Bento 2

I promise it's not going to become all-bento all the time around here: I'll settle into a once-a-week post soon, I hope (as much as I settle into anything?)

As for today's bento:

• rice (sushi rice today, as the basmati yesterday just did not work with hashi (chopsticks).  Not that today's bento is a hashi one, but still).
• red capsicum
• broccoli
• mini burgers (wrapped in spinach picked fresh from the garden
• sweet pepper and onion confit (again)
• green beans with butter, garlic and sesame seeds
• a tomato sauce to go with the mini burgers, containing carrot and zucchini (last night's pasta sauce)
• grapes

For tomorrow I've got one side done already, and I think we'll be trying another recipe from the Just Bento cookbook.  At least, that's the plan.

Indira challenge:  spinach, zucchini and herbs in the past sauce, all from our garden.  Green beans from my mother's garden.

I made bento!

Those of long memory will recall that for a little while I got very into making bento lunches.  Ever since I fell out of the bento habit I've been wanting to get back into it, and yesterday afternoon we had such a lovely domestic Sunday afternoon that I just got into it.  I made up a few vegetable fillers and mentally planned out the boxes for the rest of the week (mostly) for both M and I.

The result:

• rice
• leftover Crispy Chicken Strips from last night's dinner (instead of the meatballs it was going to be, when I worked out there were four chicken strips left that shared perfectly to two each.)
• broccoli
• celery and broccoli stalk kinpira (using up some mostly-dead celery
• a little rocket, fresh from our garden.
• sweet pepper and onion confit
• blanched spinach with sesame sauce (from the Just Bento cookbook) p36
• grapes

Looking at the container, tomorrow will finish up the kinpira, and probably the steamed broccoli as well, so I should probably look at doing a couple more fillers tonight or tomorrow.  Carrots and green beans are both planned, and tomorrow one of the main vegetables will be asparagus with sesame sauce - I mixed up a decent quantity of sesame sauce yesterday.

Anyway, I'm very pleased with myself with getting this done today.  Now to see if we can keep it going!

For the Indira Challenge: rocket and spinach

Indira Challenge #2 (and a garden update)

I hereby promise not to post every night with the results of the Indira Challenge.

However: tonight we achieved the challenge in the following way: we used some of our wall planter dill on the salmon, asparagus and brie tart that I made for dinner.  There's also mint in the fresh batch of green tea ginger iced chai that I made this afternoon.

Green Tea Ginger Iced Chai

In garden news:

• the zucchini are going great guns.
• the cucumbers mark 2 have been declared pretty much dead, and we're giving up on cucumber.  At least for this season.
• the basil might be about to get somewhere (I really, really hope)
• the OH took lots of awesome photos (and I hope she will post them sometime.

In additional news - as awesome the T2 green tea ginger iced chai is, it's not so great while one is eating icecream. It takes a few minutes after finishing the icecream before the impressiveness of the iced tea returns.

The Indira Challenge

via Sydney Morning Herald

Indira Naidoo is my role model.

I remember watching her when she was an ABC TV presenter, and I'm not sure whether she was ever a BTN presenter, but whether she was or not, she was a role model of my youth.  Even if it was just as the weekend newsreader for ABC.  I thought she was completely and utterly awesome, and still do think that.  And now I have her garden-and-cook-book.

Anyway.  (Should that be my catchprase?)

Anyway.

Indira set a challenge in her awesome book about her balcony garden: try to include something from your garden in every meal.

I'll focus on evening meals (I suspect Indira meant the same) and I know we don't manage to include something from the garden in every single evening meal, but I am going to try.  Particularly this summer, but from now on I'll be looking at Indira's book, Stephanie Alexander's book and the classic Yates Garden Guide, and doing my best to
plan ahea
d
(inside family joke)

and work towards having a four-seasons garden if we possible can.

That's the next goal.  The current goal?  The Indira challenge: use something from our garden in as many evening meals per week as possible.