Since yesterday was a national holiday in Japan, I had to wait until today before I could get my first bento of the week!

As you can see, the Missus prepared a very solid bento today with two kinds of musubi/rice balls.

“Leftovers bento for you today!”, she said. One musubi contained cheese and fish sausage, the whole wrapped in Trevise.

The other musubi, wrapped in lettuce contained smaoked salmon and tobikko, flying fish roe, for a “oya-ko combination”/”parent and child” combination, topped with olive and seasoned with mayonnaise.

Mini-tomatoes and pickled myoga ginger sprouts were also included for taste and design.

The salad garnish was also composed of leftovers: spicy mushrooms salad, pickled carrot salad, walnuts, soft poached egg seasoned with black sesame seeds and bean salad.
Where is my dessert?

Hearty leftovers, and tasty at that!
Sorry for the fuzzy pics!

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Warren Bobrow, Bread + Butter, Zoy Zhang, Hungry Neko, Think Twice, Frank Fariello, Mangantayon, Hapabento, Elinluv Tidbit Corner, Tokyo Terrace, Maison de Christina, Chrys Niles,Lexi, Culinary Musings, Wheeling Gourmet, Comestiblog, Chronicles Of A Curious Cook, Bento Boutique, Tokyo Through The Drinking Glass, Tokyo Foodcast, Urban Sake, Sake World, Palate To Pen, Yellin Yakimono Gallery, Tokyo Terrace, Hilah Cooking, More than a Mount Full, Arkonite Bento

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The Missus and I went to this beautiful island called Kume Island off Okinawa main island last week, and we took the opportunity to visit the local supermarkets as these are the best places to learn what the local truly eat at home.
We found a special mix to add to rice when steaming it and it certainly for delicious musubi/rice balls!

The Missus seemed to really enjoy herself as she offered me a pe-tasting of her bento with breakfast! It certainly made for a very tradional and colourful bento again!

For a closer look of the musubi!

As for the garnish, she made tuna patties (secret recipe, sorry! I wasn’t told about it, either!) that she fried and served with lemon slices for extra seasoning and added some lightly fried sweet pimentoes for colour, fibers and vitamins. A feww slices of pickled daikon were also added later.

As for the salad/dessert: potato and vegetables salad, mini-tomatoes and plain (but delicious!) tamagoyaki/Japanese omelette.

Poor me, I will have to wait until next Tuesday till the next bento!

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Warren Bobrow, Bread + Butter, Zoy Zhang, Hungry Neko, Think Twice, Frank Fariello, Mangantayon, Hapabento, Elinluv Tidbit Corner, Tokyo Terrace, Maison de Christina, Chrys Niles,Lexi, Culinary Musings, Wheeling Gourmet, Comestiblog, Chronicles Of A Curious Cook, Bento Boutique, Tokyo Through The Drinking Glass, Tokyo Foodcast, Urban Sake, Sake World, Palate To Pen, Yellin Yakimono Gallery, Tokyo Terrace, Hilah Cooking, More than a Mount Full, Arkonite Bento

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Finally back to “normal life” after this short but great trip to the other extremity of Japan, namely Kume Island/久米島/ off Okinawa. A few postings and a lot of pictures will soon be featured on this blog!

The Missus used that favourite woven bento box, which was actually containing a bento when we bought it! It proved a bargain in the end!LOL

The “sushi maki” were made with ton toro/豚トロ or very soft pork slices that the Missus deep-fried in tonkatsu style before wrapping them in plain rice steamed with a piece of konbu/seaweed and eolling them into lettuce for great presentation and nutritious balance.

She added soft-boiled egg marinated in a concoction of hers and sprinkled with black sesame seeds. She completed the box with some stir-fried renkon/lotus root slices seasoned with chopped scallions, dry bonito shavings/katsuo bushi and chili pepper mix.

The salad contributed more balance, vitamins, fibers and so forth with beans, celery, tomato, cucumber, lettuce, trevise, walnuts and cheese.

For dessert and more vitamin C, benihoppe/red cheeks strwawberries from Shizuoka. We are almost at the end of their season!

Back to a healthy diet!

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Warren Bobrow, Bread + Butter, Zoy Zhang, Hungry Neko, Think Twice, Frank Fariello, Mangantayon, Hapabento, Elinluv Tidbit Corner, Tokyo Terrace, Maison de Christina, Chrys Niles,Lexi, Culinary Musings, Wheeling Gourmet, Comestiblog, Chronicles Of A Curious Cook, Bento Boutique, Tokyo Through The Drinking Glass, Tokyo Foodcast, Urban Sake, Sake World, Palate To Pen, Yellin Yakimono Gallery, Tokyo Terrace, Hilah Cooking, More than a Mount Full, Arkonite Bento

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As we are leaving on our (very short) Spring holiday tomorrow to Kume Island near Okinawa Island, the Missus had to concoct today’s bento with whatever she could find in the fridge and the “pantry”.
My bento friend at Hapabento will note that my (?) half is using traditional (and small) bento boxes until she finds one of her liking make of cedar tree wood. I agree that the woven box ought to be fine, but I’m going to contradict the resident dragon!

This time she actually used two boxes as the rice and meat garnish took all the space in the bottom tier.

The rice was plain steamed rice, but the chicken that she fried with mushrooms (shimeji maibly) and cut leeks provided for plenty of “sauce” and seasoning, agremented with black sesame seeds..

The pickels were all home-made: red daikon, mini lemons and wasabi stems and leaves.

The second granish box made for plenty of colours!
marinated carrot salad and celery leaf, tamagoyaki containing shiso leaves, boiled peas in the pod and radishes.
Plenty of vitamins and fibers!

For a better view of the tamagoyaki.
Frankly speaking I love these “leftovers” bentoes! LOL

RECOMMENDED RELATED SITES:
Warren Bobrow, Bread + Butter, Zoy Zhang, Hungry Neko, Think Twice, Frank Fariello, Mangantayon, Hapabento, Elinluv Tidbit Corner, Tokyo Terrace, Maison de Christina, Chrys Niles,Lexi, Culinary Musings, Wheeling Gourmet, Comestiblog, Chronicles Of A Curious Cook, Bento Boutique, Tokyo Through The Drinking Glass, Tokyo Foodcast, Urban Sake, Sake World, Palate To Pen, Yellin Yakimono Gallery, Tokyo Terrace, Hilah Cooking, More than a Mount Full, Arkonite Bento

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What with our pending trip to Kume Island, Okinawa, which promises a lot of eating and drinking, the Missus will keep an eye on my calories for the next two days!
So it was back again to a more traditional form of Japanese bento!

She steamed the sice with shredded carrot (you know, those carotenes?) and mixed later with black sesame seeds. She accompanied the rice with home-made pickled red daikon for colour and balance.

As for the garnish, she kept it well-balanced but controlled the volume with an eye for colours.

Salad of pickled green and red cabbage, carrots and konbu seaweed for the fibers. Boiled peas intheir pods for more fibers, iron and vitamin C, seasoned with umeboshi!

For the meat garnish, she prepared a pork and beans stew by frying pieces of pork belly before adding boiled beans and tomato sauce. She sprinkled the lot with chopped parsley and rested a soft boiled egg half which had been marinated in a soy sauce mixture of her own.

For dessert, benihoppe/red cheeks strawberries from Shizuoka. Did you that 2 strawberries contain enough Vitamin C for a single person for a whole day?

RECOMMENDED RELATED SITES:
Warren Bobrow, Bread + Butter, Zoy Zhang, Hungry Neko, Think Twice, Frank Fariello, Mangantayon, Hapabento, Elinluv Tidbit Corner, Tokyo Terrace, Maison de Christina, Chrys Niles,Lexi, Culinary Musings, Wheeling Gourmet, Comestiblog, Chronicles Of A Curious Cook

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Spring has come early in Shizuoka, the mildest region in Japan after Okinawa.
This is both a bonus and a pain. We get all these great vegetables before eveyone else, but we are also plagued with grotty weather and cold rain. Mind you, we shouldn’t complain compared to other regions.
In the end it means that the bentoes will be both rich in calories and vitamins!

The rice part this time consisted of two kinds of te-mari sushi balls/手まり寿司. The missus, used freshly steamed rice, formed the balls by wrapping rice and the garnish together in cellophane paper, twisting it closed and shaping in balls with her hands. This type of sushi is particular popular in the Kyoto area, where they are both served to adults and kids with beautiful effect.
One of my te-mari sushi contained cheese and was topped with raw ham and some fresh dill.
The other contained Japanese-style pickled cucumber (Very finely chopped) and sesame seeds, and was topped with smoked salmon, lemon, capers and a little tartare sauce. A small piece of lettuce added colour and vitamins!

The salad part included home-made marinated carrot tagliatelle salad with walnuts, mini tomatoes and soft-boiled egg. The whole was surrounded by a wealth of hand-broken leaf vegetables: ice plant, trevise, luccolla, and others as well as sliced red radish and mini tomato.

As for dessert I took a couple of mikan/madarines from The Missus’ family garden.
Once again, colourful, healthy and tasty!

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Warren Bobrow, Bread + Butter, Zoy Zhang, Hungry Neko, Think Twice, Frank Fariello, Mangantayon, Hapabento, Elinluv Tidbit Corner, Tokyo Terrace, Maison de Christina, Chrys Niles,Lexi, Culinary Musings, Wheeling Gourmet, Comestiblog, Chronicles Of A Curious Cook

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Shizuoka is replete with new vegetables in this supposedly early Spring and buying them at the local markets in view of including (sorry having them included by the Missus) in the next day’s bento is great fun!

It certainly makes for very colourful bentoes, too!
The Missus has been looking around shops for this elusive (meaning big enough) pinewood bento box for better looks and better taste (she believes that the pine wood will enhance the taste of her creations).
The steamed rice looks violet because it has been supplemented with a little (too much would the rice too dark) with Kuromai/黒米 or “Black Rivce”.
Actually it is not black rice, but dark violet rice. It comes from Iriomote Island in Okinawa. It is simply “ancient rice” as it used to be many centuries ago. It does provide a lot of useful nutrients that have disappeared after white rice was polished.

Now for the garnish:
The Missus concocted her tamagoyaki/Japanese omelette with cheese and ciboulette, also called civette, chiboulette, brelette (French), Schnittlauch (German), chives (English), cebolleta (Spanish). They habeen cultivated for some time in Japan and people are starting discovering them. They contain plenty of Vitamin C and iron! The vegetables include boiled and fried lotus root slices, home-made pickled mini lemons and a new vegetable grown in Fukuoka, Kyushu. I still remember the name but I will check today again and write up some information!

More of the mystery green vegetable, eringe mushrooms. sweet red piments chicken fillets, the whole fried in spicy sauce and agremented with black sesame seeds.

Dessert was benihppe/red cheeks strawberries and mikan/winter oranges from Shizuoka.

Complete, healthy and tasty bento!

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Warren Bobrow, Bread + Butter, Zoy Zhang, Hungry Neko, Think Twice, Frank Fariello, Mangantayon, Hapabento, Elinluv Tidbit Corner, Tokyo Terrace, Maison de Christina, Chrys Niles,Lexi, Culinary Musings, Wheeling Gourmet, Comestiblog

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The Missus made this bento today because she is having her annual check-up tomorrow morning, meaning she will have to eat dinner before I arrive back home. Since I’m on a diet, I will do with a protein drink tonight!

In such cases she opts for “open sandwich” bentoes, with the result of an easyand healthy lunch.

She toasted English muffin and provided me with a small pot of salmon paste.

As for the garnish, it included lettuce, red radishes and their leaves and dip (I always eat the leaves!), seasoned salad of celery, cucumber and red cabbage, mini tomatoes, raw ham, cheese and walnuts and plenty of fruit: pink grapefruit, kiwi fruit and benihoppe/red cheeks strawberries. the latter two are grown in Shizuoka!

Colourful and plenty of Vitamins (real ones!)

RECOMMENDED RELATED SITES:
Warren Bobrow, Bread + Butter, Zoy Zhang, Hungry Neko, Think Twice, Frank Fariello, Mangantayon, Hapabento, Elinluv Tidbit Corner, Tokyo Terrace, Maison de Christina, Chrys Niles,Lexi, Culinary Musings, Wheeling Gourmet

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The Missus is still in her traditional bento mode.
First of all, I’d like to say that although the box looks big on the pictures, it is smaller than my usual fare.
It is traditional, not only in design and taste, but also in size!

This time the “mazegohan”/mixed rice was a bit complicated.
The Missus had prepared pork belly for three days by regularly massaging in salt and sugar for no less than 3 days.
Before steaming the rice, she cut the pork into tiny bits and fried it in sesame oil.
She steamed the rice together with the fried pork and its juices, pieces of carrots, and pieces of sakuraebi aburaage. Aburaage is deep-fried tofu sheets. The sakura ebi/cherry blossom shrimps were originally mixed into the aburaage when she bought it. She ut it into strips and dry-fry them first, before cutting them again into small pieces she steamed together with the rice.
Once the rice had been steamed, she stirred the whole and added cut boiled peas in their pod, shredded konbu/seaweed she had used for streaming the rice and black sesame seeds.

As for the “garnish”, it consisted of half soft-boiled egg lightly marinated in soy sauce and something elese, boiled Na no hana/rapeseed flowers seasoned with gomadare/sesame dressing, mini tomatoes, freshly cut yamaimo/yam seasoned with umeboshi flesh, and white and black sesame seeds, and home-made stewed beans (sweet) for dessert.

Very healthy and tasty!

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Warren Bobrow, Bread + Butter, Zoy Zhang, Hungry Neko, Think Twice, Frank Fariello, Mangantayon, Hapabento, Elinluv Tidbit Corner, Tokyo Terrace, Maison de Christina, Chrys Niles,Lexi, Culinary Musings, Wheeling Gourmet

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The Missus is “feeling the pressure”! Well, that’s she keeps on saying these days if I have the temerity to come to the kitchen to have a look at her at work!
I’ve also noticed quite a few bento magazines laying around in our home too and heard “I can do better than that!” comments.
Well, I’m certainly going to pile on the pressure!LOL

Today’s bento was very much according to traditions:

Three musubi/rice balls. Two of them contained fried salted salmon, chopped fresh shiso/perilla leaves and sesame seeds, the other sesame seeds, both yellow and black (they are actually the same, but roasted differently) and umeboshi/Japanese pickled plum. All musubi were wrapped in shiso leaves.

The tamagoyaki/Japanese omelette was plain tamagoyaki with melting cheese. Tasted more like dessert!

The “Garnish” consisted of:
Top left corner: Pickled mini-melons and pickled wasabi stems.
Bottom left corner: Salad of boiled beans and violet sweet potato.
Right half: Stir-fried prawns in sweet and sour sauce and boiled broccoli!

The Missus must have read my recent posting on Food Supplements!LOL

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I called this bento “the Convict Bento” bedause it was not supposed to be posted last Tuesday. The Missus was in a hurry and a grumpy mood (for good reasons?) and tersely ordered, “not for the blog!”.
I have a propensity to disobey the Missus’ orders…

It was the “open sandwich-style” bento with English muffins.
Quite simple, almost analog, but filling, tasty and colourful.

The fillings consisted of:
Boiled baby corns, white asparaguses, pois gourmends/green peas in their pods, cut green string beans with their dip dressing.
Japanese-style scrambled eggs (containing some gren veg), Japanese-char siu (cold), carrot and walnut salad, and mini tomatoes (dessert?).

Pickled green young melons (a Japanese specialty), Boiled and sauteed sato imo/taro tubers with black sesame seeds, violet kawaire daikon sprouts (for more vitamin C and iron). Plenty of lettuce was also included for making the sandwiches.

I was pretty happy about it, actually!

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The Missus might be right after all when she throws the epithtet, “jiji”, at me when she gets exasperated at me.
“Jiji” means “Grandpa” when muttered by kids when they are seeking further treats, and downright “senile old man” when proffered by my supposedly better half.
After using my hi-tec Japanese mobile phone camera, I finally discovered I had picture size options up to 2 MB! I had been using the 30KB option until then….

The pics are truly enormous now, but reducing them to this will mean a finer grain and an enhanced picture.
The only problem is that it takes ages to download and upload!

The Missus has been experimenting of late.
Today she steamed plain rice before mixing it with roasted sesasme seeds and finely chopped pickled wasabi leaves.
She then made large musubi she rolled inside thin pork slices. She fried the the rolls first with a little sesame oil, and then some tare/Japanese sauce.

She is going to kill if she finds out I handled them with my bare fingers!
As for the garnish, she fried some ready cooked sato imo/taro roots seasoned with black sesame seeds.

She also included a soft-boiled egg of hers (she never revealed the full recipe!) and boiled spinach seasoned with gomadare/sesame dressing.

As for the side dish, she prepared a salad-dessert with lettuce, mini tomatoes, boiled broccoli, cheese and orange wedges.

A true winter bento, “jiji”!

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The Missus was into her “colourful” mode in spite of all the grumbling today!

The rice was plain steamed rice sprinkled with roasted sesame seeds with enough peeping out for the looks (and photograph!).
Chicken was “karaage”/Japanese-style deep-fried chicken agremented with pimento pieces in sweet and sour sauce.. and a another sprinkle of roasted seame seeds.

As for the garnish it was a bit of an embarrassment of choices as where to start eating!
Tamagoyaki/Japanese omelette 8 ab it on the sweet note this time), lettuce, mini-tomatoes, Boiled carrots, romanesco broccoli and Brussels sprouts, with some dippping sauce under the the broccoli.

And for dessert?
A big orange from Shizuoka!

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Yesterday I had to go to that disliked city called Tokyo for a Cricket AGM and had to ride the Shikansen Bullet train from Shizuoka City.
It was an incredibly clear windy day. Mount Fuji was magnificent.
Back in the evening I enjoyed the rare sight in Tokyo of a dark Mount Fuji in the distance silhouetted by fiery skies.
I managed to take some pics on the way to Tokyo with my mobile phone camera. Look at the pictures at the end of this posting!

The Missus (who now takes her own pics) pointed out I should take the pic of the bento with the rice in the background, not in the foreground… Who can argue?

So I will start with garnish:
Soft-boiled egg/han-yude-tamago, later marinated in soy sauce, sake and mirin (and probably a little ginger).
Alabcore tuna/tonbo magura (the cheaper kind) first marinated for a little while in soy sauce then fried (with the lid on) topped with cheese and served topped again with some home-made wasabi leaves and flowers pickles (verystrong!).
Lettuce for balance and decoration.

For the slad and vitamins part, mini-tomatoes, home-made pickled carrot salad with black olives and black sesame seeds, na ho hana/rape blossoms salad seasoned with goma dare/sesame dressing.

The rice was steamed together with tinned shijimi/basket clams. These small mollusks are very popular in Asia. Check Wikipedia for more information! She had adde thin strips of fresh ginger to them.
Once the rice was cooked, she mixed the lot before placing it in the bento box and sprinkling it with roasted sesame seeds.

A simple dessert of local straberries and ornage wedges.
Nice bento, I agree!

Mount Fuji Views:

I took the pics with the camera almost aginst the window for clarity. The mobile phone camera has enough speed to obliterate all interference.
This pic was taken before reaching Fuji City, the first stop on the way.
The river in the foreground is the Fujikawa River. Because we are in the middle of winter all grass looks brown.

Another pic taken just before entering Fuji City JR Station.

Mount Fuji again caught just after leaving Fuji JR Station. Sorry for the smudges!

Now that pic was taken as we approached Mishima City which stands at comparatively high altitude surrounded by all kinds of mountains.

Last picture taken just before reaching Mishima JR Station.
After that you have to wait a long time (ifyou are lucky!) to see again over the horizon!

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After the deluge we bore yetserday, clear bright skies were welcome today. The drawback is that I had to ride of those stuffing buses to work as I had left my bicycle at work last night. Don’t worry, it’s safe and nobody wills steal it. This is Japan! I still marvel at the patience shown by the Japanese in their common transport. Not a single complaint….

The Missus was quickly back into her meat mode today. I suspect that she is planning well ahead as she has started taking regular pictures of her concoctions!
“I will start a notebook when I have one hundred of them!, she said.
It’s about time she started her own blog!

The rice was steamed together with shredded carrots on top, then mixed before being served with a sprinkle of black sesame seeds and some shredded takuan/pickled daikon.

The garnish consisted of meatballs fried coated in cornstarch first in oil then with a sweet and sour sauce of the Missus’ invention. It was complemented with half-boiled eeg, boiled na no hana/rape flower seasoned with sesame sauce, and beans (canned) and cucumber salad.

Dessert was benihoppe/red cheek strawberry like yesterday with orange wedges.

Hearty, healthy and yummy!

RECOMMENDED RELATED SITES:
Warren Bobrow, Bread + Butter, Zoy Zhang, Hungry Neko, Think Twice, Frank Fariello, Mangantayon, Hapabento, Elinluv Tidbit Corner, Tokyo Terrace, Maison de Christina, Chrys Niles,Lexi, Culinary Musings, Wheeling Gourmet

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