uphill from here?

bacon wrapped shrimp, chard, tamagoyaki, spinach

upside down gyu yanagawa donburi on rice

so 2day's menu said:

bacon and chard donburi

tamagoyaki

bacon wrapped shrimp
spinach

shmantz's explanation:

i couldn't find the bacon, but i found this beef thing. and i put some chard under the shrimps.

shmantz really enjoyed the gyu yanagawa donburi, but prefers the gyudon. and lucky me, i got to eat the bacon when i got home. good thing i hid it in the clear glass jar.

raw egg bento

pasta salad, chard, broccoli croquette

beef and tomato mixed with panko and raw egg on rice

here is shmantz's first bento! i wuz very impressed with the presentation. do you like the use of the chard and green onions?

the pasta salad is just pasta, diced bell pepper and italian dressing to taste. i blanched the chard in salt water and squeezed out all the excess liquid. the broccoli croquette wuz another handy frozen filler on sale at shaw's.

now, here's where it gets interesting. the menu i left shmantz said "gyu yanagawa donburi". he called to ask which one, and i said, "the sliced beef with the egg swirled in. it's in the rectangular container." shmantz took this to mean, "the ground beef and tomato mix with panko and raw egg chunks. it's in the round container." so he ate the uncooked leftover filling that i used in the stuffed bell pepper. the verdict? "it wuz awesome!" good thing we use egg beaters so it's probably pasteurized. "even so, there's only like a 0.01% chance of getting salmonella. you can eat raw eggs," says shmantz.

you like beef?!

yakisoba

tamagoyaki, garlic spinach, crab rangoon

onigiri, carrot and asparagus beef rolls

here is what i packed b4 ditching shmantz. i had to use up the rest of the thinly sliced beef, so these bento are dedicated to sykopmsgrrl. i like beef!

the yakisoba is that maruchan 3-pack you can buy in the fridge section of the asian store. i added carrots, onions and beef. the tamagoyaki and spinach are the usual fillers, and i threw in some crab rangoon that were on sale at shaw's. shmantz said those were delicious.

for dinner, i packed some onigiri along with beef rolls. the beef roll recipe is from one of the bento books mom gave me. it wuz quite difficult cutting the carrots and asparagus into square-shaped sticks. good thing all the beef is gone so i don't have to make these again.

tiny list for a huge menu

funnily enuf, i only had to buy bacon, chard, asparagas and pork chops 2day. all the other items were defrosted from our freezer. "what?! you don't have bacon in your fridge?!" you ask? yes, tis sad times in the café.

you'll see lots of donburi bento this week since shmantz had many days where he needed lunch and dinner. donburi seems to fill him up more. maybe cuz i end up packing more rice. and ...

SURPRISE! shmantz packed all the bento himself this week. i made everything 2nite, and left him a mess of tupperware stacks and a menu for each day to figure everything out. we'll see how good he is at following directions. predictions, n-e-1?

fresh basil from the backyard!

beef and egg soboro on rice

caprese salad skewers, shumai with sauce in the carrot bottles

the soboro is from the donburi book. i 4got to pack a spoon with 2day's bento, but shmantz said he had no problems eating it. 

to make the beef tiny, i used a potato masher, and to make the egg tiny, i used my handy whisk. we love this whisk cuz it's easy to clean, and has silicone tips so it is safe to use with non-stick pans.

shmantz's carpool friend gave us a whole bunch of fresh basil from his backyard. they ate lunch 2gether 2day so shmantz really wanted me to use the basil in his bento. the caprese salad skewers were the best i could come up with on short notice. i used string cheese since we have no hard cheeses in the fridge. usually, i serve these skewers with a balsamic vinaigrette, but shmantz wuz not interested. don't they look like hamburgers?

the shumai is from trader joe's. they are pretty good tasting, and not so bad for you nutritionally. the carrot bottles hold the sauce that came in the shumai box. shmantz's friends were intrigued by how i got the sauce in the bottles. ah, the power of suction.

shoyu vs. teriyaki ... discuss!

rice with furikake and kimchee

shoyu chicken, garlic spinach tomato

shmantz requested more furikake and kimchee, so that is what he got. i tried to make a nice design, but it kinda looks blah.

here is my mechakucha shoyu chicken recipe:

8 chicken tenders (equivalent to 4 chicken breasts maybe?)

A  1/2c shoyu

A  1/4c sugar

A  1tbs sake

A  1 garlic clove smashed

A  1/2tsp grated ginger

green onions

combine A into a small sauce pan. once all the sugar has dissolved, add in the chicken. simmer until the chicken is cooked through. using your cooking hashi, shred the chicken. continue to simmer a couple more minutes until all the shredded pieces have absorbed the sauce and turned a nice light brown color. strain out the sauce before serving and sprinkle with green onions. you can serve the rest of the sauce on the side if you want. shmantz did not want. makes 4 servings. shmantz said i should make more than just 2 servings so we can eat it this weekend too.

my mechakucha recipe for the garlic spinach tomato is similar to the sesame spinach. just use olive oil instead of sesame oil, add in two diced puchi tomato and 1 large clove of garlic (crushed), and donuts add the sesame seeds. by adding the tomato, the recipe stretched to 2 servings. i tried stuffing as much of the tomatoes into shmantz's bento as possible, but ended up having 4 pieces in mine's. not a fan. even with all the garlicy goodness, i still hate tomatoes. 

oh, so shmantz and i had a discussion on what the difference is between shoyu chicken and teriyaki chicken. we came to the conclusion that shoyu chicken has sake, less sugar and no sesame seeds. haha. they definitely taste different. also, since there is less sugar in shoyu chicken, i noticed that the sauce is a little thinner. and, we usually grill teriyaki chicken to give it that nice glazed/grilled look, but alwayz simmer teriyaki chicken (usually in the slow cooker). what do you guyz think?

yay orange!

katsuo furikake onigiri, stuffed bell pepper

sweet potato, mushroom-chicken donburi

shmantz picked out this katsuo furikake when we were at mitsuwa (thx syko!). he said the onigiri were too big so it wuz hard to eat. i told him to use his hands next time, but he insisted that he haz to eat everything with his hashi.

same goes for the bell pepper. i told him he wuz supposed to just pick it up with his hands and eat it, but he explained to me that he balanced it on his hashi and wuz able to eat it just fine. -.-; here is my mechakucha recipe for the bell pepper:

1 bell pepper

A  1/4lb ground beef

A  1tsp rosemary

A  1tsp thyme

A  1/4tsp celery seed

A  salt and pepper to taste

4 puchi tomato

1/4c (guesstimate) panko

1 egg

shredded monterey jack cheese

cut the bell pepper in half, all the way through the stem. sadly, i had to chop the stem off so the pepper would fit in the bento box. however, it looks really nice if you serve it with the stem still on. clean out all the membranes and seeds. set aside. in a small frying pan, cook A until the beef is done. i like to squish the beef around in my hands before frying it so it doesn't get that brains-like nasty look. drain the beef and dump into a mixing bowl. dice the tomato and mix into the beef. add panko until the mixture looks like you think it should. mix in beaten egg to act as a binder. pack the mixture into the bell pepper. press down the mixture as you pack so you can fit lots of meat in. sprinkle shredded cheese on top. place in the toaster oven at 320° for 7 minutes, or until the cheese is all bubbly and starts to brown.

the sweet potatoes were just pan-fried in a bit of butter until they were soft. shmantz wuz not a fan of the skin still being on, but appreciated the extra fiber. i told him to just peel the skin off next time, but i guess that is hard to do when you can only touch your food with your hashi. 

the mushroom-chicken donburi used up the rest of last week's mushrooms and the baby won bok stems. very delicious recipe!!! the recipe is from the donburi book, but it tasted more chinese than japanese. i decided not to put it on top of the rice, cuz i thought shmantz would have an easier time eating it with the onigiri instead. bad assumption.