*Bento box 101* Prepare ingredients for basic bento box!

What's typical for simple, easy but tasty bento box?

There are some commonly used ingredients. Of course, after all, it's totally optional and up to you. If you're allergic or uncomfortable eating to some food, then, try something else. Here, you'll get some ideas that could hopefully help you to create your own special lunch box later on!
Don't worry, I will show you how to

♪White [Rice]♪

So, you're making Japanese bento box! You can't miss it!
If you prefer brown rice, go ahead. If you can't find this kind of thiner grain, you can of course use jasmin rice. It's YOUR rice.
If you're willing to make rice balls, however, I highly recommend using Japanese rice like the link above. (I will talk about some brands later.) In the US, you can find at chinese or korean market too. Nowadays, you can even find them at American local supermarket. Awesome :)
I sometimes even make pasta like today. It is nice to have some variation.

♪Brown/Orange[Meat/Fish]♪

I usually put one kind of main dish. It could be homemade burger or just sauteed/boiled sausages. I am also planning to grill salmon sometime this week.

♪Green [Broccoli]♪

If you want to put salad like greek style or with avocado, good luck with that. It's nice but not practical for lunch box. The best green veggie is broccoli. Just boil them and done! It's super easy but healthy on top of it. Another one could be boiled/sauteed spinach, cabbage or zucchini.  Overall, I love broccoli.


♪Yellow [Egg]♪

Yes, the kind of bento, tamagoyaki! I must write recipe about it, because I just love making and eating those fluffy egg rolls. But, like today, short on egg in the fridge, why not boiled egg :) Just put egg in the cold water in a pan, boil it for 1 minute, leave in the stove for 10 minutes and perfect good looking boiled egg is served.

♪Red [Tomato]♪

It's your choice, but I just love colorful stuff. Colorful bento box makes me so happy. At the end, the color of red gives very vibrant dishes overall. If you don't have grape tomato, that's ok. You can make chicken or pasta with tomato sauce. You can even try squeezing a slice of apple or a piece of strawberry. :)

The next episode, I will share with you how to make tamago yaki! :)
Happy eating!

*Bento box 101* ---Choose your special "box"---

Making your lunch could be challenging, especially when you don't have time, late night, tired from work, or empty refrigerater... 

However, even if you have those situation, you can still make your lunch box in less than 15 minutes! 

Before actually preparing your own meal, let's look for your special box---actual lunch box!

Without going to Japan all the way, you can purchase a really nice one pretty much in anywhere for affordable price online.

In the US where I am now, you could find something like this Japanese style, some stylish cool box or big fulfilling lunch box. Whatever your heart desires. You might want to find something with good materials, rather than those take-out plastic/paper boxes. Overall, you would spend $15~$30 but it will last very long and you won't regret!

Also, if you want to make it prettier, you can use some cupcake paper cups to separate each food. That'd make more colorful lunch box!

So, here's this week!

I wasn't feeling well this week. Well, to be honest, it was very hard. 

It's been only a month since I gave a birth to my second child, and having two children all the time around makes me very exhausting. It's rewarding at the same time though :)

Making lunchbox for my husband is another challenge too. I want to start get ready around 6:00am, cook the rice and start preparing all the other dishes, plus breakfast by 7am. Well, it doesn't go smooth as I wish. Sometimes baby is crying, sometimes I'm feeding him, sometimes my daughter is already up and wants to change her clothes and the list just keeps going on and on... Everyday has different routine, but more or less I secure the time to cook quickly and efficiently, writing scenario in my head of what to do one after another.

I only learn how to cook while I was in Japan until 18, so it is pretty much limited. I wish I had more time to learn from my mom, but I'm learing from her now through emails and videochat.

I have so many memories of lunchbox. Throughout kindergarten to middle school, I had school lunch. I mean, it's not like what you imagine. It's like something you could eat at Japanese restaurant here in the US. It was pretty awesome. Tasty, warm, healthy, well-balanced and lots of fun. Some special occasion like school trip, I brought lunchbox that my mom made. I still remember one morning of the school trip, my parents were up so early, like 5am to make onigiri, very special one. My dad, who is an architect, cut the seaweed into a shape of face and hair like me and paste them into the rice balls that my mom made. It was a teamwork, and I remember so clearly peeking the scene with dim light behind the door of kitchen.

I will share some recipes of my lunchbox little by little. It will be such a fun project! 

I am already thinking about next week's menu, and I can't wait to try it out :)

*Brand new start*

it's been a quite while. mainly my life has just gotten busier and changed in many ways... we have additional family member now!
so, it's only been just over a month since my baby "goku" (n.b. nickname :p) was born. my princess "cotton candy" is now 4 and a big sister. my husband "pazu" is as usual sweet, kind, funny and loving person.

how about me? it's hectic to keep myself uplifting, doing all the errands at home, feeding, playing, cleaning, cooking, carrying, wiping and feeding again, more cleaning... all around.
time to challenge myself in a constant way. what am i good at? i'm a musician and got master's degree, but hey, once you have two little kids, it's not that easy. pazu knows very well i'm not a good organizer. but what do i do everyday? cooking... that's not my strongest either, but i decided to visually keep the record and see how i can improve...

so, here it is! i will show my bento box for pazu which i make everyday.