Tag Archives: cheese

Kindergarten bento – Sandwiches (Thursday 20/Sep/18)

20/09/2018

As requested by my daughter, I made sandwiches for her bento today.

Coming home, she told me that she had diligently followed my instruction by starting off with savory cheese sandwich, moving on to ham & cucumber, then to peanut butter & jam, and finally finishing it off with Nutella.

She also followed my instruction not to tell anyone she had Nutella in her bento, as sweets are not allowed for the bento time at school. I want to show her that sometimes the rules can be broken and live life a little, so she can learn how to be lenient and flexible in otherwise quite a disciplined environment. So every once in a while, I enjoy sharing this small piece of delicious secret with my little cheeky girl.

Kindergarten bento – How many ingredients comparison (29/May, 30/May, 31/May, 1/Jun,4/Jun, 5/Jun)

20/06/2018

29/May – 11 ingredients

Simmered cod, rice, edamame, egg with corns, spinach in sesame sauce, cucumber, carrot, apple, banana

30/May – 11 ingredients

Fried chicken (with corn flower), green beans, broccoli, cherry tomato, goma konbu (sesame & kelp), rice, furikake sprinkle (counted as one), apple, strawberry

31/May – 12 ingredients

Bread (count as one), ham, cucumber, scrambled egg, cheese, Dutch appelstroop, peanut butter, blueberry jam, green beans, apple mousse, mashed potato, cinnamon

1/Jun – 10 ingredients

Chicken soboro, chopped komstsuna, rice, sesame, tomato omelet, broccoli, cucumber with bonito flakes, watermelon

4/Jun – 11 ingredients

Nikudon (pork slices, sliced cabbage, rice), broccoli, cherry tomato, tofu omelet (tofu, egg, ao-nori (seaweed) powder), cherry tomato, apple, banana

5/Jun – 11 ingredients

Tortillas (counted as one), ham, cucumber, cheese, Dutch appelstroop, strawberry jam, banana with Nutella (secret, as it’s not allowed at her school), boiled egg, broccoli, watermelon

Wow, I am quite consistent, with mostly 11 ingredients used every day.

Kindergarten bento – Sandwiches (19/Apr/18)

21/04/2018

My daughter asked for sandwiches for bento, so I made them. It’s easier to get a request like that, I don’t have to think about the menu.

She must’ve liked the sandwiches, looking at her empty bento box after we came home. Even if it is not such a big deal, it still makes me happy and puts a smile on my face. I asked her how her bento was, whether she liked it or not, just to get a reassurance that she really liked it as I had assumed. I wanted to hear it directly from her.

Then she told me she actually wanted to eat tortilla wraps instead.

Kindergarten bento – Sandwich (1/Dec/17)

04/12/2017

My strained back is gradually getting better, but I still cannot carry anything heavy, including groceries. The stock in our fridge is running out, and there’s one more day until the weekend when my husband can help me with groceries.

I managed to drop by at a bakery on the way back from my daughter’s afternoon activity and bought a loaf of white bread. By the way, in Japan, this white fluffy toast bread is super popular and can be found mostly any bakery (except for the modern fancy ones). Anyway, I knew there was still some eggs, bacon and cucumber in the fridge, and we always have cheese and appelstroop being the Dutch household, so I decided to make sandwich for my daughter’s lunch.

Menu: Sandwich (bacon/cucumber/cheese & appelstroop, Broccoli omelet, Peanut butter & banana, Strawberry jam), Cherry tomato, Cucumber sticks, Leftover potato in pesto sauce

Strawberries & mikan tangerine for dessert

Kindergarten bento – Sandwich a la Maman (15/Nov/17)

20/11/2017

When I lived in the Italian city of Milan 13 years ago, I shared an apartment with two amazing, beautiful ladies, one from France, and the other one from Sweden. We all attended the same master’s course in a graduate school in Milan, studying fashion & design management. Despite our shortcomings and different backgrounds, we got along very well, and after a while we became almost inseparable.

One day, the three of us took a short trip to Paris to visit the French flatmate V’s family. Three young & crazy women traveling together with a limited budget… Any of you who’s taken a European low cost carrier would understand that their airport terminals are always located in a secluded area outside the city, which requires a long bus ride and a lot of walking/running before/after catching your flight. It was no exception for our Paris trip, and it felt as if we were always on the move in some type of transportation whether it’s a bus or airport shuttle or tram or whatever, but after what felt like a 10 hour journey, we finally managed to arrive V’s home-sweet-home in the Left Bank of beautiful Paris.

The trip was a blast, and we got to spend some quality, heartwarming time with V’s parents. Her mum, Maman, was a great cook, although she never admitted she was, and always told us she was cooking nothing special. Maman always gave us a shy, humble smile at our compliments and excused herself back to her small kitchen.

After spending a few wonderful days in Paris, it was time for us to go back to Milan. Of course, we had to take the same route back, involving a metro ride to the bus stop and a long bus ride to the distant airport. As is always the case when traveling with V, we were running late to catch our bus and hence our airplane, too.

Knowing her daughter very well, V’s sweet Maman prepared sandwiches for the three of us to eat in the bus, because she knew we wouldn’t have time to stop for a proper meal. She made one sandwich with freshly baked baguette from a bakery near by with the leftover pot-au-feu meat from the evening before. The other one was this simple sandwich made with a Pan Viennoise (long soft milk bread) with butter and boiled pink ham. Both of them were so simple but exceptionally tasty. It was the first time for me to eat Pan Viennoise as sandwich, and I can still remember the perfect combination of the milky butter and the salty tasty ham… Mmm, it was absolutely divine.

Now fast-forward to the present time in Tokyo in 2017, I randomly spotted Pan Viennoise sold on the shelf at a nice French bakery in our neighborhood. The next morning I made a sandwich using the Pan Viennoise I bought, of course with boiled ham & butter, just like what Maman made for us 13 years ago, for my little girl’s kindergarten bento. I prepared the sandwich, thinking of V’s dear Maman with a sweet smile as well as my precious memories of my time in Europe.

Menu: Pan Viennoise sandwich (boiled ham & butter/cheese & appelstroop/peanut butter & apricot jam/strawberry jam & butter), Plain omelet, Boiled green beans, Cherry tomato

Banana for dessert

Kindergarten bento – Tortilla wrap (11/Oct/17)

12/10/2017

Following the precious advice by a fellow blogger Antonio, I heated up tortillas directly on top of the gas burner. As a result, they stayed soft after being heated, and I was able to roll them all up very easily. Thank you again for such a spot-on advice!

Menu: Tortilla wraps (Cheese, ham & cucumber with appelstroop, Broccoli omelet, Strawberry jam & peanut butter, Apricot jam & butter, Nutella), Boiled okra, Steamed broccoli, Cherry tomato

Kiwi & banana for dessert

Kindergarten bento – Field trip (6/Oct/17)

06/10/2017


Today I made sandwiches for our daughter, to bring to the school trip to the zoo. 

Unfortunately, the field trip has been postponed due to the forecasted rain… Well, I’ll just have to replicate something similar next week.

The problem is that I’ll have to wake up earlier than usual, maybe by 20 minutes, again next week. I’m not a morning person, so that 20 minutes is a huge difference… And of course it didn’t rain today. They could’ve gone to the zoo!

Anyway… hope our little big girl enjoyed her bento today.

Kindergarten bento – Sandwich disaster (21/Sep/17)

21/09/2017

I hardly pack sandwiches for my daughter’s lunch. I have a reason for it; I’m afraid of overfeeding bread for our girl. Having a Dutchman in our household, we have bread for breakfast, almost everyday. We eat thin slices of bread and/or buns, with accompaniments such as cheese (preferably Gouda), ham, jam, unsweetened peanut butter, and this heavenly chocolate sprinkles called “Hagelslag” that the most of Dutch people love. If I have time I’d serve fruits and yogurt, but my husband is happy as long as there is bread on our breakfast table.

Anyway, as a very rare occasion I ended up buying sandwich slices at a bakery nearby yesterday, since all the other bread was sold out (anyone from Central Tokyo, you may want to check out this tiny but beautiful bakery called Panetteria Kawamura). And this made me think of making sandwiches for lunch for a change. I thought it would be easy and quick, and I could even save some time in the morning.

The part of making sandwiches was easy, how can it not be, but the real problem was with packing. I cut the sandwiches into quarters so that it would be small enough for my little girl to hold it with one hand and is also visually appealing. But the sandwiches kept falling apart when I tried to pack them while attempting to hold them up vertically. I’ve seen it many times in various bakeries where they are packed nicely and standing straight in a plastic sandwich box. I didn’t realise how hard it was to pack bread in a neat manner. There must be a trick for it, but I couldn’t figure it out today.

As a result, instead of saving time, I totally ran behind schedule and had to rush like a headless chicken to get ready to walk my daughter to school.

Menu: Sandwiches (fillings: Ham, Cheese & Appelstroop,  Scrambled egg & Cucumber, and Strawberry jam), Mashed pumpkin with chicken soboro, Sausage, Steamed broccoli, Cherry tomato

Japanese Nashi pear for dessert

Kindergarten bento – Cheese on top (18/Jan/17)

18/01/2017

Menu: Fusilli bolognese with grated Parimiggiano Reggiano on top, Steamed sweet potato, Cucumber sticks, Cherry tomato

Kiwi for dessert

The grated cheese on top of the pasta. By the request of my daughter’s class teacher, the graceful Miss N.

To be honest I prefer putting the cheese separately so that the amount of cheese can be adjusted as I eat. Like mother, like daughter, our four year old also likes to have a control over this kind of thing. At home she loves scooping the fine powdery cheese with a small spoon and sprinkle it as she shakes her entire body. And naturally, once for our daughter’s bento, I put the grated cheese in a plastic wrap, twisted the top and placed it on the side of the pasta, expecting her to enjoy  sprinkling the cheese by herself as she ate. But according to Miss N, a disaster apparently happened that day. Our girl’s clumsy fingers bursted the plastic wrap open, spreading the whole grated parmiggiano around her neighborhood… Miss N told me that day as a matter of factly that the school, focusing highly on building up children’s self-confidence, believes that the cheese should be pre-sprinkled on top of the pasta going forward. As diligent as I am… voila! The cheese, is now on top of the pasta.