Friday Review and Butterfly Bento Box Lunch

I bought a set of Progressive Cookie Cutters that also include an additional stencil/cut out piece - perfect for bento! Today was my first day trying one out, so I thought I'd combine my initial review of this product with the bento post. 

Below, our bento box lunch: butterfly prosciutto and cheese sandwich, veggies and ranch, and mango flowers. The butterfly wings and body are cut from cheese, using the stencil portion of the cutter (featured later in this post). Except the body...that was hard to cut out so I just did an easy rectangle. The flowers were cut using my favorite flower stainless steel cutter, which I have totally gotten my money's worth from!

The veggies are Persian cucumbers, orange bell pepper, and broccoli. 

To make this bento, I used my new butterfly cookie/sandwich cutter. It is fairly large, about 4 inches across.

It comes apart into two pieces. There are 12 cookie cutters included with the Progressive set and they all have two pieces - the cutter and the stencil. They are relatively sturdy plastic and easily cleaned, although if you use them on cheese, the stencil part has some small sections where things can get stuck. You can usually poke them out with something narrow like a chopstick or skewer.

The stencil does not really work well with the cutter for impressions (like a sandwich press), like I was hoping. The stencil part comes really close to the edge of the cutter, so they're ideal for decorating cookies with sprinkles or frosting, but not not so great for stamping. That's ok. They're good for cutting cheese and using that to decorate. Or, you could simply use a square sandwich (which would waste less bread) and impress the stencil on it. 

The cutter is deep, as displayed here against a normal piece of sliced bread. Sorry about the pic being a little off focus, I took it with my phone:

You could totally make a sandwich and then cut it, but I find it easier to cut the bread and the individual things that go inside, and then stack them. 

The set comes with a bear, bunny, circle, heart, pumpkin, duck, clover, Christmas tree, gingerbread man, star, butterfly and flower. It's most definitely worth the $12.95 Amazon is charging!

Lion on the Savannah Bento Lunch Box

I saw a cute lion on Pinterest the other day. It was made with a flower shaped cutter for the mane and a circle cutter for the face. How easy is that? I love browsing online; it's a constant source of inspiration and also reminds me to think outside the box!

For my lion, I used my tiny flower sandwich cutter for his mane (out of Colby Jack cheese). His face was made with a circle fondant cutter (out of provolone). I also added a body with my oval fondant cutter and then just used a knife to make little legs. I wanted them to be larger on one end than the other, so they'd be more like paws.  

I cut out a tail, and for the little puff on the end of his tail, I ripped the cheese with my fingers. It naturally tore that way, with the perfect little "fur" edging.

His face was made with Chinese oyster sauce (although you could totally use BBQ sauce, teriyaki sauce, or anything dark) and a toothpick.

The sandwich is prosciutto and provolone. Yum!
















On the right, I made a sun out of a mango, using my largest circle cutter and then a knife to cut the triangles around the sun. You could probably just throw in a circle though, and call it a sun. I guess I had extra time this morning to work on details. :) 

Below that we have celery "grass" and a totally-out-of-place panda with peanut butter. Oh well!

Super Fast 10-minute Bento (with fruit, nuts, and bunny gummies)

Some days it's just hell to get out of bed, and today was one of those days. So I used the old bento fall back trick - stuff it full of colorful silicone cups and animal picks. And again, I stress it every time...prep, prep, prep! And also store things in your pantry or freezer that you can just toss in, like nuts, snacks, muffins, etc. It will really save your morning. 

Today I had about 10 minutes. I made a quick ham, cheese and mustard roll up on a tortilla (side note: the cheese was used previously for decorations and had lots of holes and punch outs from cutters, but in a roll up or sandwich, no one notices!); I cut two pieces to put all pretty on the side and stuck animal picks in the other two pieces. Dumped in my pre-prepped fruit stars and flowers, some bunny gummies from Whole Foods, sunflower seeds from Trader Joe's, and cut up a kiwi. Presto! 10 minute bento.

Top/bird's eye view:

Ham & Cheese Roll Ups on a Flour Tortilla, Mango & Watermelon Flowers and Whole Foods Bunny Gummy Candies

REVIEW: This was a favorite! Mike ate everything (and I had thought there was too much food). It helps that fruit is in season and delicious right now.

Owl Sandwich Bento Box Snackwith a Stars and Flowers Fruit Salad

Mike only needed a snack today, so I made him a peanut butter and jelly owl friend to take to work. I cut two large eyes out of wheat/oat bread, using a circle cutter, and from the scraps, cut a triangle using a knife. Then I placed them on a piece of bread and used them to determine how to cut the owl face; I just sliced a little off the sides and made little pointy ears. 

Then I slapped on peanut butter, used jelly to affix the eyes and beak, and grabbed two of my fruit roll up circles for his eye balls (I have tons of circles and ovals pre-cut and ready to go). Presto! PB&J owl.

Owl Bento Sandwich made with Peanut Butter and Jelly and Fruit Roll Up Eyes on Wheat Bread

Watermelon Star with Pear and Mango Flower Fruit Salad

I had cut up all the fruit this weekend so it just a matter of arranging it all pretty in the box. A giant watermelon star, with mango and Bartlett pear flowers. Here in Southern California we are on our way into summer already, so there will be lots more fruit available for the bentos! 

Tip: I cut the pears last night and kept them this nice, bright white by tossing them into pineapple juice (pure juice, no added sugar!). I let them soak for a few minutes, then took them out and put them into a glass tupperware. You can use any acidic juice such as lemon or lime, but I like pineapple best. I keep a couple cans of it in the pantry for this purpose. It works great on apples and bananas, too!

REVIEW: Everything got eaten, but the pears were difficult to pick up with animal picks (not pictured). They were a little too ripe. I might try making flowers with apples in the future, since those are much firmer.

Frushi! Otherwise known as Fruit Sushi, with a Bunny Sandwich

We were out of town this past weekend so I apologize for the haphazard postings and missing Friday Review. I will post a review soon on another awesome (or un-awesome) bento product! In the meantime, I have figured out how to get posts to self-publish, so in the future we will have full bento coverage when we're on vacations. Yay!

On Sunday I played around with fru-shi, which is sushi composed entirely of fruit! It is super cute and fun. I made the rice with coconut milk (just substitute the exact same amount of light coconut milk for water in the recipe) and a little bit of sugar (about 2 tablespoons per cup of dry rice). Be sure to use light coconut milk, otherwise your rice will come out way too creamy and it won't stick together properly. You need to make it sticky Asian rice style, not Latin rice style (use a pot, not a pan, and don't use oil).

Next, you just cut up any type of fruit you want, into sticks (to put inside rolls) or into "sashimi" to lay on top of rice, like nigiri. Fruit roll ups make the perfect "nori!" Other helpful tips: use the sharpest knife possible, and wipe it with a damp towel after every cut. Dampen your hands before handling the rice, so that it won't stick (but don't dampen too much because you'll get your fruit roll ups all soggy). Also refrigerate your rice; it's easier to mold when it's cool (opposite of regular rice), due to the creamy texture of the coconut milk.

Frushi would be adorable for an afternoon tea, or as appetizers/desserts. It is also gluten free! My Sunday efforts included pineapple "rolls" and Caracara orange "nigiri":

For this morning's bento I didn't make nigiri, I just did pineapple and orange "sashimi" and mango-coconut rice "rolls." I love that I have silicone grass dividers for the frushi! I'm also trying to do an Easter theme for this week, hence the PB&J cut-out bunny sandwich. 

REVIEW: Everything got eaten, which is always a good thing. I've noticed the times that things don't get eaten is when it's a repeat, or there's not enough variety. So no fruit for tomorrow since there was an overload of fruit today!