"BBQ Fried Chicken" bento - バーベキュー唐揚弁当

 Today's o-bento:
 - BBQ Fried Chicken
 - Spicy Kidney and Black Beans
 - Broccoli
 - Rice with secret sesame seeds & Nori see weed inside

 I always wish I could take better pictures! My camera is old and silly, plus I don't get good light in my apartment. Anyway, I marinaded chicken in Korean BBQ in a plastic bag over night and this morning, I just added some katakuri starch (Potato starch) and fried them until they get golden brown.

Somebody said Corn Starch is good to make butter for fried chicken and I tried but I didn't like it. Was it because the one I have was too old??? Anyway, I can find potato starch at Asian grocery stores but this time I brought it back with me from Japan. I like it so far.

My husband said a man at work said if I make o-Bento for him, he'll pay for it because he buys lunch daily at the cafeteria anyway. My husband said the man mentioned that twice so he thinks he means it. I was thinking it's too embarrassing because I am not a professional, but maybe I can do it two or three times a week??

韓国BBQソースに一晩つけて片栗粉をまぶして揚げてみました。いつもとは少し違う味です。 これが日本の焼肉のタレならもっと美味しいのかもしれないと思いました。


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"Menchi-Katsu" bento - メンチカツ弁当

Today's o-bento:
 - Menchi-Katsu
 - Rolled Egg
 - Rice with soy sauce pickled garlic
 - Rabbit shaped Apple

Menchi-katsu is like deep fried thin meat loaf. These are the left over from last night! Easy! Just in case it is not enough quantity, I also gave my husband a little bag of chips.　Oops! I forgot to put broccoli in o-bento!!

今日は午前中から私も出勤なのでとても簡単なお弁当となりました。あ、いつも簡単な弁当ですけどね。

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"Exploded Croquette" bento - 爆発コロッケ弁当

Today's o-bento:
 - Potato Croquette
 - Spicy Sausage Corn Butter Saute
 - Broccoli
 - Rice with Sesame Seeds and Kombu

 This is the last croquette I made and froze looong time ago! Sometimes they are just fine but sometimes they explode when I fry them. Hmm, there are so many things I can still learn about cooking!

日本から離れると、梅干や昆布がとても貴重で美味しく感じます。 日本にいるときはそうでもないのに不思議です。無いものねだりでしょうか。手に入らないことは無いけど、もったいなくてチビチビと食べています。

"Steak Don" bento - ステーキ丼弁当

Today's o-bento:
 - Fried Beef, Onion, and Corn on Rice
 - Steamed Broccoli

 This is super easy, as usual, and tasty o-bento. I fried beef with onion and corn, then added BBQ sauce. I usually like Japanese BBQ sauce better, but my husband had it already when I moved into his place. This sauce is a little bit spicy.

My husband is going to take another business trip again from this weekend so I won't have to make o-bento for a while since then. He has just called me and said he had today's o-bento at 10am! I should have given him a small bag of chips for later today!


いつもブロッコリーは茹でずにレンジにかけるのですが、今朝は少し時間が長すぎたようで柔らかーく仕上がってしまいました。反省。

"Dried Curry" bento - 節約ドライカレー弁当

Today's o-bento:
 - Dried Curry with Sunny-Side Up
 - Black Beans with hot sauce
 - Fried Imitation Crab

 I usually get up about 45 minutes before my husband wakes up and make o-bento and breakfast for him. I had so much fun with my best friend in Maryland last nigh and I was thinking, "Hmmm, I will just pack something I already have for o-bento." so I could sleep a little bit longer than usual this morning. Dried curry and rice were in the freezer, beans and imitation crab meat were the exactly same with yesterday's o-bento!

Unfortunately, sunny-side up really doesn't look delicious... Sunny-side up is so easy and simple to make but at the same time it's so difficult to make it perfect, I think.
I used the small rectangular shaped pan in the picture below for making rolled egg. It's very small and useful.
I am always wondering how I can make a sunny-side up with the york in right in the center!

このフライパンは一つの卵で卵焼きが作れるというフライパンで日本に帰国したときに楽天で購入して、とても重宝しています。お弁当作りにはかかせません。目玉焼きを綺麗に作るためにも、蓋もあればいいのですが。

"Inari Zushi" bento - 節約稲荷寿司弁当

Today's o-bento:

 - Inari Zushi, soy sauce,and wasabi
 - Black Beans with hot sauce
 - Fried Imitation Crab

Everything is leftover! I was going to put imitation crab as it was but I decided to fry it with olive oil a little and seasoned with salt and pepper. It was good. My husband loves beans and we bough so many cans of black beans, but to tell the truth, I don't really know how to use them and it is not really my favorite thing to eat yet. He added minced garlic into beans before but since we don't have fresh garlic right now so I added some his favorite hot sauce. I tried it and it was good, so I hope he will like it. He loves spacy food all the time.

冷蔵庫の中の蟹かまをそのまま入れるつもりでしたがフライパンで焼いて塩コショウしてみました。蟹かまと言っても、裂けるタイプのものじゃなくて本当にかまぼこみたいなもので、焼いてみても美味しかったです。

"Onigiri" bento - 節約おにぎり弁当

Today's o-bento:

 - Rice Balls (Tarako, Noritama, and Tuna & Mayo)
 - Rolled Egg
 - Fried Sausage with Mustard & Ketchup

 We have a lot of "Furikake"(seasoned dried food for sprinkling on rice)  that I want to finish because they are old... The bag of Tarako, salted cod roe flavored furikake is almost empty. Today's o-bento was really easy to make, but I think it looks fine. I hope my husband likes it. He sometimes call me from work to tell me o-bento was good. Even though he didn't call me, he will tell me when he got home anyway. He knows how to motivate me.

One day, one of his friends was saying he usually brings leftover for lunch with a cup of coffee with him to work and realized he was saving a lot of money. That is so true, I think. I have never calculated how much we are saving by not to buy lunch at work or outside but to bring his own from home, but he used to go to a Japanese sushi restaurant sometimes so comparing to that, o-bento is really really reasonable. Plus the good thing, I think, is it's less hassle because he doesn't even have to leave his desk to get his lunch.

毎晩、翌朝に作るお弁当のメニューをメモに書いておくのですが、昨日のメモは、おにぎり、ソーセージのマスタードケチャップ炒め、卵焼き（また！）と3品しか思い浮かばずどうなることやらと思いましたが、詰めてみると悪くないものです。（と自分では思う。）
おにぎりのゴハンも１合以上使っているのでボリュームもあるはず。夫は今日は帰りが遅くなると言っていたので、おやつにチップスも入れておきました。（別袋。）


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"Etc" bento - 節約色々弁当

Today's o-bento:

 - Gohan with white sesame seeds (Rice)

 - Potato Croquettes and Meat Patty

 - Rolled Egg and Corn & Bacon Saute

 - Leftover of Simmered Pork Sauce

 It was a first day at work yesterday, so I set up the slow cooker so that we can eat as soon as I got home. I used to love eating pork but since I moved over here I started to feel that pork usually smell too much, but I have bought some to make pork katsuretsu, which I haven't made yet, but I used some for last night. When I offered my husband second helping, he said he would like to take it to work today.

節約弁当も板についてきたか？と思いつつ、そろそろ冷蔵庫がかなり寂しくなってきました。今月もあと2週間。

"Hosomaki" bento - 細巻きスシ弁当

Today's o-bento:

 - Kappa maki (Cucumber Roll)

 - Sausage maki

 - Corn Mayo maki

I went to grocery shopping last night to get cucumber, imitation crab meat and avocado.Our friends are coming over to our place so I will cook chicken teriyaki, Californian rolls andsome of hosomaki like these, so my husband lunch is almost the same. He loves wasabi so I put it inside of these rolls beforehand. Hope he like them.

昨晩はゴハンを2合炊いて、そのうちの半分を寿司飯にしました。運よく熱帯夜ではなく寒いくらい涼しい夜だったので、そのまま１晩置き、今朝少しだけレンジで温めて具を巻きました。６本巻けましたが、足りるかな？

"Chicken in Tomato Sauce" bento - 節約チキンのトマトソース煮弁当

Today's o-bento:

 - Chicken in Tomato Sauce

 - Onigiri (Rica Balls and Seaweeds)

It's totally a leftover from last night. I used a slow cooker for the first time in my life. I had not really heard about "slow cooker" when I was in Japan, so I had no idea how to use it or what I can make with it. I asked around and it sounded like people just put some meat and vegetable along with seasoning and water. I peeled off the skin from the bone-in chicken breast, and added some tomato sauce, basil, oregano, salt, minced garlic, garlic cloves, and lentil beans. Lentil beans are not been seen in Japan but one of my friend made me soup with it and it was so good, plus it contains a lot of iron. Yeah, iron is what I need. Cooked about 5 hours in low heat. You can't really see chicken in the picture but it was nice and tender. I liked the sauce too.

弁当らしくない弁当ですが、昨日の残り物をコンテナーに入れておにぎりを作って夫を送り出しました。簡単、安上がり。

"Curry & Rice" bento - 節約カレーライス弁当

 

Today's o-bento:

 - Curry and Rice

 - Potato and Sweet Corn Croquettes

 - Canned Fruits and Coconut Balls

So, like I wrote yesterday, we have very limited budget.

Curry and Rice are left over from two nights ago. 

Croquettes are made 3-4 months ago and they are still good! (Of course they were frozen in the freezer.)

I opened up the canned of tangerine, pink grape fruits, and peach this morning and mixed them with some very sweet coconut balls that were sleeping in the refrigerator for a long time... I served 1/2 peach with cottage cheese to my husband for the breakfast and he said it tasted funny. I had already tasted it before I gave it to him and I though it was just fine so it should be fine. Anyway, there's no GREEN in the o-bento today and I forgot to put some sauce on Croquettes! I'm sorry darling.

冷蔵庫大掃除のようなメニューです。しかもコロッケは穴が開いて中身が出ている模様でした・・・。ちなみにカレーは、チキンカレーです。おなじみの激安チキンです。

"Teriyaki Chicken" bento - 節約照焼きチキン弁当

Today's o-bento:

 - Gohan with Sakura denbu (Rice with fish rousong) and pickled garlic cloves

 - Teriyaki Chicken

 - Tamagoyaki (Rolled egg)

As soon as my husband is back home, tremendously terrible thing happened and we had to away from home for 2 weeks, so this is the first o-bento since long time ago. The thing is, we are in a huge financial crnisis, so we decided not to buy extra things and even groceries at least this month. Well, it's still 11th, but fortunately, we still enough chicken breast packs in the freezer. We bought them at Costco and they were only 99 cents per pound. Actually, when I was moving out the previous apartment in San Diego, I didn't go grocery shopping for 3 weeks to try not to waste what I already had and to clean the refrigerator and cabinets, so I think I can do it this time again. However, not eating fresh vegetable was not good idea because my facial skin got really dried after a while, especially since I didn't take any supplements. 

久しぶりの更新です。ですか、今月は節約弁当ブログになりそうな予感です。