Tonight I made rice for the onigiri the Japanese way with the last bit of risotto (not so Japanese) rice on my shelves (it would be great to use that kind of rice, so I don't have to store yet another ingredient in my tiny kitchen).
Following these instructions, and adjusting the ingredients to my small stock of risotto rice and my 1-person cast-iron Hackman pot, it worked out perfectly: very moist and sticky rice, no burns. I think this white rice cooking routine would easily fit in with evening chores, not so sure I'll be able to do this in the mornings though.

After the rice was cooked and ready for processing I made 4 (non-filled) onigiri the easy way, stored 2 in the fridge for tomorrow and 2 in the freezer.
When my dentist appoint goes well tomorrow I hope to take a bite from My First Onigiri (I think I'll be very into comfort foods after the (over-again) root canal)!

More on how my onigiri survived the fridge/freezer and how it was to my taste in another post.

Image: the goodies for bento-making I bought this week (see previous post).

A new work week, a new bento.
- scroll down for pictures -

Already learned some bento&me things:

• No matter how I think at night: "oh, this is easy, I'll put it together in the morning", it's not working: I'm not the most awake one at mornings; I'd even forgot to look at my bento notes I made the night before.
• Despite my art education, I'm not at all creative in the morning, my only goal is to get on time to get up and go to work at minimal time&effort, and my bento shows...
• I eat all but the bread I pack, could be my co-workers that bring in delicious cakes & cookies...
  

Since I'm not ready yet to get up very very early, just so I can get the creativity flowing by bento-making-time, I'll have to improvise, learn some new tricks and experiment a lot (all great motivation-triggers btw, I'll do anything but getting-up-early-just-for-making-lunch).

~
This second bento was a very simple one, no dressing, no pretties:

• 2 portions of mini heart-shaped fritata (a winner! I'm glad I made a large batch to freeze);
• mixed sprouts;
• 2 slices of plain bread (I have spreads at work, but today I didn't feel like bread, reason: our cleaning lady treated us with lovely filled cookies -last pic- for end of Ramadan);
• tiny grapes with goat brie cheese.

I found a nice Dutch cloth to wrap it in (2nd pic), I do own a very nice Japanese wrap (a gift from the Japanese Cardinal), but somehow I think it's too pretty/holy to wrap my lunch in.

Yesterday I found "veggie cutters" in a hobby shop, it's actually clay cutters, and I now know why real veggie cutters are long; my cutters just cut 1 or 2 bits, so it's time-consuming when I want a lot of small veggie-shapes to sprinkle onto my bento. Today I spotted real (long) veggie cutters in a Chinese giftshop, but they didn't sell a shape I liked (or understood, some are Chinese characters).
At the same hobby shop I bought a star shaped puncher, they had a great choice of shapes and sizes, I really had to put a brake on my "want!"-sentiments ;-)

Nice surprise at the Chinese supermarket close to work: they sell 4 different flavors furikake, I bought 3 kinds plus black sesame-seeds.
Planning to make onigiri tomorrow, when I have more time to prepare, cook, create, cool and freeze. I think I'll experiment with my risotto rice first, although I did find various brands of sushi/Japanese rice in various supermarkets (local, organic and Chinese-): I'm very lucky to live in a mixed&multi-nationalities city :-)
More luck to be found in the city: a Japanese & Korean shop (I haven't been visiting, yet).

I found some great articles that really enlightened me on the (onigiri-)rice thing: Looking at rice, Japanese Basics: How to make Japanese-style plain rice and sushi rice  and Basics: Cooking Japanese style brown rice on the stovetop in a pot. Oh, and this one on easy-making onigiri!
I'll leave that for tomorrow after work, when I have more time to prepare the onigiri (and freeze them).
(links: by Makiko Itoh from Just Bento/Just Hungry)

To be continued!

OK, so it's not a Japanese kinda cute bento, just ordinary Dutch fridge leftovers in a lunchbox ;-)

In the clear box:
- mixed greens (salad)
- 1 hard-boiled egg
- ready made dressing in a small bottle
- 1 cup of hot sweet-sour sauce (no-meatballs dip)

In the orange bread box, from top to bottom:
- sourdough bread with hummus
- 3 small no-meatballs (veg)
- 2 boxes with sliced tomato and cucumber (to drop in salad)
- 1 box with shredded carrot in orange juice and 3 walnuts

It's set in a beautiful community garden in the city centre of Rotterdam, very close to my work; when the weather is good it's my fav spot to eat my lunch.
I didn't eat it all, a co-worker brought some chinese rolls in, and I took one (it was filled with some unknown sweet substance, delicious!). So I spoiled my bento-lunch... I left 1 no-meatball and all bread to be snacks for the afternoon.

I didn't bring my camera, so these pictures were made by phone, and I couldn't see what I was doing (hi late-summer sun!), but the contents are showing. I made one picture earlier today of the package I brought in to my office (see last picture, the thermos isn't part of the bento, it's my regular teapot on my desk), I really should skill on folding and tie-knots, messy, but it held :-)

It was fun to make, it was a great joy to eat, so... to be continued!
:-D

Sjaan is suspicious of that resembling moving kitty at my screen...
- on a lazy sunday afternoon -

I already decided I wouldn't care if the leather couch would be scratched, but it seems she has no interest in doing that, super-sjaantje!
I'll work on her own blog tomorrow, to keep her former owner posted on her well-being.

Kan niet tippen aan die van Bosz, maar ook leuk.