Bento #81 - Cupcakes and Tortellini

How delicious does this look? Super delicious, that's how delicious! So over the weekend, I made a whopping 48 cupcakes, because I had some boxes of mix that had expired recently, and if you don't use them soon after, they're not going to bake properly. You didn't see a cupcake in yesterday's bento because I brought in about 30 of them in a big container... and ate like 3, haha. Anyway, I have a brownie cupcake with vanilla icing and candy chips. The brownie cupcakes are weird... they don't rise, but that makes them perfect for bento, because the icing will fit below the wrapper's height (but you can't just ice them with a knife, you need to use a bag). They're also a little greasy and don't peel well off the paper... so basically, they're super weird but still really good. I've also got a silicon cup of cashews, grapes, strawberries (with sugar) and two gummies: one melon, one apple.


And hey! Remember the last time I had three cheese tortellini with prosciutto in a bento, over a year ago? Had it again! And it's still super delicious! Unlike last time, I made it with peas... if you compare the two pictures (now and then), I think you'll find I was right in that it adds a lot of color to the dish. (The background paper doesn't hurt, either.)

Bento #80 - More Egg Drop Soup

This is the remainder of the delicious egg drop soup I had yesterday. Still delicious! I've also got salmon rice, this time with little nori apple accents. I also made more deviled eggs over the weekend, so I've got one of those along with strawberries (with separate sugar), grapes, cashews, a melon gummi, and an adorable mini funfetti cupcake! How cute is that? I completely forgot I had a whole stash of these in my freezer, but they're so adorable that I almost don't want to eat them. This was all really tasty... I wish I wasn't so lazy, I'd make (instead of order) egg drop soup every freaking day, it's so goooooood!

Bento #79 - Tasty Chinese Food

I ordered Chinese food again, but from a different restaurant than last time. That's why the egg drop soup looks so good, rather than all pale and unappetizing. The chicken lo mein wasn't quite as good as the other place's though... dilemma! Anyway, I've got delicious egg drop soup, decent tasting lo mein with nori stars, grapes on the stem, sliced strawberries (with separate sugar), and string cheese. I've also got a little silicon penguin filled with marshmallows... they're stale mini marshmallows, and I know I'm weird, but they're sooo good! They've got like... a resistance to them, but then they're all marshmallow softness on the inside. Next to the silicon penguin I've also got a piece of a brownie cookie bar I made. I wish I'd taken a picture of the whole pan, it's like a Frankenstein baked good, with brownie as a base and chunks of chocolate chip cookies everywhere... weird, but really tasty.

I also brought some brownie cookie bars in to school in a container and shared them with a bunch of people... I think I ate another two pieces myself though, haha.

Bento #78 - More Salmon Rice, with Nori Accents!

How delicious and pretty does this lunch look!? I'm finally using those nori punches I bought way back in July! Haha, I am a procrastinator in everything! Anyway, the main dish for this lunch was, as you can see, rice with tamago furikake, cooked smoked salmon, and flower-shaped nori punch outs. The latter held up surprisingly well in the humidity of the insulated compartment, and were delicious at lunchtime!

This is (obviously) in my Mr. Bento, so there's more to it than just the rice! I've also got miso soup (again from a packet), two mini powdered donuts, a mini mint 3 musketeers, a melon gummi, and a blueberry tootsie pop (I had to shorten the stick to get it to fit, though!). I've also got sliced strawberries (with sugar for dipping), a couple of grapes on the stem, and a string cheese sliced in half to fit.

Bento #77 - Adorable Piggy Box!

Today I'm using a box that my friend Jane got for me... look below! How cute is it!? Anyway, this is (obviously) a snack bento. So, starting from the top left, I've got sliced strawberries, mixed nuts, a row of delicious powdered mini donuts, grapes on the stem, and sugar for the strawberries. I didn't need to bring a fork because there's on built in the box! (It's also why the left side is in shadow... it's filled shallowly, because the fork compartment "dips" down into the bento box.) I ate basically everything but the nuts with the fork, although the donuts made a powdery mess inside the box, getting cut up and speared and such.

How cute is this box!? Super cute, that's how cute. Much cuter than the other picture I could have included, of the super-boring nutella sandwich I ate for lunch... look at the box! So cute!

Bento #76 - Salmon Rice & Miso Soup

Yum! This is some salmon rice, a food that has recently been one of my favorites. :) It's just rice with tamago furikake, and a bit of "cooked" smoked salmon. It's super easy, but it's also super tasty! I've got miso soup (from a packet... I have miso paste, but no tofu, so I'm stuck using the packets) in the water-tight container. I've also got grapes on the stem, a string cheese sliced in half (to fit), a babybel cheese, mini powdered donuts, chocolate marshmallows (I believe from here), and a mint for fresh breath after! Like I said before... yum!

Bento #75 - Separated Udon

One of my favorite things to have for dinner is udon noodles with a fried egg and any other delicious things (fried Spam, button mushrooms, hot dogs, salmon) I can find to throw in. Since the water-tight container in the Mr. Bento isn't nearly big enough to fit a serving of udon, I thought I'd just never be able to have it in a bento. And then I used my brain! :) So I separated the broth and the noodles, putting the broth in the water-tight insulated container, and the noodles and egg and "cooked" smoked salmon (and wakame) in the normal insulated container. So that's what you see here. I've also got grapes on the stem, a babybel cheese, mixed nuts, powdered donuts, a mini mint 3 musketeer, and a mint.

Here you can see the whole thing at lunch time when I poured the broth in with the noodles... the picture's a little blurry because I took it at my desk, so my apologies for that. The whole set up works surprisingly well, with no overflow of broth when combined, or huge mess from the noodles when it's being hauled around.

By "cooked" smoked salmon, I just mean normal smoked salmon that I threw in with the noodles and broth for the last minute or so of it being on the stove... smoked salmon is kind of slimy when it's raw, which is great on bagels, but not so great in udon.

Bento #74 - Snack Snack Snack Snack

Wow, there's a lot of different foods in here! I didn't feel like making an actual lunch that would fit in this enormous box, so I just threw whatever I could find in here and snacked on it all day! Going from the top left corner, I've got two silicon cups of strawberries, a chocolate pudding cup, peeled and sliced carrots (with ranch dressing to dip them in), grapes on the stem, a container of sugar for the strawberries, 2 mini powdered donuts, a babybel cheese, and a cup of mixed nuts. I used this enormous box because I really wanted pudding and to use the yellow-orange cup I put the nuts in, but they wouldn't fit in any of my other boxes. :)

Bento #73 - And Now I'm Out of Bread Too

No bread and no bananas means no sandwich (despite the fact that I still have nutella). So all I have today is a snack box with two string cheeses, a banana applesauce, and a silicon cup of mixed nuts. I really like how the string cheeses force the silicon cup into a square shape... I don't have any square silicon cups, and I kind of want some, so it made me happy. I ate this during class (except for the nuts, I ate those later) and it was almost as filling as a sandwich would have been.

Bento #72 - Out of Bananas

Agh, Tuesday... a 3 hour block of classes is never any fun. I've got a huge homework due tomorrow, so I'll probably be staying late tonight. I've got a sandwich below, but here in my snack box I've got a string cheese, a silicon cup of mixed nuts, a cinnamon applesauce, a gummi hamburger, and a melon gummi. This isn't a lot of food, but I haven't had time to make a trip to the grocery store and hence I'm lacking a lot of my bento staples.

You look at this picture, and you say "But... I thought you weren't going to take any more pictures of your super-boring nutella and banana sandwiches?" And I reply "For your information, first off, they may be boring, but they're delicious, and secondly, this isn't a banana and nutella sandwich... If you'd paid attention to the title, you'd know I was out of bananas. It is a nutella and cinnamon sugar sandwich, and it may be even more delicious than a banana and nutella sandwich." So there.