Bento Hut

My Daughter turned two!

2008-06-08T14:23:00.001-07:00

My little girl is two! We had planned a Totoro themed picnic and treasure hunt in our local country park, but the weather was terrible- it rained ALL DAY. Luckily we'd been keeping an eye on the weather forecasts and rearranged the party to have it at our home (cue 24hrs manically cleaning and preparing pass-the-parcel and other party games!). The girl and her friends had a wonderful time anyway, and she loved her cake! Only five months until The boys birthday...Ps- I love the spring! - Here is a picture of the birthday girl earlier in the week watching a butterfly with her big brother

Pasta Stars

2008-06-08T14:18:00.001-07:00

While taking the boy food shopping he spotted some tiny pasta stars and absolutely fell in love with them so instead of making ongiri like usual for this box i cooked up some carrots, peas and sweetcorn for him. Also in this bento are chopped red grapes and little quail egg faces.

The 3 S's

2008-06-08T14:14:00.000-07:00

Sausages, Strawberries, and Spaghetti (and cucumbers!!). There's not really much to write about this one, It has all of the boys favorite food inside- an instant hit

Brilliant sign

2008-06-08T14:04:00.001-07:00

Well this isnt even slightly related to bento but i had to post it. I dont know about the rest of the word but in the United Kingdom Land there is a shortage of affordable housing (investors buy it up and rent it out) and the government is trying to build housing pretty much everywhere, its quite a problem where i live- the small village with its local market town where i grow up have both doubled in size in the past 20 years, with loads of houses being squashed into the tiniest pieces of open land so when i saw this sign in another local village it really made me smile.

Two similar bentos

2008-06-08T13:56:00.000-07:00

Two pretty similar bentos here, the first one has a triangle shape onigiri made as always with sushi rice and linseed with nori, some chopped red grapes and soya beans....
The second box has two triangle onigiri, two blue quail eggs, soya beans and a scotch egg.

Pancake Bento

2008-06-08T13:45:00.000-07:00

Well, it seems like i am the type of bento blogger who posts nothing for over a month then does a huge mass update of the best of this month all in one go (basically a slightly rubbish blogger with good intentions!). I made this bento once again for my little boy, and wanted to do a two tone tier because my darling husband had just been down to london and picked me up some cute dividers from toko home before oreintal city closed (it was shut down earlier this month).
All Right then, in this bento we have:
Tiny pasta shells with peas, Quail eggs with tiny nori eyes (i thought they looked a bit dull without them!), Two mini sausages wrapped in pancake, a small pancake and strawberry jam roll, and some dried apricots. In the bottom (unseen because its really rather boring!) tier are some chopped grapes.

Pika! Pika!

2008-04-30T03:53:00.000-07:00

Finally! A Brand New bento to post!
As of about a fortnight ago my son has discovered Pokemon, and like any 3 year old boy thinks pikachu is brilliant so using the usuyaki tamago recipe from Biggies great site i put together this little pikachu, adding nori and crabstick accents. Pikachu is on a block of linseed sushi rice. I also popped in some dried fruits (goji berries, apricots, and raisins)In the bottom tier are a few edamame, sausages, carrot pieces and a couple of mini chocolate cakes as a treat.
PS- this is my entry for the Wholesome Lunchbox competition this month

Pucca!

2008-04-30T03:43:00.001-07:00

The boy really likes the cartoon Pucca so i thought i'd make him a pucca bento for playgroup- Pucca is on a block of linseed sushi rice, and is made from nori and carrot, also in the box are 'ninja' strawberries with cucumber eyes, and quail eggs.
As a quick note from me unless the bottom tier is exciting or pretty im not going to bother posting it now.

Jack Skellington

2008-04-30T03:35:00.000-07:00

The Boy recently saw the intro to 'nightmare before christmas' and thought it was brilliant (even if i am a mean old mum and wont let him watch the film- its too much for a 3 year old!) and requested an 'alien song' (what he calls the intro song!) bento. This is the result. I thought that peas and carrots would make a suitabley halloweeny colour theme (even though this was made in march!!) and mixed them in with some long grain rice for the base. Jack is made from a dairylea slice decorated with nori (i wouldnt do this again though, turns out the boy doesnt like dairylea slices- he likes real cheese, and anyway it got too sticky). There are also a couple of quail eggs in the box for extra protein.

Dora The Explorer

2008-04-30T03:19:00.000-07:00

When i asked the boy what he wanted in his bento he said with a big smile- Dora! Well I couldnt disappoint him so here is my attempt at a dora bento:It's rather pitiful and will definitely not win any awards but he was so excited when i gave it to him to take to playgroup! Dora is made from a block of linseed sushi rice topped with ham and nori, also in this tier of the box are two bread sticks, sausages, cranberries and apricots. i dont have a picutre of the bottom tier for this bento- it was made a while ago and if i remember coreectly was rather boring so i didnt bother taking any pictures! I also made my little girl a bento so that we didnt have to buy and over priced junk food when we went to a toddler fun house!
In here there are red grapes, edamame, dried apricots and cranberries, and a heart shaped linseed riceball with nori dragonflies

Soot Sprites.... Take Two

2008-04-30T02:49:00.000-07:00

Since the soot sprites where such a hit with the boy, when he and his father planned a trip to london to visit the Science museum i took the chance to put together another soot sprite bento (and a rather dull one for the husband!) In the top tier there are nori wrapped linseed and rice balls with cheese and nori eyes, frankfurter and sweetcorn flowers, lettuce and blackberries. In the bottom tier there are red and green grapes, Quial egg chicks on picks with edamame, dried apricots, goji berries, lettuce and a mini chocolate cake.

This is my husbands much less exciting bento which has basically the same as my sons- except he has a frankfurter octopus instead of flowers.

Soot Sprites take one

2008-03-06T04:59:00.001-08:00

Well, both of my children are huge fans of 'my neighbour totoro' and while im not sure that my skills are up to 'totoro' standard yet i can manage a couple of soot sprites! so we have...
Lettuce lined box with nori wrapped rice balls (roast meat in the centre, and linseeds mixed with the rice) and cheese and nori eyes, and blackberries.

and on the bottom:
Dried apricots, Dried Goji berries, cocktail sausages, edamame on picks and and animal biscuit.

Bentos at the natural history museum

2008-03-03T12:21:00.001-08:00

On this occasion I made lunches for both of my children (I have a 3yr old boy and a 21month old girl) and as we were going on a trip to London I wanted bring bentos full of healthy food for them to fill up on so hopefully they wouldn't want too many sweets and treats (it didn't work! :D).

So in my daughters we have a block of linseed sushi rice with nori dragonflies, two quail eggs, two small foil cups with cauliflower, broccoli and carrots, two soya bean picks, and two picks with cucumber wrapped in pancetta.

My son has pretty much the same as my daughter, with carrot sticks instead of cubes, and i wrapped a tiny gingerbread man in dinosaur foil (we were going to see dinosaurs :) )

(these bentos are back dated- more up to date- and better ones coming soon :)

Where it all began

2008-03-01T12:03:00.000-08:00

A few months ago i was volunteered by my husband to make the lunches for a dads toddler group that he goes to. I'd played around with making sushi before but this called for something more (fussy) child friendly- so, after hearing about bento making online i thought i'd give it ago.... for 12 children! and this is the result- not altogether back for a first try!

We have (clockwise from top left) a block of sushi rice with linseed, tomato/nori ladybird and nori dragonflies, a truffle cup with 3 mini sweets, blanched broccoli and carrot flowers, boiled quails egg and a tuna sushi roll.

Im going to update this blog first with some bentos ive already made, then with the bentos that i make my son (twice a week) for his lunch at playgroup. They have gotten better (even if they arent brilliant), and after this first attempt i popped into London and bought some proper bento boxes so this is the only one in the nasty foil boxes.
I hope i get some visitors and that you enjoy reading about this.
katherine