Bruschetta Bento

I realized that despite having a farmers market open almost every day of the week in Sonoma County (it's true!), I wouldn't be able to attend one until Sunday. So yesterday, I swung by a farm stand in Rincon Valley. Redwood Empire Farm has their own farm stand on Tuesday and Thursday afternoons, and so I scooted out there for some zucchini, armenian cucumber, basil, and mini gravenstein apples. It was fun to see Jeff and his sister Theresa selling their products right next to where they are grown. Here's my bento made with lots of local produce.

In this bento: bruschetta with tomatoes from The Patch, basil from Redwood Empire Farm, and fontina cheese, a fresh fig, a hard boiled quail egg with nori face details, slices of armenian cucumber from Redwood Empire Farms, a mini Gravenstein Apple from Redwood Empire Farms, and two baby carrots.

Here is the face punch that I picked up at Daiso on my recent trip to Seattle. I do like it, but I still want to get the awesome face punches for sale on J-List. Sigh... we'll see.

Here's a pic of the cucumbers for sale at Redwood Empire Farm stand. There's a mix of both slicing cucumbers and armenian cucumbers (which are actually an asian melon). If you can find the aremenian ones, give them a try!

Waking Up At 8:30am Bento

I've named this bento after what happened today, which after the last month, really seems like a miracle. :-) For almost a month, I have been covering for one or another vacationing co-worker on the morning news show. That means rolling out of bed at 4am, being coherent enough to write news stories at 4:30am, and then having enough brain power to talk without stumbling over my tongue at 5:30am. And I also had to do my own regular job in addition to covering the morning show. Ouchie. So this is really a celebration of the fact that I got up at a reasonable time today, and had the energy to actually make a bento. This is a small one, but I need to take baby steps while getting back into bento.

In this bento: yakionigiri from Trader Joe's, slices of peach jam-glazed pork (peach jam is from Dry Creek Peach and Produce), a fresh fig, baby carrots, and slices of Early Girl tomato from The Patch. I'm going to Party on the Plaza in Rohnert Park tomorrow, so I will have time to do more market shopping then... gotta restock for delicious summer time bentos. I missed you, bento buddies!

Cinco de Mayo Bento

Hola! Happy Cinco de Mayo! I got a bunch of chicken drumsticks from our local hispanic grocery store yesterday (Lola's--I love this place for really great deals!), and simmered them in spices and chili powder, then baked them in a salsa with lots of green onion. They turned out great, and made this bento very flavorful.

In this bento: quesadilla with refried beans, white cheddar cheese, and chicken meat. Also radishes, green onion, navel orange segments, a baby carrot, a dried mission fig, lime flavored cabbage slaw, and walnuts from the Santa Rosa Original Certified Farmers Market. Just for fun, here is the bento I made on Cinco de Mayo last year:

This one had tortillas from La Tortilla Factory, a great company in Sonoma County. I think this one was pretty cute, and I remember that it tasted good. :) Are you doing anything fun to celebrate Cinco de Mayo? Any special meal planned for today?

And remember, you still have time to enter my 1 Year Blogiversary contest, good luck!

My, What A Big Bento You Have!

This is the very first bento box I purchased. I got it at Asia Mart in Santa Rosa (Guerneville Road) and at the time, I thought it was pretty tiny. And of course, after making bento for a while, I have realized that it's huge! Ha ha! In general, our collective sense of portion sizes is way out of whack. We overeat all of the time because we don't know what serving sizes look like. Our plates get bigger and so do our tummies.

The only practical way to use this bento box now is for picnics, or for a nice healthy salad. The lower tier has salad, and the compartment that rests on top of that one has edamame, fruit, and nuts.

I mixed chopped iceberg lettuce with my favorite salad mix from Offerings of the Land. On top of the lettuce blend are slices of French Breakfast radish from Ridgeview Farms, a mixture of chopped cilantro and basil from Triple T Ranch and Crescent Moon Farms, leftover steak, and a few cherry tomatoes from Ridgeview Farms.

The upper compartment has a fig from The Patch, walnuts from the Santa Rosa Original Certified Farmers Market, half of a nectarine from Twin Peaks, edamame, and another cherry tomato.

I also included a small container of yogurt dressing. A yummy and filling lunch. :)

Recipe for Yogurt Dressing

1/2 cup yogurt

1/4 cup sour cream

1/3 teaspoon salt

freshly ground pepper

1 teaspoon dried dill weed

1/2 teaspoon dried parsley flakes

1 small clove of garlic, grated

1 teaspoon sugar

1/2 teaspoon olive oil

a few drops of taragon vinegar

Mix all ingredients together. Makes a bit less than 1 cup of dressing.

Bento Fights Hunger

I am really excited about my 60th Bento post, because with it I am introducing my new pledge to fight hunger in Sonoma County. Susan Yuen of Hawai`i's Bento Box Cookbook donates a dollar to her local food bank every time she makes a bento blog post. She makes that donation each time she hits a twentieth post to make it easy to keep track of her donations. I LOVE this idea, and I am starting it with this post. Since it is my 60th bento blog post, I made a donation of $60 today to the Redwood Empire Food Bank. Redwood Empire Food Bank is the largest hunger-relief agency in Sonoma County, providing food to 75,000 people every month.

We are so lucky to have the luxury of farmers markets and cute food for our bento box lunches. Every kid, every mom, every dad should be able to enjoy nutritious lunches. I encourage you to support the Redwood Empire Food Bank, and to also find the food banks in your own communities who are working so hard to feed those in need. You can click here to donate, and I have also added their link to the right side of my blog.

Today's bento features a green zebra tomato from The Patch, cherry tomatoes from Ridgeview Farms, french radishes from Ridgeview Farms, leftover steak, homemade spaetzle, figs from The Patch, two chunks of Point Reyes Toma cheese, cucumber and basil from Crescent Moon Farms, and slices of charentais melon from Ridgeview Farms.

Charentais melons taste so amazing, they have more subtle flavors than cantaloupe. These are melons from Reenie at Ridgeview Farms. The charentais are the smaller ones with the green ridge along the outside.

I am also really excited today because I just got the pictures from a photo shoot I did with my buddy Candice Caballero. Candice is soooo talented. You really have to check out her work. She was asking for people to model for an upcoming photo exhibit so I volunteered. We headed to a local golf course with my scooter and did what I jokingly refer to as a "Scoot Shoot" - ha ha! Here's a few of the fun shots she got.

Probably no bento posts this weekend, since I get to head to the Taste of Sonoma on Saturday. It's going to be so much fun! Have a great weekend bento buddies!

Chicken and Rice Bento

I wanted a more substantial bento today, and I had some leftover chicken from that yummy bird I got from Triple T Ranch. Save your leftovers! They make great bento ingredients! :)

In the upper compartment: leftover chicken cooked with zucchini and spices and garnished with cilantro and basil, tomatoes from Ridgeview Farms and The Patch, a fig from The Patch, grapes from Neufeld Farms, and a lychee (from Safeway!).

In the lower compartment: Crescent Moon Farms cucumbers (marinated in seasoned rice vinegar, sugar, and salt), rice, chopped beni shoga (red pickled ginger), black sesame seeds, and a small sprig of fresh dill.

Today's bento was put together pretty quickly because I set the rice on to cook while I was taking a shower. The chicken was already cooked, so it was just a matter of heating it up with some other ingredients and then putting it in the bento. I think I took about 15 minutes to make this bento, not counting the rice cooking time.

These are gorgeous Green Zebra tomatoes from The Patch in Sonoma. They are at the Santa Rosa Original Certified Farmers Market every Wednesday and Saturday. Great tomatoes!

Recipe for Spicy Chicken with Zucchini

1/4 cup cooked chicken, chopped small

1/8 cup small dice zucchini

1/2 tablespoon minced red onion

1/2 teaspoon minced fresh garlic

1/2 tablespoon olive oil

1 teaspoon soy sauce

1 pinch ground ginger

a few drops toasted sesame oil

1/2 teaspoon seasoned rice vinegar

1/2 teaspoon sugar or 1/2 teaspoon honey

1/2 teaspoon sriracha hot sauce

1 tablespoon fresh orange juice

Cook chicken, zucchini, onion, and garlic in olive oil in a small skillet over medium heat. When sizzling and warmed through, add other ingredients. Stir and heat through. Serve with rice and garnish with cilantro and basil. Makes one serving.

I featured this bento on Shannon's What's For Lunch Wednesdays blog. Check it out for other great bento ideas. :)

Salad Bento

One of my favorite vendors at the Santa Rosa Original Certified Farmers Market is Les from Offerings of the Land. He's got the most amazing greens! His braising greens mix is lovely, and often he has great bunches of kale or mustard greens. But my absolute fave is his salad mix. It's hearty and has so much flavor. And the colors are amazing, with little orange petals and blue flowers here and there. His mix is really popular, so you have to get to the market early to get some.

In this bento: salad greens from Offerings of the Land, homemade croutons and a cherry tomato from Ridgeview Farms. In the second compartment: quesadillas made with La Tortilla Factory Hand Made Style White Corn Tortillas, swiss cheese and leftover roasted chicken, cucumber from Crescent Moon Farms, a fresh lychee, fig slices from The Patch in Sonoma, more cherry tomatoes from Ridgeview Farms, steamed edamame and a bit of beni shoga (pickled red ginger). I also made a bit of yogurt dressing to toss with the salad greens.

The leftover roasted chicken was from a chicken I bought at the Santa Rosa Original Certified Farmers Market! Triple T Ranch has eggs almost weekly, and every once in a while they will have fresh chickens. I decided to go for it, and I was really happy I did!

I roasted the chicken on a bed of sliced up Gravenstein Apples and filled the cavity with more apple slices and a few cloves of garlic. I rubbed it with a mixture of butter, parsley, mustard powder, grated garlic, salt, and pepper. It turned out really yummy, and I have to say it tasted more chickeny. If I see these guys for sale at the market again I will definitely buy one.

Bento M-O-U-S-E

A friend of mine is recovering from surgery and has asked me to make him a get well bento. He is a SUPER fan of Disney, so I went to the Disney Store and found BENTO BOXES! I was hoping against hope that they might have some, and they did. And even better, they were on sale 3 for 10 dollars! I picked up a Mickey and pals one for Tim, a Princesses one for my step daughter, and two for me: a Toy Story one and an Ariel one. Oh goody goody goody!

For Tim, I put together this bento filled with meatballs, homemade spaetzle, a cherry tomato from The French Garden in Sebastopol, a fig from The Patch in Sonoma, greens from Offerings of the Land in Glen Ellen, two fried potatoes shaped like Mickey, steamed broccoli, and carrot flowers.

Here's the top of the bento box. It is pretty cool and comes with two removeable dividers inside. The only thing I don't like about it is that the latches on the sides have to be perfectly lined up in order to stay shut. But for 3 bucks, it can't be beat.

My bento is very similar, although I picked up this bento box in San Francisco Japantown. It is a three tiered box and I only used the lower tier for this bento. It cost a bit more than 3 bucks I am sad to say. In my bento: steamed corn on the cob from Duffy at the Santa Rosa Original Certified Farmers Market, cherry tomatoes from The French Garden and Ridgeview Farms, a fig from The Patch, fried Mickey potatoes, meatballs, steamed broccoli, carrot flowers, and greens from Offerings of the Land.

I like this Mickey Mouse box a lot and I also found the Mickey vegetable cutters and stamps at the same shop. I need to figure out how to make the stamp come out better because you can barely see the face details.

I hope that Tim likes his Mickey Mouse bento and gets well soon. This is the first bento that I have made for someone outside of my immediate family.