Archive for the 'beans' Category

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Korean mandu bento lunch

You don’t have to have gourmet leftovers on hand for a quick but satisfying bento lunch. Here’s a simple vegetarian lunch that I threw together from frozen foods and pantry staples.

Contents of preschooler lunch: Rectangular Korean vegetarian dumplings (pan-fried mandu, like potstickers with a crispy bottom and soft steamed top) and dipping sauce, edamame, strawberry and a shelf-stable mini pudding cup (Kiku Petit Pudding, like a little flan or creme caramel, found here online and in Cost Plus World Market’s retail stores in the U.S.). The pudding cups can be frozen and used as edible ice packs in bento lunches for maximum packed lunch food safety. I like the Assi brand “Cooked Vegetable Dumplings” (calorie info here) that I picked up at Kukje, a large local Korean market (store info at my list of favorite SF Bay Area ethnic markets). They cook and cool quickly because they’re flat and thin, and you get maximum crispy surface area on the bottom. Perfect on mornings when I don’t have nice leftovers ready to go in the fridge.

Morning prep time: 12 minutes, using frozen dumplings and edamame. In the morning I pan-fried & steamed the frozen, store-bought dumplings in a mini frying pan, and lightly simmered the edamame in the hot pan afterwards while the dumplings cooled on a mini cooling rack. I also use the mini cooling rack and pan in my convection toaster oven for fast meal prep; they were only US$1.50 per piece at Daiso (Japanese dollar store with branches internationally, additional store info at my San Francisco Bay Area shopping guide to bento gear). (Full details here with speed packing info.)

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Published by Biggie on May 21st, 2008 tagged beans, bento, dumplings or buns, for kids, vegetarian | 28 Comments »

Ma po tofu and Sloppy Joe lunches

Not all dishes fare well cool or at room temperature. Just imagine Sloppy Joe filling eaten cold — congealed and nasty. Because there are no microwave ovens at my son’s preschool or at the park, I like to have a thermal food jar or thermal lunch jar on hand to expand lunch options to include warm food.

Amazon carries thermal bento sets with a thermal food jar and an insulated carrying case for packing cool side dishes. You can achieve the same the effect on the cheap by using a regular thermal food jar that you can find at stores like Target or Walmart, plus a small side dish container for the room temperature or cool foods. (Read more about hot vs. cold lunch packing considerations.) When I use this set for my own lunches, I also like to pack fresh rice in the thermal lunch jar, keeping it warm and soft until I’m ready to eat. (Note to San Francisco locals: Kamei has the two Zojirushi-brand sets behind the counter for $33. Store info at the SF local shopping guide.)

Later this week I’ll be traveling out to Philadelphia to visit my ailing grandmother, so I won’t be as responsive as usual on the comment front. I’ll still be updating the blog from the road, but just a quick heads up. It’ll be interesting to see how my husband fares packing our three-year-old’s lunches on his own for two days; I promised to help by planning out simple menus that require only quick assembly. Maybe he should read my Mommy’s Lunch Manifesto — Need for Speed… I hear that works for dads too.

Contents of preschooler bento lunch: Homemade ma po tofu (with tofu, ground pork, enoki mushrooms and salted black beans), rice, edamame and apple bunnies made with miniature Red Delicious apples that Bug and I found at Safeway (see the apple rabbit tutorial). I thought apple bunnies were out of the picture because Bug doesn’t like apple skin anymore, but something about these tiny apples made him ask for apple bunnies.

Morning prep time: 10 minutes, using leftover mapo tofu. In the morning I made the apple rabbits first and got them soaking in acidulated ice water to curl the ears and prevent the fruit from browning, then moved on to warming the frozen rice and ma po tofu in the microwave and pre-warming the thermal food jar with hot tap water while the apples soaked. (Read on for packing details, Sloppy Joe lunch and recipe, and review of Bush’s Grillin’ Beans.)

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Published by Biggie on May 11th, 2008 tagged beans, bento, food jar, for kids, glutenfree, lactose free, meat, recipe, review, rice | 25 Comments »

Tocino and simit sesame bread lunches

Contents of preschooler lunch: Sesame bread (Turkish simit or Greek koulouri), Filipino pork tocino (sweet cured pork), grape tomatoes, wrapped cheese triangle, and Sabra roasted garlic hummus from Costco. This was from the first batch of tocino I’ve cooked (from a frozen package); it was sweet like longanisa sausage and Bug downed it happily (he passed on the traditional vinegar accompaniment). Next time I’ll try packing it with some fried rice and fried egg to make Filipino comfort food…

Morning prep time: 3 minutes, using all leftovers.

Packing: I tucked a little pick into the center compartment for the pork, and the box’s built-in dividers and watertight lid contained the thick hummus without leaking. Lunch packed in one 350ml tier of a Lock & Lock lunch set.

Contents of my lunch: Sandwich of hummus, ham and thinly sliced cucumber on Turkish sesame bread. Venezuelan eggplant, grapes, and grape tomatoes.

Morning prep time: 5 minutes, using leftover eggplant.

Packing: The tiny tomatoes act as gap fillers to stabilize the lunch during transport, and the eggplant went into a reusable silicone baking cup to keep it away from the grapes. This was a bit of a poor choice on my part, as the lunch got shaken around before eating, and some of the oil from the eggplant leaked out of the cup. It didn’t get on the rest of the food, but with a little more shaking it probably would have. If I were to repack this, I’d either put the eggplant in a disposable lidded plastic cup or drain and dry the eggplant before packing it in the silicone cup. Packed in a 500ml Leaflet box with movable divider.

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Published by Biggie on October 23rd, 2007 tagged beans, bento, for kids, lactose free, meat, sandwich or wrap | 9 Comments »

Seafood soup lunches

In an effort to get through my photo backlog before Bug’s first day of preschool on Monday, here are some remains of a lovely Peruvian meal from Fina Estampa restaurant in San Francisco. The standout was aguadito de mariscos, a shellfish soup with cilantro sauce, rice and white wine. I packed my soup in a little thermal bento set, which is handy in that the lid of the thermos lifts off instead of screwing off, so it’s easy for little hands to open. Although similar sets sell here and here for about US$40 (ouch), you can duplicate this setup on the cheap by using a thermal food jar and separate bento box packed in an insulated lunch bag to take both hot and cold foods at the same time.

Contents of my lunch: Aguadito de mariscos (shellfish soup with cilantro sauce, rice and white wine), pink beans with sofrito, smoked ham, mustard sauce and fresh pineapple. The mustard sauce recipe is from Cookâ€™s Illustratedâ€™s The New Best Recipe, and the beans with sofrito is from Daisy Cooks! (The Cook’s recipe link works if you subscribe to their online edition).

Morning prep time: 5 minutes, using all leftovers.

Packing: I preheated the food jar with hot tap water while heating the soup in the microwave. Packedin a 560ml insulated bento set (240ml rice jar and 160ml side dishes).

Contents of Bug’s lunch: Yellow rice with Peruvian beef and vegetables, wrapped cheese triangle, and fresh pineapple.

Morning prep time: 5 minutes, using all leftovers.

Packing: I cut the beef and vegetables small for easy preschooler eating, then mixed it in with the rice and microwaved briefly to restore the texture of the refrigerated rice. A little plastic food divider (bought at Daiso in Daly City, US$1.50 for a good-size assorted pack). Packed in a 270ml one-tier Thomas the Tank Engine box with the hard plastic sub-containers removed to fit all the rice.

Contents of my husband’s lunch: The same as mine, with TastyBite-brand Jaipur vegetable curry (from a ready-to-eat pouch).

Packing: Instead of using a separate sauce container, I decided to take advantage of the secure built-in dividers in the Lock & Lock container and spoon the mustard sauce in right next to the ham. It worked out fine; the viscous sauce didn’t jump compartments, and it gave each bite of ham good flavor. Packed in a 300ml thermal food jar and one 350ml tier of a Lock & Lock lunch set.

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Published by Biggie on September 29th, 2007 tagged beans, bento, fish or seafood, food jar, for kids, meat, rice, soup or stew | 2 Comments »

Disposable lunches for airplane

I packed a couple of bento lunches in disposable containers for my in-laws’ airplane flight home after their visit. They’re a little busier than our normal lunches, but I’m pleased with the diabetic version for my father-in-law because of the limited food options for diabetics on airplanes. They tell me that they were the envy of the other passengers and flight crew. I usually appreciate the reusability of proper bento boxes, but this is the rare case when a disposable box was a better option — when the boxes won’t be coming home to me at all.

Contents of my mother-in-law’s lunch: Ham & cheese sandwich with mustard sauce on low-carb bread, TastyBite Jaipur vegetable curry, red bell pepper strips and poppy seed dressing, Swiss and Cheddar cheese slices, pink beans with sofrito, blueberries and pineapple, wrapped cheese triangle, and corn chips.

Prep time: 0 minutes the morning of, 15 minutes the night before (mostly spent staring at our assorted leftovers, trying to figure out what could go where and fill the gaps). The beans and pineapple were leftovers, as was the ready-made curry from a shelf-stable pouch.

Packing: Everything is disposable except the sauce container with salad dressing for the bell pepper. To keep the bread from getting soggy, I first toasted the bread and used cheese as a moisture barrier next to the bread so that the mustard sauce didn’t come into contact with it. The curry went into a disposable lidded condiment container. I rubber-banded the containers (3 for about $1 at Ichiban Kan in San Francisco), wrapped the two lunches together in a spare dish towel, then tucked two plastic forks into the flap on the top. I used the traditional bento box wrap shown on this illustrated how-to wrapping chart (Otsukai Tsutsumi). This kept the flimsy containers contained compactly so they could be thrown into carry-on luggage, and the dishcloth could be used as either a placemat or napkin.

Contents of my father-in-law’s lunch: This is the diabetic version of my mother-in-law’s, but with ham and mustard sauce solo (not in a sandwich), a salad with low-carb ranch dressing (by Eating Right), and Bengali smothered cabbage with mustard oil.

Packing: I used cheese slices as an edible divider to keep the ham away from the corn chips, and put the moist cabbage and mustard sauce in disposable lidded condiment containers. I now realize I wasn’t thinking enough about the restriction on liquids and gels when I packed this; my in-laws were probably lucky they didn’t have problems with the mustard sauce in airport security.

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