Tuesday, October 4, 2011

Bento Tuesday!

It's the first Tuesday of the month, and that means it's time for sharing  Bentos!

Nothing incredibly exciting but still nice to post to continue to encourage myself and others to pack healthy and cute lunches for our kids. I actually got stopped when I was out with the kids this week. An assistant at the school recognized the kids and commented on how wonderful the bento boxes are and how much healthier they eat because of it. That made me feel GREAT about choosing this style of eating for them. It also reinforced what I don't see and that is because of the choices I make when I put their lunches together they are eating better. I know that I would like more variety and even better things for them to eat but even what they are getting is good. :-)


 This lunch is a PB/banana roll up with goldfish and 2 raspberry swirl cookies.  I couldn't help the treat. I found myself addicted to these cookies and I was eating more of them than the kids. So I sent them for their lunches. :-) That very quickly kept me from having to eat them!

Here we have turkey on a hamburger bun (the bun is a recurring theme as we always have left over buns after cookouts) with goldfish and grapes. This box came back completely empty so it got sent back the next day but it didn't go over so well the next time. OOps! I guess you live and learn. What works one day doesn't necessarily work the next.
 Here is an almond butter and honey sandwich with pretzels and a yogurt box with a candy corn on top. After all it's getting close to Halloween and that dreaded candy has found it's way into my home. I did find out after doing this that you can't let it sit overnight or the candy will melt... and THAT is not a pretty sight. Plopping the candy on that morning works out but not the night before. Yet another lesson learned. :-)

This is the kids favorite bento box, and mine as well. It's harder to pack the right sizes but the way that the box stacks and the size that it makes is a whole lot easier to fit into just about any lunch bag or box. Of course my son won't be caught dead with this box because it's bunny themed but when no one is looking he'll eat out of it and stack it up, too.  This is a veggie sandwich with cream cheese, chives, cucumber and lettuce. Yogurt covered raisins accompany it and the snack for the day is well - scooby doo! fruit snacks and goldfish of course. After all that healthy sandwich must be counteracted in some way. At least they think so. They don't know the goldfish are whole grain and that Betty Crocker is one of the few mass marketers that use real fruit juice as one of the main ingredients.

The next bento is the perfect size for my littlest one. This is chicken strips and grapes. Simple, yet perfect. I added some applesauce and a fruitable and she was in hog heaven. 
The next day was rice ball and PB/Jelly
 
Here is my favorite lunch from the last few weeks. The heart sammie. Inside is ham, a side of carrots, half an apple and a round of cheese finishes off that meal. The other box is pate with lettuce (go figure) and grapes, carrots and a cheese wheel.

 
One of the lunches got sent with a side of fresh mulberries from our tree. The girls love to eat them straight off the tree but that makes me cringe. I much prefer washing them and sending them this way.

I'm always looking for new (very) inexpensive containers for bento boxes and so far the biggest trouble seems to be fitting into the lunch boxes! I have found that the sandwich containers are perfect for one type of lunch box but have to go sideways into another. So I am still on the hunt. The best fit overall seems to be the tri stack skinny bunny. The kids enjoy the design, I enjoy the size and the ease of fitting into any size lunch bag/box. 
I love the lock box littles for things like yogurt and applesauce but I would prefer to keep as many of the parts of the meal together as possible.... but then again that may not be possible. I mean how feasible is it for the partially liquid ingredients to stay in their 'section' of the box? Probably not all that likely.

Thanks for catching up with bento Tuesday - or tolerating it as the case may be. :-D

'Till next time!

Barbie~

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