Tutorial Sweet Simmered Shiitake Bento Timesaver

Today's tutorial post is about another trick I have up my sleeve, sweet and simmered shiitake mushrooms, which is essentially a bento timesaver recipe. This is a perfect recipe if you know that you will be busy for the rest of the week and have no time to prepare every item individually in mornings. If stored well in the refridgerator, this sweet and simmered shiitake mushroom bento timesaver should last up to a week.

Sweet and Simmered Shiitake - Bento Time Saver and Space Filler

Ingredients:
10 dried shiitake mushrooms
3 tablespoons soy sauce
2 tablespoons sugar
2 tablespoons mirin (dry sherry can be used as a substitute)

How to:

1. Soak the dried shiitake in cold water until soft. This takes about 1 hour. 

Tip: Usually I'll soak the mushrooms while I'm preparing dinner. By the time Mr Bear and I have finished eating dinner and finished all the cleaning up, it will all be soft enough. If you like, you can soak the mushrooms overnight as well.

How I soak dried mushrooms

Tip: This picture shows how I soak the mushrooms. Because the dried shiitake mushrooms tend to float (which I find rather annoying), I used a dipping dish as a weight so that all mushrooms will get soaked evenly. 

Do not discard the water which you used to soak the mushrooms.

Once the shiitake mushrooms are soft, remove the stems and cut them into bite size pieces.

Tip: As shown in the very first photo, I have cut them into different shapes. This is a personal preference because I figured that if this sweet and swimmered shiitake timesaver is going to appear on me and Mr Bear's bento for the next 2 days, it might be more interesting if they don't look the same everytime we open up the bento.

2. Put the shiitake in a pot with enough soaking water. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat and add all the other ingredients. Continue simmering until the liquid is almost absorbed completely.

Let it cool completely and portion it into little containers or small silicon cake molds. Store in the refridgerator.

This shiitake bento timesaver might taste a little sweet on it's own because it is designed as a side dish to go with rice. If you like you can serve it together with a plain salad as well.

This is how I make the Sweet and Simmered Shiitake Bento Timesaver, I hope you find the recipe and tips helpful too.

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

Bento Miffy Sandwich Nijntje Boterham

Today's bento features Nijntje, also known as Miffy internationally, which is one of my favourite characters when I was growing up. When I was young, I remember my mom reading the books to me. Sometimes we would go to the library and I would pick out the books by the basket, literally begging her to bring all of them home. hahaha!
Many people might not know, but this little rabbit has Dutch origins and goes by her Dutch name Nijntje. Her creator Dick Bruna created this character in 1955 after telling his grandson stories about a little rabbit they had seen in the woods in Utrecht. Nijntje (pronounced roughly as "NAI-n-je" in the English way) was the typical child's pronunciation for Konijntje which means little rabbit in Dutch.

Although Nijntje is drawn with barely a few lines, it is instantly recognisable as a rabbit. Soon the character Nijntje becomes an instant hit internationally. Dick design his Nijntje books with minimal dialogues (some even without dialogues) because he thinks that the illustrations should speak for themselves and also because the books were also meant for children as learner books. Nijntje's books soon got translated into many languages and exported into many countries in the world, including Japan. But there was a big problem because not many people can pronounce Nijntje's dutch name. Soon, Nijntje got another name that is easier to pronounce, MIFFY. This is why all translations of Nijntje referred to her as Miffy, or at least with a phonetic translation that sounds like Miffy.

Bento Miffy Sandwich Nijntje Boterham

Many think that Miffy is Japanese, because Sanrio's Hello Kitty and friends are drawn using a similar line style. In addition, the Miffy brand is popular in Japan and there is a lot of Japanese-made Miffy merchandise. To complicate things a little more, Hello Kitty found a friend called Cathy in 1976. Just like Miffy, Cathy is also a rabbit who doesn't talk much and is drawned in a similar fashion. Of course Dick Bruna wasn't very happy about it and there was a long love/hate relationship between the company that owns Miffy, namely Mercis BV and Sanrio. On November 2, 2010, a Dutch court ruled against Sanrio and ordered the company to stop marketing Cathy products in Belgium, Luxembourg, and the Netherlands. Sanrio raised an appeal soon after.

Following the 2011 March 11 earthquake and tsunami in Japan, Sanrio and Mercis BV settled the lawsuit out of court under the condition that Sanrio must stop worldwide production of merchandise that feature Cathy. Instead of continuing the court battle like most big companies are likely to do, the two companies will donate the legal fees to help the earthquake victims, which I thought was rather sweet of both of them.

Ok, I think this post is getting rather long. Sorry I got carried away, hahaha, because I really love Nijntje / Miffy a lot and she reminds me a lot of my childhood. I hope you like this Miffy Sandwich Bento or should I say Nijntje Boterham Bento as much as I do :)

Bento Meatless Monday grapefruit write up

Today we are having a simple meatless grapefruit salad bento for lunch. I have decided to make this meatfree fruit salad because we had eaten a lot of junk food over the weekend and I am feeling really quite guilty. hahaha! Yesterday, Mr Bear and I ordered Surinaamse take-out with a full portion of chicken curry and roti (for me), a full portion of lamb and roti (for Mr Bear) AND a full portion of Java-style Saoto soup (Soup soto) with rice! Hahaha basically it was rather big portions even for 3 big adult eaters. We sat in front of the TV and basically binge ate. hahaha, and before we knew it, we had finished EVERYTHING and the takeout boxes were all licked clean. Come to think of it, its rather unbelievable. LOL!

Sorry, I had digressed, hahaha! Other reason why I had made this meatfree bento with grapefruit is because of its high vitamin C content and its high fiber content. Pink and red varieties of the grapefruit also contain high amounts of an antioxidant called lycopene (which can also be found in tomatoes). What is also good about the grapefruit is that it can help lower cholesterol, which makes it ideal (at least psychologically, hahaha) after yesterday's food binge. There is one very important thing to take note though, if you are on medication, please check with the healthcare professional before eating a grapefruit because studies have shown that grapefruit might give certain drug interactions, often making the drug more potent than it is supposed to be.

Bento Meatless Monday Red Ruby Grapefruit Salad

Previously I have also made a Grapefruit Salad Bento, but this time round, I made a variation. Instead of laying pieces of lettuce to filter out the grapefruit juice, I cut the grapefruit into a half. Then I removed all the juicy grapefruit flesh from one half and sliced them into manageable bite-size pieces and pop them back into the grapefruit "basket". This way, all the grapefruit juices stay IN the basket and not everywhere else. For the other half, I sliced it into wedges and stack them on top of the basket. I top it up with a sleeping bunny food pick and a few small slices of the lettuce for the colour. I hope you like today's Meatfree Monday Red Ruby Grapefruit Salad.

Bento Elf Babies - Inari Sushi - Meat-free

These two elf babies are essentially Inari sushis, simply tofu pouches and rice balls.
I made this Bento Elf Babies with some leftover tofu pouches from the Ninja Bento I made for Mr Bear on Friday. Even though I am carnivourous (most of the time), I really will eat meals without meat if its delicious and presented in an appealing way. I guess you can say that I am a big kid in disguise. hahaha!

Bento Elf Babies Inari sushi, shown here with 2 black Ojue compartments

Hope you like this Meat-free Inari sushi Elf Baby Bento!

Bento Tricolour Pesto Pasta

Today's bento is a tricolour bento made with bow-tie pasta (also known as Farfalle) laced with pesto sauce. I added red capsicum and golden yellow zucchini for the extra colour and taste.

Tricolour bento with Pesto Farfalle Capsicum and Golden Zuccini

The golden yellow zucchini and the red capsicum were prepared together with the farfalle pasta and pesto sauce as one-dish. When I was packing this tricolour bento, I set aside the red capsicum and yellow zucchini so that it looks bright and colourful. Have a bright and colourful Friday too and I hope you like this tricolour pesto pasta bento!