Tamagoyaki Bento

Tamagoyaki is a japanese style omelette that is often found in bento boxes. I love having this convenient bit of tasty protein in my lunches. Sometimes I add herbs or wilted greens to it, but often I keep it simple like this one. I do season it with salt and mirin, and sometimes a bit of soy sauce and a pinch of sugar. I use a special pan for making tamagoyaki, but really you can make it in any pan you'd like. It is simply a rolled omelette.

Also in this bento: yakionigiri rice ball from Trader Joe's, steamed edamame, slices of armenian cucumber from Redwood Empire Farms, a mini apple rabbit made with a Pink Pearl apple from Triple T, grapes, orange cherry tomatoes from the Oakmont Farmers Market, and a few baby carrots.

Voting has begun for Hapa Bento's Back to School contest. You can visit her facebook fan page to vote and also get more great ideas for packing your own bento. Have a great Monday!

Hapa Bento Back to School Bento

Debra of Hapa Bento is having a Back to School contest with an adorable Elph bento box up for grabs. And the cool thing is that you can enter with any bento you'd like! It doesn't have to be a cute bento, or themed for school. Any yummy bento can be entered into the contest. Click here to go to her page and find out the details.

Here is my entry: a drumstick that I baked and then coated in a spicy (perhaps a wee bit too spicy) sauce, orange cherry tomatoes from the Oakmont Tuesday Night Farmers Market, fresh mozzarella balls, a sprig of basil from the garden where I am house sitting, slices of armenian cucumber from Redwood Empire Farms, and red grapes. The bento box I am using is from the house where I am bunny sitting/house sitting this week. It's not really even a bento box, just a glass container with a locking lid! Think outside the bento box. :)

Sorry I have been MIA, bunny sitting does not make for easy bentoing. I also included this bento in Shannon's What's For Lunch Wednesday. Check it out for great lunch ideas.

And.... I have a new blog! It's called Sonoma Nail Art. I figured that since I have got a bit of practice under my belt and better nail art tools, I would start a blog just for my nail art. Take a look, and let me know if you have any suggestions for designs. Have a great week bento pals!

Char Sui Bao Bento

This is my 120th bento post, and that means it is time to donate to my favorite local charity: Redwood Empire Food Bank! For every 20 posts, I donate 20 bucks to the Redwood Empire Food Bank. That's a dollar per post. I like to think that my lunches are helping other people in my community enjoy a healthy meal as well. I was inspired to donate a dollar per post after seeing the wonderful example set by Susan Yuen of Hawai'i's Bento Box. She donates to her local food bank. Debra of Hapa Bento also makes donations for each bento post. We are a supportive community of bloggers, and it is great to see us making an effort to help others. I encourage you to find a charity you like and make a donation per post, or you can make a donation to the Redwood Empire Food Bank. For every dollar Redwood Empire Food Bank gets, they distribute $4 worth of food! They are very efficient.

Today's bento includes a char sui bao from Trader Joes topped with three nori hearts, a few baby carrots, steamed edamame, and fried rice with onion and carrots. I can't wait to go to the farmers market this weekend. I totally need to get more bento ingredients.

This morning I ran into dragonmamma at the grocery store! It was so fun to meet someone from the bento world in person. I know dragonmamma doesn't do bento so much, but she does have a fun blog and is in the midst of a fun 365 challenge: breaking a routine everyday. She's breaking habits left and right, and building new synapses along the way. It's really fun and inspiring, be sure to check it out.

Have a great day, bento pals!

Expelliarmus Bentokus!

I went to see Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1 yesterday. It was pretty exciting, and I wore a temporary scar tattoo on my forehead, along with my plastic Harry Potter glasses. Yes, yes I am a huge nerd. But it's so much FUN! The movie was good, although that Harry and Hermione kiss came out of left field and made me feel bad for the 9-year-old kid who decided to celebrate his birthday at the theater. His poor little friends will be scarred for life. To commemorate the beginning of the end, I had to make a Harry Potter bento. ~8-)

This is the younger (kinder, gentler) version of Harry when he was just a little wizard at Hogwarts. Harry is made of onigiri (rice balls) with nori covering the lower onigiri, and nori for the hair, glasses, and eyes. His scar is drawn on with food coloring pens, and his mouth is part of a pink egg sheet. (It was my first try at egg sheet and it worked ok, gotta try again soon.) Harry's Gryffindor scarf is cheddar cheese and bits of red bell pepper. His wand is a pretzel stick with magical white pomegranate seeds (from De'Santis Farms) shooting out the end. There's steamed broccoli, a chunk of roasted delicata squash (from Ridgeview Farms), baby carrots, and a few Aidell's chicken teriyaki meatballs as well.

This bento also works for hapabento's November B.O.M.B. - this month the theme is Squash! I am sure I will have another bento that will fit the theme before November 30th. Check out the B.O.M.B. entries here, and be sure to submit your own.

BIG NEWS: I made a bento calendar for 2011! It's filled with lots of fun pictures of bento, and each month has a special tip to help make bento-ing easier. Check it out here! And if you buy the calendar before November 30th, it's 40% off! Use this code at checkout to get 40% off: 40CLNDRS2011

In Flight Bentos

My lovely family came to visit this past weekend and we had a blast wine tasting, eating out, and shopping. It went by way too fast. But I saw an opportunity to make some in flight bentos for my mom, sis, and brother and had to do it! Debra of Hapa Bento makes them for her house guests all of the time, and I am so jealous of her guests! :) So I made these little snack bentos for my family to enjoy on their short flight from Santa Rosa to Seattle.

There's a heart shaped onigiri rice ball topped with a little spiral I punched out of nori seaweed in each box, plus carrot slices from Quivira Vineyards and Winery, red bell pepper slices, frozen Aidell's teriyaki chicken meatballs, and slices of persimmon tossed with lime juice to keep them from turning brown. The persimmon is from De'Santis Farms. I also used romaine lettuce and parsley (from Quivira) for decoration and to separate the different portions of the snack bentos.

As you can see, my family loved their snack bentos! And the meatballs had thawed by the time I presented the bentos, since I made them in the morning and then stowed them in the fridge until they had to leave for their flight. It was really fun to do, and wasn't hard to make three little bento snacks since I put them together in an assembly line kind of way. If you want to make in flight bentos for visitors as a parting gift, I suggest collecting a few disposable containers to use, so you don't have to part with a beloved bento box. I found these plastic containers at Daiso, but berry containers are great for this use, too.

Food Ninja Vote

I am so excited that the voting for the Food Ninja contest has begun. Three fantastic food bloggers put out a call to all Food Ninjas (basically anyone who does anything rad in the kitchen or with food), and the voting has begun! I entered a Food Ninja video, showcasing my bento making skills. Here is the video, I hope you like it!

I had so much fun making this video and the resulting bento. My 10-year old stepdaughter did the photography/filming at the farmers market, and I made my hubby do the "unsolicited" testimonial at the end. The Japanese subtitles say silly things like "Don't Try This At Home" and "My Wife Is Crazy!" I filmed each of the video segments while speaking German, just to make sure my overdub wouldn't match my mouth. It took about 3 days to put this together. And serious thanks to Sheri of Happy Little Bento for her inspirational Ninja Egg. Sheri rocks!

You can head to lafujimama.com right now and vote for the best Food Ninjas in each category. I would really appreciate a vote for Sonoma Bento in the video category. And you can vote for other bentoists as well! Debra of hapabento entered in the blog category, and Sheri of Happy Little Bento entered her awesome Ninja Egg bento in the picture category. Voting ends on Saturday, October 30th so please head over now to vote.

And just for fun, here is a Froggie Bento I made for my stepdaughter this past summer. I got the inspiration to make it from the Yum Yum Bento Box book by the wonderfully talented Pikko and Luckysundae. It's similar to another Froggy bento I made at the same time, but just slightly different. Have a great weekend, GO GIANTS!

Jack O'Sandwich Bento

I'm crazy about Halloween, my very favorite holiday of the year. If I could get away with it, I would probably make Halloween themed stuff year round. So get ready for lots of spooky bentos!

This Jack O'Sandwich bento was very easy to make. I roasted the brussel sprouts in the oven while I assembled the rest of the bento. In this bento: a ham and cheddar sandwich with a cheddar Jack O'Lantern on top. The pumpkin is decorated with nori (toasted seaweed) face, and a cucumber peel leaf. Tucked into the corner are a few baby carrots and two little cherry tomatoes from Middleton Farms. Also in the bento: two raspberries, a few slices of cucumber (you can see where I took the peel off of the cuke), more cherry tomatoes, and a few roasted brussel sprouts.

Remember to enter my 10,000 Hits Bento Giveaway! I love reading about the fun costume ideas you have. Deadline to enter is this Friday, October 8th at noon.

Recipe for Roasted Brussel Sprouts

1 pound small brussel sprouts, trimmed & any brown leaves removed

olive oil

salt and pepper

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Cut and X mark in the top of each brussel sprout. Put brussel sprouts in a baking dish and drizzle with olive oil. Sprinkle with salt and pepper and toss to coat. Roast for about 15 to 17 minutes, stirring the sprouts a few times during roasting time, until sprouts appear browned in areas and are fragrant.

Because brussel sprouts are a great fall food, I am including this in hapa bento's fun B.O.M.B. contest. Enter your fall food bentos now! :)

Potato Croquettes

Not a lot of time to post today, still covering for my coworker. Today I made croquettes out of leftover mashed potatoes.

The croquettes have a little piece of fresh mozzarella inside, so they will be a little cheesy as well.

Also in this box: cherry tomatoes and watermelon from Ridgeview Farms, baby carrots, and slices of Armenian Cucumber from Redwood Empire Farms. I also have a little container of meaty tomato sauce to go with the croquettes. I got this box at Daiso in Seattle's Westlake Mall. I love it!

I have added this bento to hapa bento's September B.O.M.B. challenge. Potatoes feature greatly in my fall food repertoire. Check it out and submit your own fall foods bento.

Happy Birthday California!

Today is California's 160th Birthday! The state of California was admitted to the union on September 9th, 1850. And of course it would be impossible to fit that many candles on a cake, let alone in a bento, so I used the state animal instead. The California Grizzly Bear was adopted as the state animal in 1953. The bear appears on our state flag and in our state seal. And now, on California's 160th birthday, the bear is making an appearance in my bento.

I actually made two bentos today, because I wanted to make a sandwich and a salad. The salad is made with salad greens from Offerings of the Land, walnuts from the Santa Rosa Original Certified Farmers Market, baby carrot 'flowers', a pepper jack cheese bear with a black sesame seed eye, and a mini caprese skewer with a Triple T Ranch cherry tomato, Triple T basil leaf, and bocconcini fresh mozzarella ball. I brought along some homemade yogurt dill dressing to go with the salad.

I made a second bento with a PB&J sandwich, baby carrots, a sliced french breakfast radish from Ridgeview Farms, and grapes that my friend Steve gave me from the Santa Rosa Original Certified Farmers Market.

The sandwich bento was arranged in this cute Toy Story sandwich container that I found in the Dollar section at Target. It came with a water bottle, and I think it was actually $2 for the set. Still, it was really fun to use a sandwich container and pack it bento style. The foods fit in snugly to keep everything in place. Debra at hapa bento has used two sandwich containers on top of each other to make a two tier bento. What a great idea!

Rush Hour Bento

This morning I was in a mad dash! My friend Carina asked if I wanted to go to the farmers market with her (of COURSE I do!) and I realized I had to get moving if we were going to make it in time. So this bento was made with the utmost haste. But really, I think it turned out beautifully.

There's steamed corn from the Santa Rosa Original Certified Farmers Market, steamed edamame, an orange tomato and a red cherry tomato, inarizushi stuffed with plain rice, two turkey patties, and a few pretzels.

Bento Stash made this bento possible! I literally was able to throw this together and take a picture in 10 minutes. Yay! I also posted this on the What's For Lunch Wednesdays blog hosted by Shannon. Check it out for great bento ideas!

Here's the recipe for the turkey patties, which I modified from a post by Debra at hapa bento:

Recipe for Turkey Patties

4 oz ground turkey meat

1 pinch salt

1 quail egg yolk (or part of a chicken egg yolk)

1 tsp soy sauce

1 tsp sugar

1 green onion, minced

1 tsp sesame seeds

a few drops of toasted sesame oil

1 pinch powdered ginger

1/2 tblsp corn starch

vegetable oil for frying

Mix together all ingredients except vegetable oil in a bowl. Form golf ball sized balls and slightly flatten them from the mixture. Heat vegetable oil over medium-high heat. Add turkey patties and cook for about 2 or 3 minutes on one side. Check to make sure patties have browned a bit, then flip patties over and cover with a lid. Finish cooking for another two minutes or so, until patties are cooked through. Makes about 5 patties.

Picnic Bento

Hapa Bento has a great themed bento challenge each month, and this month the theme is Picnic! I thought a lot about what to make, and I always associate bugs with picnics. Bleh, hate those bugs! But a cute little olive ant is a welcome addition to this Picnic bento.

I made an ant out of olives, nori (toasted seaweed), and a few pieces of dried spaghetti for his antennae. The ant is surveying the picnic spread from his perch on a biscuit filled with ham and spices. The spices are a blend called Duqqah that I picked up from The Handmade Pantry.

In the rest of the bento: blueberries, cherry tomatoes, deviled quail eggs (!), a slice of cucumber, two homemade pickled cornichon, and arugula. I love this arugula from Ridgeview Farms in Healdsburg. It is so spicy and delicious!

I purchased a four pack of small olives at the grocery store the other day, and honestly, I was really sold as soon as I saw them use this scooter image on the packaging. Beep! Beep!

I also included this bento in Shannon's What's For Lunch Wednesdays blog. Check it out to see what other bento bloggers are creating!

Recipe for Deviled Quail Eggs
6 quail eggs
2 or 3 tablespoons vinegar
3 teaspoons mayonnaise
1/2 teaspoon prepared wasabi paste
salt
paprika

Rinse quail eggs in warm water to remove any dirt or feathers from the shells. Fill a small pot with water and add vinegar. Add quail eggs and bring water to a boil. Boil for 5 minutes, then remove pan from heat and take it to the sink. Run cold water into the pan and gradually pour out the hot water. Allow eggs to cool then gently peel. The vinegar should make it easier to remove the shells.

Carefully cut eggs in half and remove yolks. Place yolks in a bowl. Add mayo, wasabi, and salt to taste. Blend well. Transfer yolk mixture to a plastic bag and snip a small piece of the corner of the bag off. Carefully pipe the yolk mixture back into the egg white halves. Top each with a little pinch of paprika. Makes 12 teeeny tiny deviled eggs.

Life's a Beach

One of the awesome Bento Bloggers out there, Hapa Bento, has a monthly contest called the B.O.M.B. (which stands for Best of the Month Bento). The theme for June's B.O.M.B. is the beach! I tried a turtle onigiri, which worked out okay, but not great. I think this one is better!

The cheese sunglasses with nori lenses are resting on a "sandy" bed of soboro (a.k.a. crumbled cooked meat.) This is turkey soboro. I also have cucumber skin palm fronds, and an orange pepper coconut (it could be a sun, I wasn't really sure), and there are waves of steamed cauliflower washing up on the beach, with a sea of blueberries behind it.

Recipe for Turkey Soboro
4 oz ground turkey meat
1/4 cup minced onion
1 tablespoon mirin (or dry white wine)
1/2 tablespoon rice vinegar
1/2 tablespoon sugar
1/2 tablespoon soy sauce
a few drops of toasted sesame oil
freshly ground pepper

Combine ingredients and cook over medium heat until cooked through and moisture has mostly evaporated. Makes enough for one bento box lunch.

Hot Chicks

Hot chicks (made of steamed sweet potato slices) about to kiss! Hotsie Totsie! This bento box lunch also sports garam masala spiced sausage slices, grapes, and garlic scapes cut into claw-type shapes. In the lower compartment are portabella mushroom raviolis with nori flowers, baby carrots, steamed broccoli, and a few slices of red bell pepper.

Hapa Bento is using flowers as this month's B.O.M.B., so this bento box lunch qualifies with its cute nori flowers, although I may go for a more obvious flower themed lunch and enter again.


I put this lunch into my favorite Hello Kitty japanese lacquer bento box. It's so elegant! By the way, the garlic scapes are from Middleton Farms in Healdsburg, and the scape season is pretty much over now, although I am seeing green garlic still available at the farmers markets.