Bento books !!

After courts last Tuesday, I dropped by KLCC.

I thought I checked out Kinokuniya and see if their Japanese books aisles have any bento books.

And true enough, what did I find !!!!

 
I got these at a steal at RM42.

It is a good deal because they are selling them at ebay for like USD19. Plus that with USD4 for shipping or probably USD9 for EMS and you get the idea.

I got this other book as well. It’s around RM46.

If you ask me, I still prefer those pictures that those Japanese moms churned out in their daily blogs. However, these books does makes a refreshing reading (flipping) at bedtime.

However, I think the prettiest bento book has got to be from this book that I got from www.NST.my 6 months ago, before the price hike from their supplier.

I still haven’t utilised any of them ideas in the span of the 6 months since I got this book !!! I do enjoy flipping through them, though.

Perhaps this coming school holiday.

Let’s hope I have some time to make some kawaii bento for the kids.

So, bento addicts ! Fast, fast hop over to Kinokuniya check out their bento books. There aren’t many there the last time I looked.

And this is not a paid post, by the way. haha.

Happy bentou-ing , folks !

Bento #39

Because Kimberly has started blogging, I showed Kimberly one of the blogs belonging to another little girl, Rachel and she saw that Rachel had pancakes for bento, so she said, “Momma, I havent had pancakes for a long time !”

So, Monday’s bento was pancakes.

Ashley has had pancakes for her school’s bento but not Kimberly.

Bento #39

Bento #39 is pancakes cooked in the Hello Kitty frying pan. If we were having the pancakes at home, she gets to draw eyes and stuff on the Hello Kitty face with the sauce pen, but because this is for school, I didnt want the chocolate sauce to smudge all over the pancake, so she has them plain.

One of the monkey container contained peanut butter. The other contained butter icing (butter and sugar beaten up) leftovers from the butter cake we baked over the weekend.

Those monkey containers are really nifty. It came with a little spreader spoon stored neatly inside the container. Cool, yea? One of my favourite bento accessory.

Ashley has only cereal for school. This is because she has started to show an interest eating the school’s food together with her classmates in school and I like to encourage that.

For Bento #36, Bento #37 and Bento #38, click “here”, okay ?

Have a great day today, all

Bento #34 and Bento #35

Bento #34

Yours truly woke up late, so Bento #34 was made in a rush. And I do mean, a rush. Ha ha. what, like in 10, 15 minutes? wash bunches of champagne grapes, slot a bunch each into Tigger’s green round containers. Took out chinese sausage of the night before from the fridge, cut into strips, peeled pear, slice and cut 2 slices each for the kids, placed in silicon triangle cups, and that’s Ashley and Kimberly’s Tuesday’s bento.

Sorely lacking in colour combination and variety. My only consolation is that both containers came home wiped clean. At least its the food that I know they definitely want to eat. Perhaps they finished them purely because there is so little food in there.

Wednesday’s bento is somewhat better.

Bento #35

It’s peanut and butter sandwich cut into Hello Kitty shapes. In the purple jellybean container, skewered peeled grapes, peeled at request of my little madam who says that she had needed to spend a long time peeling them despite my attempt to get her to eat the fruit’s skin as well.

I didnt get a chance to use my Hello Kitty kamaboko, so sliced some yellow zuchini (the last of the lot) and green zucchini (also the last of the lot, ha ha) and layered them with the sliced fishcakes.

Ashley didnt go to school on Wednesday, so I didnt prepare any bento for her.

For Bento #36, Bento #37 and Bento #38, click “here”

Have a great week ahead, all !

Bento # 29 and Bento #30

Toddler’s Bento #29

Ashley’s Bento for Friday is chicken teriyaki from yesterday’s dinner. This is one of her dad’s favourite dish. And Ashley’s too. So I figure it would be a good choice for her bento today.

LZmommy is right. Not easy to think of what to put into bento boxes at times. In my case, it’s purely because I would only put food that they would want to eat, with only one unfamiliar food at most. But there are so little variety that my toddler would want to eat. With Kimberly, I have it easier though.

Anyhow, Ashley’s bento is simply teriyaki chicken skewered on foodpicks, and turkey drumstick (debone and cut into manageable sizes) skewered likewise. On the side are her favourite zucchini and cucumber. She loves crunchy fruits and vegetables like apples, pears, zucchini, sengkuang, even raw carrots thinly sliced.

She didn’t finish her bento in school, so as usual, I would offer the unfinished bento to her again on the ride home, and she would almost always finish them.

I also brought along some apple slices in the yellow container for her when I picked her up from school because that morning’s bento wasn’t much.

Look at my little demure lady’s manner. So unbecoming. Ha! Ha! That’s Ashley eating the remaining cucumber.

And zucchini…

Bento #30

As for Kimberly’s bento, it is somewhat the same, with zucchini and cucumber, save that she doesn’t like having the same food twice in a row, so I had to cook her something else that morning.

Marinated some baby sharks fillet the night before and pour some flour out on a covered container left in the fridge. Fried them the next morning for her bento.

So Kimberly’s bento is baby shark fritters and zucchini and cucumber slices, with a lone cherry tomato.

Kimberly loves cherry tomatoes, but Ashley would only eat them sometimes. Ashley is more minded to eat tomatoes with the presence of her chieh chieh, such is the influence of her big sister over her.

As usual, a close up of the bento ……

And that’s Friday’s bento.

Oh, in case you noticed that the Bento # numbers doesnt run, its because I posted Bento #28 at my old blog at www.allthingspurple.blogspot.com, so hop over there for Bento #31, Bento #32 and Bento #33.

Okay,now. the reason why i need to type out the blog url in full is because I havent figured out how to make the link stand out in another colour. In blogspot, its automatically blue, but here, link and post, they are all in indistinguishable black. I appreciate any tips at all. Anyone? Any tips at all?

Now to take a 2 days break from bento-ing. It’s weekend again, the peel-fruits-by-the-barrel time of the week again. For homemade juice, dearie, I juice them and freeze them by the trays to last the kids the whole week. Some of them goes into popsicles sticks.

Now you guys have a great weekend !

Bento #26 and Bento #27

As mentioned in my old blog, I havent decide yet if I should seperate my my new blog , (dot my) and my old blog (dot blogspot dot com) with different focus, so for the moment, I will be posting from both sides, including Bento posts, to even both blogs up. So if the Bento # numbers doesnt run, just hop over to my my old blog, okay?

Actually, I find that it takes longer posting from my new blog, cos I have to figure out stuff like, … what is this visual and html feature at this right hand corner on top of the post here? …. and going like,…. Oh, okay, that’s what its for ….. before I proceed.

Anyhow, this here is today’s bento.

Bento # 26

Today’s bento is Hello Kitty shaped peanut and butter sandwiches. To fill the gap of the bento, weiners. I try not to let the kids have weiners more than once a week, even though the kids loves them.

Some asked how I got my kids to eat the things they did. I guess the only reason my kids eat their bento meals is because the only occassion I ever let them eat stuff like weiners is when I packed them in bento boxes. Nothing wrong with certain items like peanut butter sandwiches. But I save certain food for bento meals instead of letting them eat those at home so that they would find those food appealing for the lack of it. Therefore, those food packed bento are food that they would want to eat.

I would perhaps add one new item every now and then to tempt them into expanding their palate ie. yellow zucchini for Ashley or mandarin oranges for Kimberly. In this instance, I skewered a cherry tomato between slices of Japanese fishcakes, to check if Kimberly would like them. This is because Ashley rejects them. Japanese fishcakes are somewhat softer compared to our local ones. Our local fishcakes are much more firmer to the touch.

If they eat at home, they eat homecook food like rice with mui choy pork or steamed pomfret or pasta with salmon, not finger food like nuggets or fish balls. For tea, its usually pancakes, waffles or meatloaf/meatballs, or the Chinese’s old fashion staples of fried noodles or fried rice, although in my fried stuff, Kimberly always complain that she cant see the rice or noodles for the crowded meat and vegetables in the dish. I guess lots of other mums are like me, kiasu-ing crowding every fried rice dish with as much protein as they could. Ha ha.

Bento #27

Anyhow, Ashley’s bento for today.

Ashley’s bento is simpler. Plain bread cut into crescent shapes and weiners slices skewered with food pick. On the side, 2 blocks of cheese cubes, which she loves.

Happy Bento-ing, folks !!

Be sure to come back and visit this new blog too, yea? Have a great day, all !!