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 Accessories - Stainless Steel Cutter review - Bear and Rabbit

This pair of stainless steel cookie/vegetable cutter is one of my most flexible (as in 1 product, multiple uses) bento accessories so far. They looked like the average cookie cutter except that it comes with this little matching extra part that allows you push the cookie dough out while maintaining an even surface in the rabbit/bear face.

It can also be used as a fruit/vegetable cutter, for slices of carrots, cucumbers, melons etc. It is also possible to make sandwiches and then cut shapes out of them using this cutters.

I have also used them to shape rice as well. Perhaps one of the intended use for this IS for rice I supposed? because I really find the extra matching part to be extremely useful for pressing the rice into the mold and then pushing out the rice onto the lunchbox or plate.

I have also fried and egg with it. First I wipe some cooking oil onto the mold. Next I heated some oil in the pan. Put the stainless steel molds into the pan. and I cracked an egg INTO the mold. I waited a little till the egg seems sort of solid and remove the molds.

Cute factor: 7/10
Ease of cleaning: 7/10 Take care not to cut yourself when trying to clean this. Edges can be pretty sharp.
Wastage: Depends on what you use it for.
Multi-purpose: 10/10

Rabbits and Elves

Its Boxing Day a few days back. Mr Bear and I just got back to our little apartment after 2 days of over-the-top Christmas binging at his parents' place. On Monday, its back to work for him and back to my books for me. I wanted something that isn't that rich after two days worth of Christmas menus. Yet at the same time, I am still clinging on to that Christmas/ Holiday mood and refused to go back to reality. Thus I made this Rabbit and Elves bento for Mr Bear so that he'll have a nice leisurely lunch the next day. I hope you'll enjoy it too!

Bento Box
-metaphys ojue lunch box

Greens
-rocket leaves

Elves
-inari-sushi (稲荷寿司) *fancy sounding name, but not that difficult*
Grab some abura-age (japanese tofu-skin pouches), you can get this in japanese supermarkets or even oriental supermakets. Carefully open the pouches. Make round clown-nosed sized riceballs and stuff the rice ball into it. Tuck in the raw edges of the pouches and carefully position nori eyes and mouth.

Rabbits
-sliced red apples, soaked in water and lemon juice solution to prevent the apples from turning brown.

Rubies
-red seedless grapes