avid cook, speedy lunch packer, mom in San Francisco, & former expat fluent in Japanese.
Archive for August, 2008
Published by Biggie on August 29th, 2008 tagged bento, eggs, pasta or
First off, welcome to new readers finding their way here from yesterday’s article in The Washington Post on packed lunches and bentos (free registration required to view the article). The article calls me “the Rachael Ray of bentos” because of my focus on speedy lunches, which I found to be pretty amusing. So does this mean I need to come up with a catchphrase like Yum-O now?
If you’re new to bento-style lunches, be sure to read the Bento FAQ for an introduction. I’m on the road at the moment posting only sporadically, so please accept my apologies for not being as responsive to comments as usual.
My husband likes to barbecue on the weekends when we have people over, so earlier this summer he smoked some pork butts on the DIY flowerpot smoker for about 15 hours. We generally have people over when we do this, and it yields so many leftovers that I divide some into smaller portions, double-wrap, and freeze it for later when we’ll really appreciate it. It makes great fodder for Leftover Remakes, where I use leftovers to make a new dish. In the past I’ve used leftover pulled pork in dishes such as pork sopes, a straight sandwich packed in a Mr. Bento-type thermal lunch jar
, as a pizza topping, or even plain.
In a play on a pulled pork sandwich with coleslaw, one evening I sautéed some chopped-up cabbage, added a portion of the leftover pulled pork, seasoned it with a little jarred tomato-based pasta sauce, and added the mixture to some Annie’s boxed shells & cheese pasta. To maximize payoff for the times when you take time to cook, make more than usual and freeze the excess planned leftovers to use in other dishes. A list of freezing tips is on the Top Tips page.
Contents of preschooler dinner: Roasted salmon and broccoli, cherry tomato, and shells and cheese pasta doctored with sautéed cabbage and North Carolina-style pulled pork. (Click on any photo for a larger view.)
Morning prep time: 10 minutes, using all leftovers. In the morning I revived the texture of the leftover pasta by microwaving it in a microwave-safe dish with a little splash of water, and tossed the broccoli with some vinaigrette so that it would have some flavor when eaten at room temperature. (Read on for packing details and an additional preschooler bento lunch.)
Published by Biggie on August 29th, 2008 tagged bento, eggs, pasta or noodles, vegetarian | 24 Comments »
I’m always on the lookout for ways to save time cooking for packed lunches, but never gave much thought to a real basic: boiling water. Whether I’m boiling frozen dumplings, fast-cook pasta, or multi-cooking several different things together to save time, the slowest part of the equation seems to be bringing the water to a boil in the first place. Was there a way to speed this up?
I’d heard that electric kettles were a good way to boil water faster, but I was a little dubious as to exactly how much time they’d save. Was it a marginal amount of time, or substantial enough to justify buying something that would take up more counter space in the kitchen? I bit the bullet and bought a Hamilton Beach 1.7-liter cordless model
at Costco, and pitted it in a head-to-head race against a regular kettle on our gas stove. I think I’ve been watching too much of the Olympics lately! (Click for the test results.)
Published by Biggie on August 22nd, 2008 tagged review, tips | 103 Comments »
No, no — don’t go away! I know Spam sushi sounds awful, but hear me out. I first heard of the Hawaiian classic Spam musubi when I was in college a long time ago, and I have to admit I was pretty skeptical. Come on, Spam spiced ham loaf? In sushi? You’ve got to be kidding me.
About eight years ago, some of my Hawaiian friends decided to hold a luau here in California, complete with a whole pig cooked in an underground pit dug in their back yard. So as a novelty, I volunteered to make a party-sized batch of Spam musubi (shown at right). Funny thing, though. Once I started cooking (frying the Spam, flavoring it with homemade teriyaki sauce, putting wasabi furikake on the rice for a little kick), it started to smell really appetizing and I tried some. Wow! I’ve been a convert ever since and try all the different variations I run across, although I only make it a couple of times a year as it can be labor-intensive.
There are a number of variations on Spam musubi, including Spam makizushi (rolled in a long, skinny sushi roll), sandwich-style Spam musubi (shown above), traditional-style Spam musubi with a narrow strip of nori (shown below), Spam musubi with a layer of egg inside, etc. I’ve even had tasty versions that replace the Spam with teriyaki chicken, barbecued chicken, chicken katsu, or Portuguese sausage. As with rice balls, feel free to experiment with alternate fillings, especially those that are strongly flavored. I suspect that Korean barbecue like bulgogi or kalbi would also be tasty prepared this way, especially when fully wrapped in rice and seaweed as shown above. What variations have you seen? (Click for the full recipe and step-by-step tutorial.)
Published by Biggie on August 20th, 2008 tagged lactose free, meat, onigiri or sushi, recipe, rice, tutorial or how to | 69 Comments »
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