Finally Summer!

It's officially been midsummer here these few days. It's tiring to do anything in my hot room. While, I keep on making bentos as usual. Here are some of the ones I made recently. By the way, I will be away from this blog for a while longer due to stuff to do. I hope that y'all are enjoying your summer if you are in the Northern Hemisphere!!

Ika Fry Bento

It's Omusubi Tuesday today! I made sesame omusubi, shoyu-koji pork saute and ika (squid) fry. I actually thought this morning that it was Monday today because yesterday was a holiday here. That's why these bentos only contain two kinds of okazu... I thought *today is Monday so I'm allowed to be lazy yay* haha! But I happened to make some omusubi for Yuppi's bento this morning. I hope to share varied ideas of my favorite omusubi (onigiri) fillings on every Tuesday in the future.

In the meantime, although it's not that I'm so busy, I will be taking a short break from blogging in order to clear up tons of chores. I will be back in a week or two, maybe with many bento pictures. I might overwhelm you, so prepare yourself!

Hotcake Bento and Sukiyaki Bento

It's *Flour Thursday* today so I made hotcakes (Japanese pancakes, not that which have to be hot) for bento. Since I didn't do any prep for a flour-thing-bento last night this one turned out too simple. Wish I had bought sausages and fruits... I whipped up some hotcakes and rustled up some grub from the fridge. Chicken tender tempura (leftover) dressed in sauce, cheddar cheese in foil, butter and a ketchup bottle for the hotcake (Yuppi like it with ketchup).






This one is literally a simple bento for *Simple Wednesday* yesterday. It's safe to say that *Donburi style* (rice topped with savory foods) is perfect for simple bentos. By the way, for those of you who have no idea what I mean -- Simple Wednesday, Flour Thursday things, check out the last post!

Tenmusu Bento

I announced the giveaway winner on the last post. The drawing went quite smoothly thanks to Pig chan's big help LOL! Again, a huge thanks to everybody who livened up the event! The giveaway closed, but the bento gallery is still open. Your bento pictures are always welcomed if you haven't joined it yet.

Today's bentos feature Tenmusu --- omusubi (onigiri) filled with shrimp tempura seasoned with tempura dipping sauce or salt. I love both, but made salted ones this time. I did a bit different thing from the normal method. You would first make shrimp tempura, but I just salted a bit and floured some shrimp instead of tempura-battering, and then shallow-fried them, it's lighter this way. You can dip your shrimp tempura in tempura sauce or men-tsuyu (Japanese noodle sauce) instead of salting. I say, both work well. Then you just make omusubi as usual with the seasoned shrimp tempura and nori. Tenmusu is one of my favorite omusubi (onigiri) variations!

In the meantime, pay attention, I fixed my daily bento activities as follows. I thought I had to take steps to get out of my bento rut. I'm actually considering putting Meatless day in there.
Lazy Monday
Omusubi Tuesday
Simple or free Wednesday
Flour Thursday
Cleaning (fridge) Friday
Wow this sounds kind of funny haha! But I don't care, I'm currently going with it. How long I can continue, we'll see.

Winner of 200th Post Giveaway

Ahem, I'm going to be announcing the winner today! Ah wait, before that, I have to show you guys how the winner got chosen. I said I'd draw one name out of a hat. Yeah out of a hat. I literally put the pieces of paper with the names of all those who had joined the giveaway *in a hat*, by the way, which is one of my favorite ones I put on all the time. But the picker is not me. Our little darling birdie drew the winner LOL!









Eeny, meeny, miny, moe...



Pig chan is biting one right now lol.



Wahahah! Here is the one he picked out!



Ta daahhhh! The luckiest person on the planet! Congratulations!!!


Ahhh I really really wish I could give all of you the prize. Strange, Priscilla, Burinsmith, Tatabonita, Gamene, Angelenteo, Mande, Ohayobento, Bentomonsters, Lizzie and Torng Horng. Thank you so much for joining the giveaway and sharing your lovely hearty bento pictures. All of you livened up this event. And thank you for giving me a lot of inspiration to keep bentoing. Amazingly enough, every single one of the bentos is the type of one I want to eat for real. I am so happy to have you awesome bento mates! Let's keep making real yummy bentos!

Burinsmith, once everything is ready I will email you and post up a picture of the surprise coming to you. It'll probably take some more time, so please stay excited until then!!

Chicken Tender Katsu Bento

It was terribly foggy this morning so these photos are also kind of foggy haha. Today's bentos contain leftover chicken tender katsu with tonkatsu sauce, leftover korokke (fried potato patty, croquette), tamagoyaki with umeboshi paste in it, mayo broccoli, and plum cuties for refreshment. The shape of plums and that kind of fruits is adorable isn't it? I love how they brighten up bentos. Tomorrow is Tanabata (star festival) here. I'm drawing one person from those who've joined the giveaway wheeee! I'm so thrilled right now. Happy Friday!!

Egg Shrimp Salad Bento

Today's bentos contain chicken saute with snap peas, satsuma-age (fried fish patties) and mushroom stir-fry, and egg shrimp salad. I couldn't get clear shots due to the weather. It was raining.






Today's hit is the egg shrimp salad! I tossed boiled-shrimp and cut shiokoji eggs together with some mayonaise, lemon juice and chaat Masala (an Indian handy condiment). It turned out a lovely spicy salad. I will definitely make it again for sammies.

Shoyu Koji Karaage Bento

This morning I made chicken karaage since Yuppi requested it yesterday. She is a huge karaage hunter. This is my first time using shoyu-koji for karaage. Though I haven't posted it yet I made shoyu-koji the other day. It's as simple to make as shio-koji. You just replace the salt and water with shoyu. If you ever have a chance to make it, try it with sashimi or sushi. You would feel the difference. The rest of these bentos have potato cucumber salad, shiokoji tamago, plums and ume-shiokoji broccoli.



Here is what shoyu koji calls for.



Today's quick okazu!! Today I made ume-shiokoji broccoli. It came out amazing. A long time ago, I got an idea of ume-shoyu broccoli from a vegetarian chef, lightly boiled broccoli tossed with a bit of umeboshi paste and shoyu. It is a nice salad that goes with rice. I remembered it and made it with shiokoji instead of shoyu. Ume-shoyu, ume-shiokoji, both work on broccoli (cauliflower as well).





This is mine. I'm happy it's my kind of bento. Can you guess what the difference between these similar photos is? To all those who found it out, I'll give a little something... Yes, I'll give you my love. You have to take it lol!

Have you entered yet?

Eggless Omrice Bento

These are effortless bentos I made a little while back. I wanted to make omrices, but after stir-frying the ingredients, I noticed that I ran out of eggs, so they ended up *eggless omrices* haha! Ketchup chicken rice in a word! Since I wanted for some reason to eat Kentucky nuggets so bad at that time, I packed in some store bought ones (no KFC's).

By the way I really like these enamel containers. Talking of enamel containers... Have you taken part yet?

ちょっと前に作った手抜き弁当です。ほんとはオムライスを作りたかったんだけど材料を炒めた後で気が付いたの、卵がなーい！！結局卵なしオムライスになりました。早い話がチキンライス、あは。どういうわけかこの時無性にケンタッキーのナゲットが食べたくて、お弁当にも投入しました。これはKFCではなく冷凍ナゲットだけどね。

First Bento July

Shiokoji chicken saute, shiokoji omlet with ketchup, butter shoyu potato and boiled broccoli with mayo. Nothing new but my favorite bento dishes.





Eeeeek! Half of the year passed already!? Can you believe it? I can no longer be comfortable because 2015 is coming soon haha! I have to step on the gas and catch up on stuff and everything for the rest of the year! This morning I remembered something important. So I whipped up a giveaway entry. Go check it out!

Lovely Bento Boxes

Hi guys! As I mentioned earlier I'm going to do something fun in honor of my 200th post. (It's actually almost 250th though.) I will be doing three things as my 200th post celebration. I decided I wanted to make a bento video and a bento gallery where my bento buddies could see their bentos. Hopefully I will make the video within the year. Now it's time to do my second giveaway! As with the first one, I'd like to send my giveaway to one of those who have enjoyed this blog for some time now. So I have to apologize to *instant readers*. For the winner, I picked out my favorite enamel containers, which are quality, not from Daiso lol. Not so big as the pictures below. You know what, I'm going to add some more lovely items to it. I'll keep it a secret for now for some thrill. Hopefully I can mail the prize to the winner within a month or two (how slow!)







RULE
Share a picture (or some) of your own favorite bentos. They don't have to be cute or fancy. On the comment box below, paste the URL of the page of your site (or flickr) that has the bento picture you'd like to share. Or you can email me your bento picture. In that case, let me know. I will email you so that you can email back with the picture. No matter you don't get the win, I'll add the picture to the gallery.

TERM
I will draw a winner out of a hat on TANABATA -- 7th july. Only 5 days left! Hurry and win!!

This giveaway closed. Your bento pictures are always welcome continuously to the bento gallery. 7th July