Venturing :: Bento Box Lunches March 16, 2010

I’ve always admired the idea of bento box lunches. So Simple. So Structured. So diverse – the possibilities are endless!!

My daughter’s brown bag rotation consists of Sandwiches, Pizza Rolls, Chicken nuggets – repeat. I need to feed her healthier & eye pleasing lunches while she’s away @ school. I needed to give bentoing a try.

After googling a few pictures & ideas, I was off to our local Ichiban stores!! I scored on a lot of rice molds, boiled egg molds & mini silicone cups. I’m still waiting for a few books on bento box lunches but I already started to make my daughter her first cute bento lunch

Isn’t that rice star the cutest thing ever??

Stack 1 : Molded Rice (Star) & Beef from Sinigang w/ Spinach (Flower Silicone cup)

Stack 2 : Grapes

Stack 3 (Cover): Plastic fork

Simple & I made it ahead of time and stuck it in the fridge. I plan on making her lunches ahead of time (latest would be the night before) to avoid the morning hustle. It took less than 5 minutes to prepare the cute bento box.

If my mom packed me this for lunch, I’ll be eating all of it!!

mPm [menu plan monday] January 25, 2010

I’ve been meaning to hop on the mPm bandwagon @ orgjunkie.com, but I never got to it.

I think it’s such a great idea! It would help me plan ahead of time and finally confront the my most hated question…. “What’s for dinner?!?”

• Monday : Sweet & Sour Pork Mandarin Orange Pork
• Tuesday : Beef BBQ Cheese Melts
• Wednesday : Oven Fried Pork Cutlets over Rice
• Thursday : Pork Chops w/ Cranberry & Pear served over Rice
• Friday : Cheesey Beef & Broccoli Casserole

I’m really a newbie to the whole cooking scene and I’m having fun making meals for my family. After living off dine-ins and take outs to premade box dinners, I put my foot down to make my family well worthed dishes.

Another note : my husband really can’t eat chicken. It triggers his arthritis, so I’m venturing cooking w/ pork & beef. My next goal would be a lot of veggies & fish.

Enjoy!!

[mPm updates]

Monday : I had to ditch my sweet & sour chicken since all my recipes called for pineapples – cans I thought I had! In a frantic search for an alternate recipe : I found Mandarin Orange Pork – the recipe needed more salty – next time I’ll adjust. Patis always brings the best outta a pot of food.

Here’s how it turned out =)

.please excuse the non-HD pic presented to you by the iphone.