I've been thinking about the incredibly cute little egg molds that turn boiled eggs into Hello Kitty or a volkswagen. I don't really need to have cute eggs in my bento boxes, but I'd sort of like to anyway. Some of these cute decorations are in the form of well known cartoon characters, so they're called Chara(cter)ben(to), or charaben, and that's become a general name for cute bento. I decided to experiment with cookie cutters and boiled eggs, since lots of cookie cutters have interior design lines that will make an impression on eggs, which are pretty malleable. This is a teddy bear egg, made with a cookie cutter pressed onto the egg for a minute or two..
The pink arc is apple jelly made from empire apples, which have a really red skin. Apple jelly is incredibly easy to make and doesn't require any specialized equipment. Directions on my other blog, here. Also have a few pomegranate seeds. Both give a little sweetness to the fried rice, instead of using duck sauce. There's also cottage cheese to go with the grapefruit.
This bento: rice with vegetable broth, 1/2 boiled egg, apple jelly, pomegranate seeds, onions, mushrooms, red bell pepper, grapefruit, cottage cheese. soy sauce.
Local foods: Apple jelly from local apples, cottage cheese.
Oh wow, that looks amazing, Kathy! That Teddy Bear Bento is adorable.
ReplyDeleteBTW, link to jelly recipe is broken (I clicked because I'm psyched to test it out!).
How are you liking the design vs. eating thing?? That is, are you happy with how they taste after you've designed them inside the boxes??
ReplyDelete@Arm70- They taste better after putting all that effort in. In fact, my biggest problem is waiting til lunchtime to eat them :-D
ReplyDelete@Max - you were too quick for me! I hadn't yet written the apple jelly post when I wrote that there was a link. You caught me out. The jelly post is up now, and I'll put the link in.