La petite biscotte Now in Munich…

My first bento!

Ok this morning I got up 1 hour earlier than normally but I’m glad I did it, because check the result: my first bento!
Bento is a traditional way of preparing lunches for school/work in boxes that have several compartments to store the food carefully in order for the tastes not to get mixed up. But there is much more behind bento. Bento is also (as Japanese food in general) about the preparation. The appearance is supposed to be so appetizing that you feel like eating everything. For Japanese children for example a bento is the link between home and school. The mothers carefully prepare food for the child to feel accepted among friends and for the child to feel so appealed by the lunch that it will eat everything to the last rice grain. There are even bento meetings for parents and loads of magazines with ideas.

But bento aren’t only children meals Adults and people in general like to eat those whenever they aren’t at home. You can often buy those in shops or at train stations. Sometimes they contain special regional foods and then the bento are called ekiben (if I’m not mistaken ^^).
Taken from Wikipedia:

Types of bento

• Chūka bentō (中華弁当) are filled with Chinese food. The Chinese do not eat food that has become cold; this was invented in Japan.

• Kamameshi bentō (釜飯弁当) are sold at train stations in the Nagano prefecture. A bento is packed in a clay pot and cooked. This clay pot is a souvenir item.

• Makuno-uchi bentō (幕の内弁当) is a classic style of bento with rice, a pickled ume fruit (umeboshi), a slice of broiled salmon, a rolled egg, etc.

• Noriben (海苔弁) is the simplest bento, with nori dipped in soy sauce covering cooked rice.

• Sake bentō (鮭弁当) is a simple bento with a slice of broiled salmon (鮭, sake) as the main dish.

• Shidashi bentō (仕出し弁当) is made in a restaurant and delivered during lunch. This bento is often eaten at a gathering like a funeral or a party. It is usually packed with traditional Japanese foods like tempura, rice and pickled vegetables. A shidashi bento packed with European-style food is also available.

• Sushizume (鮨詰め) literally means “packed sushi“, and is a bento filled with sushi.

Other

• Hayaben (早弁), literally “quick bento”, is eating a bento before lunch, and having another lunch afterward.

• Hokaben (ホカ弁) is any kind of bento bought at a bento franchise called “Hoka-Hoka Tei”.

• Reitō mikan (冷凍ミカン) is a frozen mandarin orange often sold at a train station alongside ekiben. It was one of the earliest desserts sold onboard a train.

• Hinomaru bento (日の丸) was the name for a bento consisting of plain white rice with an umeboshi in the centre. The Hinomaru bento takes its name from the Hinomaru, the Japanese flag, which has a white background with a red circle in the centre. These bento were common in during the second World War, both because of the scarcity of food and the desire to and necessity of avoiding displays of excess while maintaining an image of stout. patriotism.

How to make bento? Well I will devote many many entries to this as I am reasearching stuff about bento like mad so stay tuned :p

I don’t claim to make perfectly traditional Japanese bento boxes, please don’t get me wrong I take a large part of Japanese recipes and check which ones I can cook that aren’t too time consuming (as I’m a full time student I don’t have much time) and that are doable with the ingredients that I can find here in the region I live in. (we only have one Asia-mart and they have one single shelf of Japanese ingredients… So not much choice for now - and ordering over internet is kinda pricey). Also I will fairly often use local recipes or western food that is well known (like chicken nuggets, country potatoes or taboulé).. but I will generally try to keep as much Japanese foods as I can and I will also try to keep the food as healthy as possible.

The obento you see above consists of Japanese cooked rice with roasted sesame seeds sprinkled on top of it. Moving on to the right we have teriyaki fried chicken (Teriyaki is a marinade for meat - will add a recipe at the end). Then cucumber slices and a little cornichon. Above we have chopped carrots and an onigiri (Japanese rice ball). Totally on the left we have a little fruit salad, a milk bottle of salad dressing (cute no? ^^) and two cherry tomatoes.

Recipes that you’ll need:

Onigiri

Makes 4 servings

• 4 cups of freshly cooked Japonica rice
• salt
• nori seaweed, cut in 4×2 cm stripes
• fillings (traditional fillings are Umeboshi (pickled plum),chopped pickles in general or dried bonito flakes… but as it is really hard to get a hold of any of these fillings here in France I like to use flaked cooked salmon, tuna seasoned with a tsp of soy sauce, omelet or any fried meat. The filling may not contain any liquid, it must be dry and it must be conservable up until you actually have lunch) note that fillings are not obligatory but if you put in some it should generally be fairly salty as it is accompanied by a lot of rice
• optional: black and white toasted sesame seeds

(If you don’t know how to cook Japanese rice: click here)
Clean your hands so that they are impeccably clean. Wet them under cold water and then rub a bit of salt with sesame seeds on your hand palms. Take 1 cup of cooked rice (while it’s still hot … test the degree of heat that you can still bear with your hands) and rapidly working, form a ball. Make a little, but deep hole with your finger in the middle of the ball of rice and add a teaspoon of filling. Now close the rice ball in such a way that the filling is embedded in the center; shape the onigiri either in a triangle shape or in a disc shape or in a rounded cylinder shape. To make triangles just cup your hands in an angle and rotate the onigiri until happy with the form. A sheet explaining this better: click.

Teriyaki fried chicken:

For the Teriyaki marinade

• 1/2 cup of soy sauce
• 1/2 cup of mirin (if you don’t find this ingredient you can substitute it by either sake and sugar or a sweet sherry)
• 2 tablespoons of sugar

Put all these ingredients together in a little pot, mix them and turn on low heat while stirring it. Let it simmer a few minutes and then turn off the heat. After the sauce has cooled down put it in a bottle and store in the fridge.

For the chicken:

Cut one chicken breast in bite sized pieces and pour about 3 tbss of teriyaki sauce over it. Now add salt and pepper and cover the chicken well with the sauce. Put it in the fridge to marinate for about an hour then fry in a pan. Watch out with the heat though as the sauce contains a lot of sugar it will easily burn.

Fruit Salad

• Fruits of your choice, cut in little pieces. For example: peaches, pears, cherries and grapes.
• 1/2 cup Honey
• 1/4 cup lime juice

Make a dressing from the honey and lime juice and pour over fruit pieces. Mix well, serve cold.

See you soon!