Bento 30 and 31

Bento #30:

pasta with sausage, beef, green beans

Bento #31:

Leftover chili, carrots, hummus, salad

Homemade hummus is so good. To bad the picture got washed out. Don’t those carrots look like cheetos? I promise you they were carrots!

Both these meals left me hungry in a few hours. I need to work on packing more carbs to keep me full.

Hiyashi Chuka – Japanese Noodle Salad

Spring is coming! The weather in NY has been warming up and sunny days are a motivation to eat healthier and exercising outdoors. I went for a jog today.. I am so out of shape I barely got anywhere. So I went home and made lunch. haha.

Hiyashi chuka is a cold dish served in the summer. It’s normally made with chukamen which is raw ramen noodles (not the instant kind) but I didn’t have that on hand so I used rice stick noodles. I topped it with lots of fresh veggies, some protein and finished it off with flavor boosts from scallion and sesame seeds.

Toppings: English cucumber, corn, baby carrots, shredded chicken, egg strips, red pepper, shredded nori, scallion, sesame seeds.

Dressing: 1/3 cup water / 3 Tbsp rice vinegar / 2 Tbsp soy sauce / 3 Tbsp sugar / 1 tsp sesame oil (serves 4).

Delicious and good for you! Eating a variety of colors in vegetable form gives you lots of nutrients. Cooking with Dog has a video on how to make another version of this dish. Watch it to learn how to make the egg strips.

Jap chae/Korean noodles (Bento 9)

Laptop lunch for dinner at work. I made jap chae after Wendy threw the surprise party with Korean food. I think hers tasted better but this was my first time making it so now I know how to improve my methods.

Jap chae, salad, red pepper, cucumber, goddess dressing, avocado and tomato “guac” (which got really brown and gross – didn’t end up eating this), and dove dark chocolate.

I asked Wendy for her recipe and she pointed me to Maangchi. I basically followed that recipe but approximated the vegetable amounts. Some tips from what I’ve learned: add salt to taste because the recipe didn’t call for salt but I feel like it needed it; don’t skip the step where she adds soy sauce to the spinach because my spinach was bland; definitely marinate the beef beforehand (soy sauce, sesame oil, cooking wine, sugar), overnight is best; and don’t forget the green onions like I did. Otherwise, quite a delicious and flavorful dish.

Bento 7 & 8

Lack of time to update so two bentos for you this time. Laptop lunch was yesterday’s dinner at work and onigiri were for class today.

Quinoa pilaf with veggies, chicken and walnuts, salad with Trader Joe’s goddess dressing, cucumbers and tomatoes, veggie straws (rosemary), string cheese.

Wasabi mayo tuna onigiri with furikake. Nori on the side for wrapping. I didn’t expect to eat all three because I don’t usually eat that much rice but I was hungry and class was boring.

First Laptop Lunch! (bento 5)

Here’s my laptop lunchbox that my siblings got for me for my birthday all filled up! I will get to enjoy this at work tonight.

Left over smoked salmon sushi, salad greens with English cucumber and sun dried tomatoes, french dressing, polenta flowers, snack box: TJ’s honey wheat pretzles, almonds, walnuts, a chocolate munchkin, hello kitty candy. Vanilla Horizon milk (not shown).

Asian Fusion Coleslaw

Got the recipe from Food to Live By. This is a really yummy and refreshing salad that my family has made twice already. It’s not mayo based but rather oil and vinegar and very full flavored. Here’s the recipe with my changes in parentheses.

Fusion Coleslaw
Serves 6 (4).

Ingredients:
2 cups shredded red cabbage (1 cup)
1 cup shredded Napa cabbage
2 large carrots, coarsely grated (1 carrot)
1/3 cup thin strips of scallion greens
1 jalapeno pepper, cut into slivers

3 Tbsp toasted sesame oil
3 Tbsp unseasoned rice vinegar
1 Tbsp sugar
1/2 tsp Asian chili garlic sauce
1 Tbsp finely grated peeled fresh ginger
Salt (optional)

1/2 cup honey-roasted peanuts (we crushed them)
1/2 cup raisins (we used golden and cranberries)
2 Tbsp sesame seeds, toasted

Directions:
1. Toss together all the vegetables.
2. Mix ingredients for dressing in glass jar and shake. Taste for seasoning and add salt or pepper to taste.
3. Pour dressing over salad and toss to combine. Add peanuts and raisins and toss again. Refrigerate the coleslaw, covered, to allow flavors to develop (2-4 hours). Serve coleslaw chilled garnished with sesame seeds (room temp is okay too).

Caprese salad

Of all of my vegetable plants the tomatoes seem to be the most successful so far. The basil grew quickly as was expected but now they are flowering and look scary. The jalapenos were the first veggies ready then the bell peppers (which were mislabeled sweet red bell peppers at the store) and now finally the tomatoes but they are prolific! I have three plants and they are very hardy. They survived several heavy rainstorms and now have lots and lots of fruit. Recently whole bunches have been ripening so they were picked and eaten. They’re very sweet and plump.

My favorite way to eat them is in a caprese salad. The simple flavors of all the ingredients shine in this salad. I only wish I had some fresh mozzarella. Tomatoes, basil, mozzarella cheese, and extra virgin olive oil come together in this yummy dish.