bento #95

Yay, snack bento!  Quite a bit of food can be packed into these little containers.

- three hamburger patties
- one banana muffin
- mango
- green pepper and a few grapes

Overall, it looks rather cluttered... not sure how that happened!   This was a snack for after hiking and before evening church.

bento #94

The other day I made a bento (not this one), thought it looked like a lot of food... too much for me to eat in one meal, and then promptly sat down and ate it all!  Guess I was hungry!  I eat several times a day, and the less I interact with people, the less hungry I am, so I haven't been eating much lately.

- bologna and cheese sandwiches
- cabbage slaw
- cucumbers
- apple slices

I like all the colors in this one.  Pink, red, purple, green, yellow...

bento #93

Good thing I had this bento ready from yesterday because today I ate toast.  Toast and tea... two strawberries for lunch (they were on sale again this week!  yay!)... and ice cream for dinner.  I'll probably have more toast again for dinner tonight.  Yes, I normally eat more than toast.

- chicken lo mein
- asparagus (I always think of Veggie Tales when I eat asparagus... this doesn't happen with any other vegetable)
- one strawberry

bento #92

Getting closer to #100!  I ordered Chinese food the other day... I had two solid days of grading ahead of me, knew I wouldn't feel like cooking, so went ahead and splurged.  Thus, I'm eating Chinese leftovers for several days.  :)

- garlic chicken with broccoli; rice
- strawberries and a mini banana

Turns out I didn't like the mini bananas very much.  They get mushy quicker and more easily than normal bananas, and I'm not a mushed banana fan.

This is also a camouflage bento; green veg in the green container, red veg in the orange container.  Can you find the broccoli and strawberries?  :D

bento #91

We can call this "red and yellow bento."  With a bit of green.

- fried chicken legs
- potato salad
- asparagus spears
- corn relish (corn, red pepper, Italian dressing)
- strawberry, cut in half
- mini banana... very bento friendly!

I made it as a picnic lunch for Sunday... just didn't post it till now.  I ate it after I was done hiking, so just at the potato salad, corn relish, strawberry, and a few asparagus spears.  Then my sister called, and I didn't have time to eat the rest before I left for church.  Well, I wasn't that hungry anyway as I'd just hiked 8 miles in 80-degree weather.

bento #89

Obligatory trying-to-be-witty introduction.

Barely descriptive list of food in bento (corned beef patties, veg).

Trying-to-be- interesting conclusion.

Adios!

bento #88

It seemed like not too long ago, I was quickly on my way to bento #100... wasn't that several weeks ago I was at #75?  I guess I've been moving more slowly these days.

Another breakfast bento... love these
- the right half has a layer of grits you can't see... with ham and green pepper cooked in them, sprinkled with a bit of cheese
- fried egg on top
- broccoli (raw!  I actually ate it!  I figured since I ate it at my friend's house in a salad the other day, I should be able to eat it here.  Of course, I did use it to scrape up the leftover grits bits
- red pepper and some grapes

bento #87

Hmm, I just realized I didn't post yesterday.  I typically write up my posts at night, but I'm not on much of a schedule these days to help me remember when to do things, and I was busy grading last night anyway.  I'm sure ya'll were just sick to death with worry, wondering where I was.  :D

- pork, cabbage, carrot, mushroom, and onion stir-fry.. with a bit of broccoli for color
- one white and one brown rice onigiri.  I like this method: a tasty one and a healthy one.  Guess which I eat first.  ;)
- some mango in the cup, and a few grapes

I do love that stir-fry!  Wishing I still had leftovers... although there's still pork in the freezer and the veg in the fridge!

breakfast bento ideas

I'm still collecting/on the lookout for ideas for breakfast bento, so if anyone has anyone, pipe in!

tamagoyaki, of course
breakfast rolls... with spring or egg roll wrapping (not sure if I could do nori in the morning)
yogurt and granola
fruit

Sausage and rice

Frittata

Croissant and jam

Hard-boiled egg

Sausage bun/roll

Scotch egg

Whole wheat muffin

Baked custard

I'm a bit stumped, obviously!  I actually had a few more ideas, but then I forgot to save my original "bento ideas" file before I re-installed the operating system on my computer... whoops.

bento #86

Well, it seems Blogger completely deleted the post that was supposed to appear today.  That's too bad because it was funny and I actually said something interesting.  It's going to be impossible for me to recreate, of course.  ;)

- pork stir-fry, using the recipe here.  It put in cabbage, onion, carrot, and mushrooms.
- coleslaw
- one brown rice and one white onigiri
- broccoli
- mango and grapes

It seems I don't notice the gaps when I'm packing the food... it all looks pretty solid.  It's only when I'm editing the photos (and usually after I've eaten the food) that I see the bits of lunch box staring out rather obviously.

bento #85

Hmm... this looks surprisingly like yesterday's bento.  Sometimes it's just easier to make up a big batch and eat it several times in a row (for me, often within the same day).

- more ww noodles in soy sauce sauce.  :D
- a hot dog crab and octopus
- broccoli, grapes, and baby carrots

Very suspiciously like yesterday's bento, in fact.  I didn't even change up the order of the vegetables-- or the veg that was included!  At least there's some color on the right side of the bento!

bento #84

Finally, a new bento with new bento food.  I made this Sunday to take hiking, but hadn't uploaded my recent photos yet.

- whole-wheat pasta (it always looks so brown! the soy sauce doesn't help!) with a sauce made of rice wine vinegar, soy sauce, a little sriacha, sugar, garlic, ginger, and some egg scrambled in.  It tasted good but was a bit salty, as you can imagine!
- a hot dog crab and blackberry starfish
- grapes, broccoli, and baby carrots

I'm a hike-a-holic,

as will be evidenced by my weekend.

Friday: 11.5 miles
Saturday: 1.5 miles
Sunday: 7 miles
Monday: 8 miles
Today: rest  ;)

My feet have held up remarkably well... only lost part of a toenail (not the dead black way), have two blisters on the same toe (underneath!), and have a bruise on the top of my foot... not sure about that one.  I'm going hiking tomorrow as well, probably with an umbrella!

I'm finding hiking easier than it was last year, although that's probably because it hasn't been above 72 degrees yet.  Hiking in 85 degree weather is much different!  And, I should add, these are flat Midwest trails, nothing exciting, rugged, or steep.  Just a few casual hills.

Veg, the best part of bento

I realized the other day that I never finished posting these lists.

I have two lists of veg, cooked and uncooked, and try to include one from each list:


Cooked veg comes first because I like those the best:

Blanched spinach w/ ss and sesame

Veg w/ soboro

Orange juice carrots

Miso marinated asparagus

Spring greens namul

Hot and sweet peppers

Asparagus

Broccoli

Sautéed mushrooms

Stir-fried snow peas

Cooked cabbage and red cabbage

Bok choy

Stir fried green beans
Carrot kinpira

Poppyseed green pea burgers

Maple red peppers

Mushrooms & bean sprouts

Sautéed bean sprouts

And raw veg: 

Cherry tomatoes

Cucumber

Baby carrots

Cucumber salad

Coleslaw

Carrot sesame salad

Green salad

Refrigerator pickles

This is where it gets difficult since I don't really like raw vegetables... as evidenced by the short list.  ;)  Still, I tend to pack raw veg most often because it's easier and I don't have to cook anything!

books... hiking... and the AT

A Walk in the Woods is the one that started it all.   I read this and thought "I really want to read more about the Appalachian Trail."  So, I did.  Oh, and I also read almost all of Bryson's other books, too!

I read:

A Walk for Sunshine, Jeff Alt
A Woman's Journey, Cindy Ross (very light, not many details, with her illustrations)
Barefoot Sisters: Southbound, Lucy and Susan Letcher (started this last week! and have the sequel, too.  I think this is the only SOBO book I read, and it's messed up my internal map a bit. I feel like they're doing everything backward!)
Bearfoot: A Northbounder E-mails from the Appalachian Trail, Patrick Pittard (very good... a slightly different corporate-lived perspective)
Blind Courage, Bill Irwin (yes, a blind man walks the Appalachian Trail.  If you only read one book, I'd recommend this one)
In Beauty May She Walk, Leslie Mass (LOVED this!  she hiked the AT at age 60! I believe this is the first book I read after Walk in the Woods)
Long-Distance Hiking: Lessons from the Appalachian Trail, Roland Mueser (still reading)
On the Beaten Path by Robert Aldin Ruben
Walking Home: A Woman's Pilgrimage on the AT, Kelly Winters (I have to admit, I like books by women hikers the best)
Walking the Appalachian Trail, Larry Luxenberg



Books I still want to read: too many to list, but I have at least a dozen on my amazon.com wishlist!
Oh, I also read a few trail journals during the summer.  That means, in the past year, I've read at least FIFTEEN accounts of hiking the AT.  It doesn't get repetitive, either!

Then, I decided to start reading about another trail, the Pacific Crest Trail.

A Blistered Kind of Love, Angela and Duffy Ballard
The Cactus Eaters, Dan White
Journey on the Crest, Cindy Ross  (I also have her CDT book)

Other trails:
Crossing Arizona, Chris Townsend (Arizona Trail... very good!)
The Man Who Walked Through Time, Colin Fletcher (walks the floor of the Grand Canyon...still reading)
Where the Waters Divide, Karen Berger (Continental Divide Trail)



There might be a book or two that I've missed (no, I'm not kidding!).  A few of them are on loan to my friend and sister.


The exciting thing is that new books have been published since I was looking these up last summer, so I have about two dozen new books to read!  :)

bento #83

It looks like a snack... no, it's not a lot of food.  I haven't felt like eating lately.  Or cooking, for that matter.  Do you know how difficult it is to write a bento blog when I don't cook?  I had a stash of older bento photos I've been interspersing on days I don't cook.

- three mini hamburger patties with some tonkatsu in the orange tulip
- rice flowers
- asparagus
- grapes

Overall, a green and dark bento.  :)  I should have added a few baby carrots or something... but there wasn't room!

Newest Obsession: long-distance hiking

Since the original title of this blog is Newest Obsession, I thought I'd tell you about one of my newest.

Okay, it's a bit of a repeat from last year, just picking up on an interest that was in hibernation over the winter.  Last year I read many books on the Appalachian Trail-- and hiking in general.  If I can find my reading list, I'll post it here.

I've been researching that again.  While a thru-hike of the Appalachian Trail isn't possible for me right now, I realized today that I can thru-hike another trail.  Now I have to find someone with whom to hike!

The trail I really want to hike:  Metacomet Monadnock Trail, 110 miles through Massachusetts and a bit of New Hampshire.  It goes around and up Mount Holyoke (the history of Mt. Holyoke Female Seminary is another long-standing obsession of mine), so that makes me veeerrry interested.

Now, I haven't actually done any long-distance hiking.  I did a few 10 and 11-mile hikes last summer: 10.5 miles on the North Country Trail in Michigan with my sister, 11.5 hike at Clifty Falls (all the trails except one), and a 13-mile hike at Mounds State Park.  All of these were completed within four hours, so I was only out an afternoon, really.

Long-distance hiking gives a completely different feeling from regular hiking... that's fun and all, but you don't get that "high" you get from finishing a long hike.

bento #82

Snack bento... a small one, but this was all I had time to eat.  I like to take snacks for my four-hour class.

- corned beef and potato patties.  No, I didn't cook my corned beef on St. Patrick's Day... long after.  But, I chopped up the beef and mashed it with the potato and carrots I'd cooked.  Pretty good!  I got this idea from Yum-Yum Bento.
- cucumber and carrot slices

bento #81

Time for leftover pizza!

- pizza... I love thin-crust pizza leftover, whether cold or warm
- two kinds of cabbage: coleslaw and red cabbage slaw
- a few asparagus spears tucked in the back
- blackberries
- a tomato and a few snap peas

bento #80

Not sure what's up with rather unappetizing photos lately... I had intended to make this an English breakfast fry-up bento... but then forgot to fry the eggs.  :)  Oh well, everything else is similar.

- scrambled eggs with cheese (they got a little brown because I'd already fried the ham in the same pan)
- sauteed mushroom
- cherry tomatoes
- toast
- pan-fried ham

I also couldn't get the lighting correct with this one.  Bah, food photography.

bento #79

 A rather brown-looking bento...

- a bear face made from breaded fish filets (there are two, stacked) and mini burger patties.  I was supposed to use meatballs but... didn't.
- fried cabbage... cooked in butter.  Fish and halushky (fried cabbage and noodles) was a common dinner when I was growing up... I just leave out the noodles now.
- with blackberries, peas, a cherry tomato
- and tartar sauce in the orange cup