I'm Biggie: avid cook, speedy lunch packer, mom in San Francisco, & former expat fluent in Japanese. 
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Peas and egg scramble lunches
Morning prep time: 8 minutes. Last night we had yakisoba (Japanese fried noodles with meat and veggies), so after dinner I pre-packed our boxes with the leftover noodles. This morning all I had to do was slice some fruit, and make a quick egg scramble with frozen peas to round out our lunches. Here’s Bug’s lunch, with the orange slices cut next to the rind to make it easy for little hands to eat.
Because the finished dish is going to sit at room temperature until lunch, Japanese bento cookbooks advise stirring the eggs with chopsticks like this until they’re broken up and thoroughly heated through for optimum food safety. This presents some packing complications, however. If you pack this loose egg dish with other food in a non-divided container where the lid doesn’t touch the food, the eggs/peas will roll all over everything else. My divided Lock & Lock container (below) was perfect for this, but I wound up needing to put a little “surprise animal cap” over Bug’s eggs after I took the photo. Wrapping the smaller sub-container in plastic wrap would provide the same stabilizing effect, just not as much fun.
Another tip I picked up from a Japanese bento cookbook was to use little individual servings of coffee creamer (or half & half) when making a small amount of eggs for a packed lunch. It gives a nicer flavor to the eggs than plain milk, but I don’t usually have cream or half & half in the house. It seems like a waste to buy a large container of cream just for a few eggs, so I pocketed a couple of these from a restaurant where they came with my coffee.
My lunch is the same, with a couple of strawberries. In a minor Leftover Remake, the fried noodles also incorporate Moroccan grilled lamb from dinner the other night, as well as bacon, zucchini, carrots, cabbage, onion, red bell pepper, green onions and beni shoga (pickled red ginger). Packed in a 350ml container, this was too small for me according to the bento box size guidelines, but I packed light as I knew we’d be shopping at Costco after lunch, where Bug and I snack on samples.
Quick speed equipment note: a nonstick mini fry pan and mini spatula are very convenient for cooking small amounts of lunch food (saves on cleanup too). Years ago I received a little 8″ frying pan in a cookware set as a wedding present, but I’ve started looking at it in a new light since working through a Japanese cookbook about making your child’s entire bento in just one mini frying pan (”Mini Fry Pan Hitotsu de Mainichi Tsukaeru Enji no Obento“, full review in my write-up of children’s bento books). Very handy.
READ MORE:
- Moroccan lamb lunch
- Lamb & hummus wraps
- Choosing the right size bento box
- Biggie’s list of top speed tips, tutorials and equipment reviews
April 25th, 2007 | Categories: beans, bento, equipment, for kids, leftover remake, meat, pasta or noodles, recipe, tips | 
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April 25th, 2007 at 7:38 pm
I too bought a mini frying pan my mom made fun of me but it has come in extreamly handy for portion control and cooking. I usually create all my bento dishes in that 1 pan alone. Invaluable I def recommend them to bento preparers.
April 25th, 2007 at 8:44 pm
I use my 8″ pan all the time for single servings, like when I make eggs just for me, or Im frying up a bit of meat. it’s perfect for one hamburger or one piece of chicken.
when you said “mini” I thought you meant this crazy one I bought for a friend one time at bed bath and beyond, it’s like four inches and fits, like, one sunnyside egg.
April 25th, 2007 at 8:54 pm
That’s hilarious because I never thought of my 8″ pan as “small”. It’s all I use since I live by myself. And you’re right, the clean up is awesome.
April 25th, 2007 at 9:29 pm
Hullo! I’ve friended this journal and just want to say how I’ve enjoyed reading the posts, getting quite a few ideas. Now, I’m hankering after a bento box.
April 25th, 2007 at 10:41 pm
Ha ha, I have that silly tiny pan and hate it because the handle gets super-hot. I’ve since given it to Bug to play with as a toy (perfect size to ‘cook’ his plastic toy food).
April 25th, 2007 at 10:44 pm
I didn’t previously use it that much as I usually cook for three or more, but it really is perfect for bentos.
April 25th, 2007 at 10:44 pm
Aren’t they great?
April 25th, 2007 at 11:33 pm
Biggie, another colorful lunch box. I am not one for those half & half tubs either - so your tip about pocketing them in restaurants is pretty neat.
April 25th, 2007 at 11:59 pm
I have a baby frying pan too and I love it. It’s great for deep frying stuff since I use less oil to get the depth needed for deep frying.
Btw, I love your idea about using individual cream containers for scrambled eggs. I buy these for my work coffee but it never occurred to me to use it for cooking. I wonder if powdered non-dairy creamer could also work if reconstituted with water? Anybody tried it?
April 26th, 2007 at 12:04 am
Thanks nin! Enjoy your lunch-packing, no matter what container you use!
April 26th, 2007 at 2:16 am
The best of luck to you in getting votes! :3
Also, I was wondering.. you always seem to be mentioning fantastic ideas that you’ve seen in bento cookbooks. Where on earth can I get a hold of these cookbooks?! Thanks! :3
April 26th, 2007 at 8:08 am
Of course not fun *at all* for kids, but I find that a little tiny bit of Glad Press’n Seal works wonders for keeping loose things in one spot (or keeping moisture away from the crunchy things). I usually tear a wide strip off of the roll and use scissors to cut it down to a usable size (then I use the rest of the strip later in the week).
Great idea on the half and half! You can buy those at the store, too. It’s my understanding that they are shelf stable for quite a long time.
April 26th, 2007 at 8:37 am
Thank you!
April 26th, 2007 at 8:38 am
As always, a great looking couple of bentos done in incredibly short time! I admire them so much.
I’ve only once used scrambled eggs and I left that one overnight in the fridge. Kid didn’t complain so I guess it was ok the next day
She has her bento in an insulated bag with several “snow packs” to keep it cool btw.
April 26th, 2007 at 8:38 am
I also have a tiny little deep pot for frying small amounts of food, but it’s a little too dinged up for a nice photo. Haven’t tried the reconstituted powdered creamer — maybe someone else will chime in!
April 26th, 2007 at 8:40 am
Any Japanese-language bookstore near you (Kinokuniya, etc.) would have them, and then there’s always Amazon.co.jp.
April 26th, 2007 at 8:41 am
Funny you should mention Glad Press’n Seal — I used some just this morning to rein in a little container of blueberries in Bug’s bento! I guess it’s the week of rolling, spillable food in our house…
April 26th, 2007 at 8:43 am
Thanks trekkiegrrrl! Sounds like a great, safe way to transport perishable food — I know we don’t want to take risks with our kids’ health (mine is another matter, though!).
April 26th, 2007 at 11:24 am
Oh definitely. We can choose to eat something or not if we think it tastes a little iffy. Kids generally don’t think of that, especially not if it’s something they haven’t tasted before like a lot of the more-or-less japanese stuff I’m experimenting with at the moment. So the adults need to make sure it’s safe to eat.
Kid’s lunch is only out of the fridge for like 3½ hour, from she leaves home and until lunch time, so even without the icepacks it would *probably* be ok. I’m just very picky myself. I detest “room temperature” food. Food should IMO be either HOT or cold as from a fridge. At work I normally keep mine cold, also with icepacks and in an insulating bag, and heat it in the microwave there if it’s anything that should be eaten hot. And I must admit that, except for sushi, I prefer my rice hot.
Oh speaking of perishable food. A few days ago I’d packed shrimps (or prawns, I’m not quite sure of the difference) in my kid’s bento, and I packed them in the morning (everything else was ready) still frozen. At lunchtime they’d thawed, and that day I only packed one snow pack instead of the usual two, because I wanted the prawns to just about thaw. Worked a charm, except I should have put some tissue or something in the little silicon cup they were in, because they’d gone fairly soggy. But they were still cold and fresh :o)
April 26th, 2007 at 12:32 pm
Do you reheat the meals you make, or do you eat them cold?
April 26th, 2007 at 6:07 pm
Bug and I are usually outside when we eat (at parks/playgrounds, playgroup, zoo, etc.), so we eat them cold unless it’s a meal I’ve packed in a thermos or a thermal lunch jar.
April 26th, 2007 at 6:12 pm
The “no room temperature food” thing sounds very Chinese!
They like hot food hot too. Have you tried packing your rice in a little food jar, and your other food in a smaller bento? I did it that way a few times and really liked it (click photo for details):
April 27th, 2007 at 8:02 am
Yes I’ve considered getting one of the insulated bentothings. Problem (in this case) is that I usually make the rice in advance. Generally I cook rice for like 2-3 days at a time, and then I can just heat it before eating it, in a microwave. And luckily kid doesn’t seem to mind cold rice
(though she prefers them hot, too. It’s just not possible for her to heat them as there’s no microwave at school)
Hmm.. I guess I COULD time the rice cooker to make fresh rice in the mornings, at least once in a while. And then one of those bentos would be great. I’ll ponder that a bit. And look at eBay for a solution that doesn’t cost an arm and a leg :o)
April 27th, 2007 at 9:56 am
Ooh, but you can still do it your way without spending much money!!! Just nuke the leftover refrigerated rice in a microwave-safe container, then plunk it into a preheated food jar.
The thermos thing pictured above isn’t a fancy bento thing, it’s just a regular food jar that you can get for about $15 (see link below). Walmart and Target definitely sell them in the kids’ lunch section. Target also has a cool-looking blue one with rubberized top & bottom — check out my (early stage) Amazon aStore here for some options (first page in the “Lunch Containers” section). Or a lot of different food jars here
(the all-plastic ones tend to have bad reviews for heat retention, though).