Bento Less Days

I have been craving for bento for weeks but don't have energy to whip one. Not even the simplest lunch. Here are the bentos that I have totally forgotten to post here:

pork bento with egg. on the backgrund is a miso soup

I had this bento last February when we celebrated our eight anniversary. We are not the organized couple who would book somewhere for a date. We usually spend our anniversary the same way we celebrate our monthsary (yes, you read that right! we celebrate monthly) by going to the mall and randomly select a restaurant or a fast food. This year we ate at a  japanese restaurant, Teriyaki Boy. We got two mugs for free. I will post  about it in the future.

Below is a bento that I prepared for work last February. I had a strawberry sandwich and a crabstick/carrots/lettuce with asian dressing salad that was topped with parmesan cheese. great lunch,right?

February Bento Lunch: egg with olives as eyes, lettuce, asian dressing, strawberry sandwich, parmesan cheese, crabstick and carrots (L-R)

Japanese Curry In Few Minutes

This is not my first time to cook Japanese Curry. I have been a fan of this curry since I found the recipe at my favorite local bento blogger, kaoko . And I am such a bad blogger that I forgot to take a photo of my cooked pork curry. But I did not forgot the ingredients:

The star of the post. What you see in the box is how the cooked curry will look.

S&B Golden Curry No.3

You will need at least a half kilo of pork (not pictured), potatoes, carrots and onion. I used three potatoes although the recipe calls for one potato only, one carrots and one small onion. Diced the three ingredients.
Saute the onion and add the pork until brown. Add the potatoes and carrots and six cups of water. Make sure that everything is covered by the liquid. Let simmer until pork and vegetables are cooked.

potatoes, carrots and onion

 Add one pack of curry. You can dissolve the curry first by adding some liquid from the pot in a bowl and mixing the curry to avoid undissolved curry. Simmer until it thickens.

another photo of potatoes, carrots and onion together with one pack of S&B golden curry

Serve with rice or put in a bento box with rice and fruit (i prefer banana) and you are on your way.

Lock & Lock Bento: Leftover Bento Madness

Entering my third trimester, with workload still as difficult as before I have to resort to food for some energy. I have been bringing bento to work than ever. They are not as pretty as the previous one, more on the practical side. I have encountered some bento safety issues lately and manages to find solution through google and other bloggers.

I have been using G's Lock&Lock because its available and most of my bento boxes are small (or so i think!).


Pink Salmon and Scrambled Egg Bento

This bento is a speedy bento. The Pink Salmon is a canned-store bought one which I nuked for few minutes while the egg is a easy-peasy scrambled egg. I added a tiny ripe tomato for my vegetable and a dash color on a blue penguin food pick.It goes well with my bento staple: rice. 

 

Tuna Soboro with ginger - ground pork with potatoes -cucumber - rice bento:

The tuna soboro is an experiment (found the recipe from justbento) and still quite tasty after being stocked in the refrigerator for two days. It's a little bit too tasty for my pregnant-affected taste buds though so I might adjust the seasoning next time. The ground pork is a sauted port with potato and a dinner leftover. The cute ms. monkey container (she used to be mrs. monkey but the hubs lost her partner, mr. monkey few years ago.sad ) have mayonnaise for my cucumber. It was a delicious lunch and I think its a hearty lunch. Too big actually for me and the little one in my belly.

What's in your lunch box? I have been reading a 9 year old blogger's account of her daily school  lunch lately and I wish we have lunch like that here in the office. 

Office Snacks

Our summer turned into a rainy season with all the rain showers lately. Although some find that annoying (especially those who are beach lovers), we welcome rain in our weekend. It made our days and nights cooler. Summer here in the PI meas intense heat that you will probably be dehydrated if you do not bring with you a water bottle to cool off.

As I get bigger (my belly), my food fatigue wore off. I can now eat the things that I used to love except coffee.
Okay, I have to admit that there are days that I sneak in some decaf but that's all.

This is the best snack for me at this time of deprivation:

krispy kreme (glazed) and brewed coffee 

 This snack cost me almost nothing. I have a great friend who would visit us at the house and brings us a dozen of this donuts and the coffee is a gift from friend.

local brewed coffee (or kapeng barako) and bibingka

This combo cost 50 pesos. You can buy it on the go or dine-in.

 As a precaution (I am freaking out on the what-nots of being pregnant, even when it comes to food), I have been bringing my own lunch in the office. I am still lazy.

I know that brewed coffee is off-limits for me. That's why this bibingka will do for now. I will pretend that my Anmum choco drink is as good as my home brewed coffee when it comes to taste.

bibingka from Bibingkinitan

What's in your snack bag?

Another Easy Bento Rice-Based and Favorite Snacks

My energy is coming back! Being pregnant is not a walk in the park but you it is a great experience knowing that you have another life living inside you. One of my DH's colleague lost her baby last Saturday and we are saddened with the news. It reminds me of being extra careful for the next five months so that this kiddo inside my belly will grow stronger each day, safe and sound.

For the brighter issues, here is another bento that I have not posted yet. It was easy and tasty! Next time though I will be adding some vegetables and fruits for a more balance meal:

bacon, meatloaf and rice. 

I used my daiso-bought rice mold and small butterfly cutter + flower food picks and panda&tiger.

On breakfast, I missed my favorite "taho". It is a soya yogurt that is served with brown sugar and sago pearls.

yummy taho!

Our weekend is fun except for an incident with the househelp that leads us to the decision of finding a new one. Do you have any househelp issues?

Joining linky party:

Motivate Me Monday at Keeping It Simple
Making Monday Marvelous at C.R.A.F.T.

Fish Fillet and Hashbrown Bento

I am still here. Our wifi connection had some technical issues and I cannot upload any pictures, that is my excuse for not blogging. But really, pregnancy makes me not so eager to blog and even read blogs! But I am on my second trimester of pregnancy now (we were on 3 months and 2 weeks, so that means I am already on my 2nd trimester right?) so most of my former self is back. I have more energy to stay long in front of the computer.

There are so many photos that I haven't posted yet so expect more photos to come!

Here are my creativity on the move:

Fish Bento:

Lunch Bento: Fish Fillet, Banana and Rice (house-topped container has store-bought sweet&sour sauce for the fish)

Hashbrown Bento:  

Snack Bento: strawberry and peanut butter rolled sandwich on white bread, store-bought hashbrown. yellow container have some ketchup on them.

For the fish fillet recipe, you can find it here.

I did some bento-shopping and here's the new addition to my growing collection:

sweets food picks, small cutters

Food at the office cafeteria taste awful, so expect more bento and recipe posts soon.

I am joining the fun at:

Whipperberry's
Happy Hour Projects

Bento on the Cheap

To be honest about it, my bento making days was gladly set aside as I adjusted back to my pre-graduate school days. 

And now that I am well adjusted, here are the stash of bento photos that I had found on our computer. 

I hope that the photos will give you an idea of making your bento, fast and on the cheap:

Rolled bread with spread, meatloaf on cute animal picks, cherries

Assemble the sandwich theme: mini french bread, cheese {below the bread, not pictured}, black grapes, cherries, tomatoes

another bento sandwich: cheddar cheese, italian herb {on yellow capped bottle}, sliced tomatoes, mayonaise, lettuce and a chocolate

peanut butter heart mini sandwich, grapes and banana

The steps on creating those lunches are easy. I came up with whatever is available in our pantry and tried to have a balance of taste.

Do you have bento questions in mind that is related to this post? just ask.

YouTube and My Midnight Online Moments

It is a Happy Saturday.

Below is my breakfast (bacon, egg and Four Ref Fruit Tea):

I had fun spending the day cleaning our room and removing stuff from the shelves. 

Stuff that gone astray from their designated places. 

And it happened because I fail to notice the disarray on  my usually well-placed room. 

And also being busy is a good excuse to be lousy and plain lazy to organize anything.

And now that everything (except the closet) are on its proper place, photos can be posted in few minutes. 

I have to admit though that there are two bags labeled (on my mind) "no particular place for the moment".
I will continue cleaning up tomorrow. I have to get my sleep though.

SO here are my bento photos:

 cheese sandwich, choco mallows, fruits and gummy candy

choco hazelnut sandwich (heart and star shaped), cherries,and car-shaped cheese

 lazy bento. everything was bought. and i think i missed some stickers while editing this picture. lol. (see middle part of photo)

*** 

More photos tomorrow. Food photos.

***

I remember an old friend who used to sing this song to me. 

We had our long history of fights and misunderstanding because we were both not ready to commit in a relationship that time. 

It sounds like some soap but he did promised to marry me when he comes back (he worked overseas) and I am still single.

I got married few months before he came home.

not that great video though.but it is the most presentable one i found :D

Here's for a young love that should have been but I am glad that turned into a great friendship.

Grill

It was a fun filled day.

Since finally I am not on the denial stage (re examination this August), things will be more busy around here. I am  not sure though if I will be able to squeeze everything in but my priority now is to cram in every lessons missed and finish at least half of my paper. I should not be discussing it here since I have a blog about school but just to let you know what have been keeping me from bento this day. 

Now that I have that posted, here is my Friday Fun activities:

Today is the last day of one of our staff so we had a lunchout instead of the usual crackers/ramen in the pantry. 

Sorry, no photos. my bad. 

We had a "scramble". That sweet pink colored crushed ice (and milk) with powdered milk on top that we used to buy when we were kids. We bought it at the mall and happy to be eating the street food with an assurance that it passed quality control. 

Then I had fun printing some Ta Da list. I will post below the links on this "to-do-list"and much more.

My classmates came and visited me since I have not been attending their review lately. I am happy to see them as well.

I started working on the data of my paper.

Cancel meeting next week (Agency Directors) and happy to plan of skipping work on Monday. Unfortunately I have to go to work since we will be transferring on the other office.

Found the tea that I have been looking for: Twinnings Four Red Fruit. 

In addition to that I also bought a jar of nutella and a bag of oatmeal (with raisin, banana and pineapple). 

I promised to blog more. even if I am busy.

No photos today. I will try tonight. 

Have a great weekend.

***

A DOZEN LINK FOR YOU

List of downloadables and organization link (+ some for home management)

1. Living Locurto
2. I am an Organizing Junkie
3. Get Creative with Pink
4. My Daily Randomness
5. The Blog Train Blog
6. Little Paper Dog
7. I am not sure what is the name of this flickr account but on blog referred this account and says the photos there are free (for wallpaper).
8. Daisy Jane
9. Creating Keepsakes
10. The Small Objects
11. June Pfaff Daley
12. Creature Comforts

and one more blog for Mom's out there:

IXL for online lessons for kiddos

I Miss This Space

I have been busy the past week on missed deadlines and review. 

That's my lame excuse for the lack of posting.

I did not forget this space, in fact there are bunch of photos on my camera that is waiting to be uploaded. 

There are plenty of time but there are plenty of things to do to fill them up easily. 

But I did not forget blogging. Particularly Bento.

I have frequented stores for bento accessory hunt and I often see these but never realized its usefulness:

image via Hawaii 's Bento Box Cookbook, Bentos and More for Kids

Now I know where to use them. It could have saved me few minutes if I got them earlier. 

Anyway. I am happy to learn something new today.

On the work related post, I am happy to announce that everything is okay. I have my list of to do and everything seems to be moving towards the list of have done. 

Sidebar will be updated for blogs with loads of kid bento (easier to do).

Having a great Tuesday. Hope you do, too.

Bento # 4 and 5: tunaloaf and kid bento

I am on bento #5 ( the official count for the bento we bring to work). 

But there are some backlogs of bento that did not make it to the office but somewhere else. 

Since I made them, although not specifically for the office lunch, 

So I am posting them as well.

Bento #4:

the tunaloaf (cut-out and inserted a car-shaped cheese. I used small cookie cutter). 

The tunaloaf tasted like the local meatloaf here but more fish-y... 

(can't really find a word on how to describe it).

 the hubby informed me that the pineapple balanced the taste. I think it washed off the fish-y taste of the tunaloaf.

The verdict:  I wont have them again.

pizza spread sandwich, pineapple slice, oreo cookies, cheese+loaf combi shaped liked a car, cheese shaped like a fish, vanilla flavored wafers.

Bento # 5

two-cheese sandwich (italian cheese+cheddar), mango cubes, grapes

I tried to be creative here, thus the cut-out car shaped on the bread. haha. that's all I can say. It's a great lunch though. Lots of fruits. We love mango so much. I do.

same with the one above

and other bento delish!

 

(here is the cover of the bento box. cute? it's from one of those shows at Cartoon Network. He is Mac from "Imaginary Friends". )

 

 PB, chocolate cupcake (store bought) and cubed mango.

 We are having a good week so far. 

Non-bento speaking, we were able to pay off the rest of the 20% of our downpayment for the lot. It means we will be able to get the agreement for lot title transfer. The agreement is one of the documents that we will be submit to the financing agency for our lot +house construction loan. I can not be more excited. Even if the lady from the realty office informed me that we will wait for another month for the approval of our loan. At least it will be on the financing firm by then. I am happy that it did not wiped out our lifetime savings. I can not wait to have my own home. 

Thank you, God. For the Blessings.

Next blog will be about home interiors found in the net.

something like this:

image via apartment therapy

Bento# 4

I am thinking of crackers and pineapple. and maybe some leftover chocolate cake.

We might give the tuna loaf a try. 

Yes, a tuna loaf...not meatloaf. 

Imagine how people came up with this ideas. 

More processed foods for us to partake. 

I can not wait to have my own kitchen, much more my own house. 

It will be easier to experiment in the kitchen instead of tiptoes on mornings as I try to prepare the bento before going to work.

Photos tomorrow.

Good night.

Sandwich Bento Lunches

As promised....

Here are the promised photos of my bento accessories:

Bento #1: PB and Mango

 Bento # 2: Cheese Sandwich with fruits, sausages and grapes

Here's mine:

His Bento:

Bento # 3 : Chicken Nuggets and rice (eaten at home)

I have been obsessing on bento since 2007 and have accumulated lots of rice molds but I can not use them because rice during lunch is something we avoid. 

I only get to use my molders during weekend where we indulge on some rice because we allow ourselves to be convinced that we can lose the extra calories with all the organizing and computer activities we have on Saturdays and Sundays.

The hubby surprised me with a chocolate muffin when I woke up Saturday morning:

YUM!

We had a blast this weekend. Hope you had a great one too. 

Happy Father's Day to all Daddy in the world.

O.B.E.N.T.O

Not an acronym. 

I just want to emphasize that starting today, this blog will have another category: 

bento. 

Don't worry, there is no plan on making this a foodie blog. 

Just posting pictures of what I have done creative for the day and it seems that with my busy schedule and lack of flexibility to do what (living with in-laws is fun but it stops you from starting projects because you can not just leave unfinished projects anywhere) I want, bento lunch for the hubby is my only outlet. 

Today, I made my first bento for this year. I have menu for the week and hopefully get myself into doing them while catching up with my work and school that left unattended last week while I procrastinated. 

My inspiration? Biggie's flicker with numerous easy to do bento like this one:

image credit: lunchinabox

okay, i did not copy hers but the photos and creativity of using the ice cream molders on the egg is a genius! This gave me the idea to use my onigiri molds on egg...if I have time, i think.

Now...

If only the hubby includes rice on his diet...

hmmm..

what-do-you-think?