Bento Burrito with Usagi Food Picks

Today's bento post features burrito and some of my favourite bento accessories, the Usagi Food Picks. This bento was made a few days back when I still have some of the carrot kinpira bento time saver left. As for the 4 mini burrito, it was made from 1 large burrito sheet cut into quarters and then rolled up individually to fit the bento box. I have included the usagi food picks (usagi means rabbit in japanese) so that I don't have to pack extra utensils for the carrot and cucumber. This means less washing up to do ^^," I hope you like this burrito bento too!

Bento Burrito with Usagi Picks

Tutorial Thursday Bento Uncle Samosa

Yesterday Mr Bear and I had an Indian home delivery for dinner. The portions were surprisingly big and there was quite a lot of left overs. There was a big samosa that we couldn't finish and so I decided to make a tutorial on how I bento-fy (is there even such a word?) something as challenging as a irregularly shaped Samosa.

Bento Uncle Samosa

Because the samosa does not really have a smooth surface and I was feeling lazy, I decided to put the decorations on the OUTSIDE instead of directly on the samosa.

What I did was to just wrap the samosa in saran wrap (aka glad wrap, food wrap). Next I fill up the rest of the space with cucumber and tomato. I didn't use any dividers in this bento because the saran wrap would already prevent the samosa from coming in direct contact with the cucumber and tomato. As a final touch I just use a marker to draw in the eyes on contruction paper and stick it on. Uncle Samosa's moustache is made from a brown piece of contruction paper, so I didn't have to do any colouring myself. hehe.

If there is stickers lying around in the house, it will be even easier. You just have to draw in the eyes and stick it on the saran wrap.

Hope you like this easy time-saving tutorial and have a good laugh at silly Uncle Samosa!

Bento Inari Hairclip Bears

Today's bento post Inari Bears with Hairclips, is consist of Inari sushi, which is simply made of rice stuffed into tofu pouches, and some cucumber on the side. Sometimes I add cream tuna or corn into the pouch too, but this time  its plain.  I didn't take long to prepare this bento, because its just stuffing the rice into the pouches and slicing cucumbers. Later on I just stick foodpicks (which I bought recently from Bento&Co) near the corners to form ears for the bears. They also look like hairclips for the inari bears. So far this has been my favourite set of food picks because it's quite funny.

Bento Bears with hairclips which are funny looking foodpicks I ordered from Bento&Co

If you see the picture above, they looked like butterfly and clover "hairclips" but there's more to it than meets the eye. Here's how the funny foodpicks look like from the side:

Funny Bento Foodpicks 1 - sideview

Funny Bento Foodpicks 2 - sideview

Hehe, I think this picks will come in handy for cherry tomatoes, little quail eggs or grapes. Using food picks means that dirty fingers will not come in contact with the tomatoes, quail eggs or grapes and it instantly adds some colour to a bento.

Tutorial - Bento space filler - cucumber flower

Due to popular requests, I have decided to do a tutorial today on how I made the cucumber flowers which was feature in previous bento posts. It is much simpler than it actually looks and its also a fantastic space filler for bento boxes.

Bento Space Filler Cucumber Flower - shown here in a Ojue Lunchbox compartment

Here is a series of simple step-by-step instructions:

Slice the cucumber as thinly and evenly as possible

Cucumber slices - I cut about 15 slices in total

For illustration purposes I have sliced the cucumber into little discs which are slightly less than 2mm. If you like you can try slicing them into paper thin slices for a more delicate look.

Sprinkle salt on the cucumber slices

Place the cucumber slices in a bowl. Sprinkle some salt onto the cucumber slices and mix thoroughly. Squeeze out the excess liquid and rinse away the salt crystals under running water.

Cucumber slices in a ice water bath

Prepare some ice water and place the cucumber slices into the icy water.

Line the cucumber slices up like this

Lightly pat dry the cucumber slices with a paper towel. Line the cucumber slices up as shown in the picture above, making sure that the slices overlap each other.

Here comes the magical part - roll the cucumber slices towards yourself

Starting from the furthest end, roll the cucumber slices towards yourself. It might be a little slippery, so using both hands might be helpful. (I had to struggle here a little because my right hand was holding the camera...^^,")

Soon you will end up with something like this

Soon you will end up with something like this. If there is a lot of liquid, gently squeeze out the excess liquid as shown below:

Squeeze! *gently please*

If you are planning to use the cucumber flowers immediately as a single space filler for the bento box, you may omit the steps below.

Push uncooked spagetti into the cucumber flower

Take a piece of uncooked spagetti and push it throught the cucumber flower until you can feel that it's pushing through to the other end. Break off excess spagetti. Repeat the step, taking note of the order of the arrows.

Voila! Cucumber flower bento space filler

This is how it looks like. This cucumber flower bento can also be prepared in advance and placed in the fridge. Usually I will make 3-4 cucumber flowers at the same time and store them in an airtight container in the fridge. Usually they can last for a couple of days and they are fantastic especially when I need to pack a bento fast. Hope you like this cucumber flower tutorial! :)

Bento Cheese Salami Sandwich Rollup cucumber flowers

Today I woke up feeling a bit "dry" for bento ideas. Yes, sometimes stuff like this happens. I think isn't necessarily a bad thing because it shows that I'm still human after all :D So the very first thing I usually do in this situation is to open the fridge door and stare hard at everything sitting on the shelves. I saw half a cucumber, 1/4 slice (Not even half a slice -_-") of young cheese, half slice of salami. So this is what came out of these leftovers.

Bento Cheese Salami Sandwich Rollup and cucumber flowers

The bento box is an airtight food storage box which I got from the Hema store and it comes in a set of 2. I like it very much because it has an easy size and shape to work with. As for the star shape, I used a set of star-shaped cookie cutters from Daiso.

I hope you like this Bento Cheese Salami Sandwich Rollup with cucumber flowers (oh yes, and those two little white/blue packages are chewy candies)

Bento Apple Cucumber Lettuce meat-free

Its Monday again and for many people it's either another back-to-work or back-to-school day. After a weekend of eating a lot (of junk), I thought maybe making a healthy meat-free bento is a good idea, just to kind of detox a bit. This is what I have for lunch today: Bento Apple, Cucumber and Lettuce

Hope you like this Meat Free Monday bento!

Bento Nasi Lemak recipe- Coconut Rice , Omelette & strawberries

I'm pretty excited. Tomorrow is going to be the Cook a pot of Curry day in Singapore! More than 50000 people are going to cook curry dishes for the event. Yesterday, I have written a post on Devil's Curry and today I am going to post something that's less spicy. Bento Nasi Lemak paired with cucumber and strawberries!

Bento Nasi Lemak

Here's what I put into the rice cooker:
(serves 3, I saved a portion rice for this bento and had the rest for dinner with Mr Bear)
3 cups rice
1 small packet of coconut cream (aka Santan, available in most supermarkets)
water
pinch of salt

While the rice is cooking, I sliced the cucumber, fried the chicken, omelette and dried anchovies and there you go! Nasi Lemak Bento with Coconut Rice with Egg omelette, chicken, cucumber, dried anchovies and strawberries.

Recipe: Easy Peasy sour cucumber salad

This afternoon I made myself an easy peasy cucumber salad because I realised that I probably gorged myself with too much food during dinner yesterday. Unfortunately I totally forgot to take any photos, so I guess you might have to wait till I make my next batch. Here's how I make them.

Ingredients:
cucumbers
1/4 cup white vinegar (make sure its meant for food, not your kitchen table!)
1 tbs soya sauce
1 tbs sugar
1 tbs salt
-------
Optional items (choose 1 out of these ingredients below)
- black sesame seed OR
- white sesame seed OR
- sliced spicy red chilli

Directions:
Slice the cucumbers into stripes. Pat them lightly to remove excess moisture. Put cucumbers in a jar, add in the rest of the ingredients. If you like, you can also add in one of the optional ingredients. Close the lid and give the jar a good shake. Ready to serve!

How to cut bananas to fit bento boxes

Different bento boxes have different height and sizes. Here's how I cut bananas to fit the height of my bento box. (You can also use the same method with a raw cucumber to give the bento box a nice green colour)

Step 1: Insert 2 long toothpicks/ satay sticks into the centre of the banana. The toothpicks serve as guides on where to cut later on. With practice, you can omit this step.

Step 2: Cut gently along the blue line till you feel that the knife blade has touched the toothpicks, right at the halfway point of the banana. Take care not to cut yourself.

Step 3: Flip the banana horizontally across (like the way you would flip a page from a book) and repeat the process.

Step 4: Hold the banana upright and you will see the following picture. Make the vertical cut right through the banana. Be very careful not to cut your fingers.

 

Step 5: Pull the banana apart and cut them according to the desired height. TADAAAAH!!!!

Bento: A not-so-Japanese Bento

This is also one of my first few bento attempts. The spagetti was leftover from dinner the night before.
It tasted so good! To add to all the goodness: It was cooked with lots of tender loving care from Mr Bear  :D
The little white cube on the top is our fish apartment. Mr Bear figured out that since we live in an apartment, it will also be quite cool if our (future) fish also lives in one.

 Heres a breakdown on what's in this bento that's not typically japanese:
-Leftover spagetti
-Sliced cucumber (seperated by 2 rectangular silicon cake molds)
-Green seedless grapes