bento Again

Top Left: teriyaki meatballs and greens version 2

Top Right: two inari with pickles

Middle: salad with lettuce, peas, tomatoes, broccoli, and carrots (and dressing that I added)

Bottom: celery sliced to fit in the top case of my box

So a return to bento-ing today. The goal is to finish the stuff I have in my fridge. So far I'm doing ok since this was the last of greens version 2. I don't have anymore meatballs, either, but I'm sad about that since that means I need to get more ground pork and ground beef. I've decided to refrain from diving into my stock of tuna this week, since I've had tuna two weeks in a row. This leaves a bit of prosciutto and some frozen salmon for animal protein, and beans and eggs for veggie protein. oh, and milk. I do have plenty of milk. I'm sure I'll drink it all, though. If there's one thing that I can devour, it's milk.

Tuesday and Salad

I planned a completely different bento for today, but didn't have time to prep sufficiently. I wanted a relatively low-cal meal for lunch, so I went with salad and a few things from from the freezer.


Top Left: salad toppings - tomatoes, avocado, goat cheese

Top Right: teriyaki-pineapple meatballs, havarti cheese, lobster salad

Bottom: carrots and lettuce for my salad

Not pictured: salad dressing

Dinner Bento 1/3/09

Top: Salad with carrots, tomatoes, and garlic cheese curds. The lettuce was separated from everything else during the day by virtue of a foil baking cup holding the other things.

Bottom: Pineapple, sliced flap steak marinated in cholula chile-lime seasoning with lemon juice, paté, and roasted potato slices.

Not pictured is my salad dressing and the cauliflower-cheese soup that I have been keeping around in case my bento dinners aren't enough.

Lunch Bento for 1/3/09

Top: salad with cheese; tomatoes, mushrooms, and asparagus (mushrooms and asparagus are under the tomatoes) in a separate compartment to keep the lettuce from wilting.

Bottom Left: roasted potato slices, peas sautéed with pancetta, delicata squash stuffed with ground beef/pork.

Bottom Right: pineapple, carrots, tomatoes, and paté

Not the most harmonious of lunches but it's tasty. I made some paté recently and decided to portion it out for use in my bentos. Alas, I didn't think to pack crackers today in my rush to get out the door.

Bento 1

A small dinner bento.

From Mead and Other Musings

Top: a salad with carrots
Bottom: grilled flap steak marinated in cholula chile-lime seasoning and lemon, steamed asparagus, and pineapple

Not pictured: Cauliflower and cheese soup, dressing for salad.