The Week in Bentos : Feb 24 - Feb 28

The weather gods are playing again - After a beautiful Saturday with temperatures at a pleasant 75, its back to 20 degrees on Monday. There was freezing rain and snow flurries, slick roads and predictably, closed schools in a city unused to such drastic vagaries of nature !
So housebound we are , yet again :)

Last week, we had a good lunch week.


 
On Monday, LG7 took a peanut butter and jelly sandwich on wheat buns, a homemade oatmeal pumpkin bar, a cutie orange and apple slices.


 
On Tuesday, lunch was rotini pasta with store bought marinara sauce, cheddar cheese cubes, apple slices and another piece of the oatmeal chocolate chip pumpkin bar. Some of the pasta came back home because " he was busy talking to his friend and didnt have time to finish his lunch. " That earned him a lecture !

 
On Wednesday, I made quesadillas with chopped broccoli, crumbled paneer and shredded cheddar. It was accompanied by ketchup, some potato chips , an orange and strawberries.

 
On Thursday, LG7 got a grilled cheese sandwich, goldfish, oranges and strawberries.

LG7 went on  a field trip on Friday with his class and was required to take a packed lunch which could be disposed. So that translated into another sandwich, with some strawberries and goldfish crackers in ziploc bags and a small bottle of water. Basically a repeat of Thursday.

Overall, it was a good week.
Hope you stay warm and have a wonderful week ahead !!

The Week in Bentos : Feb 17 - Feb 21

Irrespective of whether my weekend has been hectic ( filled with outside activities, cooking and baking sprees ) or sedentary , the end of said weekend always comes as a surprise. As in "Is it Sunday night already ? Where did my weekend go ? " Does it ever happen to you ? Its the same right now, sitting as I am on my sofa at 9.45 pm on a Sunday night, surrounded by silence and kept company only by the relentless ticking of the clock :)
Wonder what the week ahead has in store for me !!
Here are the lunches that we packed this past week.

On Monday, LG7 had a holiday from school on account of President's Day. So, no bento lunch packed that day. Instead, we had a quiet day at home and celebrated LG3's third birthday at home by baking a simple eggless chocolate cake. LG3 was, unfortunately a little sick, so it was a pretty quiet affair.


 
On Tuesday, LG7 took a waffle sandwich with almond butter and jelly, carrot sticks, strawberries and blackberries and a piece of chocolate cake for a treat.

 
On Wednesday, I tried a pasta recipe with a white sauce, an orange, apple slice and carrot sticks. For some reason, LG7 didnt like the white sauce and brought back almost half the pasta back. I will have to tinker with the sauce recipe to get it to his liking.

 
On Thursday, the Easy Lunch Box contained spinach and corn quesadillas with ketchup, an orange, strawberries and a chocolate chip cookie.


 
On Friday, as per request, I sent Annie's Mac and cheese, carrot sticks, strawberries and an orange and heaved a sigh of relief when everything came back empty.

I have been observing that LG7 is almost emptying the contents of both his water bottles. Thats probably a sign that winter is bidding adieu !

Hope you have a wonderful week ahead !

The Week in Bentos : Feb 10 - Feb 14 2014

Winter seems to be releasing its hold on our area slowly..Its getting warmer day by day and we are definitely looking forward to spring and summer. I need to get some of my seeds started. Although my vegetable garden is by on means on a large scale, I still look forward to all the activities associated with the garden !

I tried a few new things last week in the lunchboxes and they were all pretty successful.
So here goes:


 
On Monday, I made cheese Uttappa ( savory rice and lentil pancakes) with ketchup, leftover fried potatoes and strawberries.

 
On Tuesday, I made toasted sandwiches with a savory avocado filling. I also included carrot sticks and orange segments. I am happy that I have been able to wean LG7 slightly from his peanut butter fixation !

 
On Wednesday, I packed Mac and Cheese in the thermal jar, an oatmeal chocolate chip bar and fresh mixed berries.

 
On Thursday, it was mixed pasta again in a light butter sauce, with a cutie orange, blackberries and the oatmeal bar for a treat.

 
On Friday, I made grilled sandwiches with almond butter and apple slices, orange , strawberries and dried fruits and almonds. I added a heart pick as a nod to Valentine's Day !
I attended LG7's class party and thoroughly enjoyed myself, watching LG7 interact with his friends.

Hope you had a wonderful week too !
 

The Week in Bentos : Feb 3 - Feb 7

I am getting progressively later and later on my weekly Bento posts ! Do you ever get the feeling that the day just gets away from you sometimes ? I definitely have more time now than I did a few weeks ago, because my younger son LG3 has started attending preschool full time. But even then, the hours seem to fill up with chores and tasks of all sorts ! The only thing left to do, is to allocate times for specific tasks for the entire week and be slightly more organized than I am at the time. I will let you all know how that works out !

 
On Monday, LG7 got whole wheat noodles with spinach and corn in a light tomato sauce with nutritional yeast, blackberries and a chocolate chip cookie for a treat.


 
On Tuesday, the lunch box contained sandwiches made with whole wheat bread and avocado filling, one half toasted and one un-toasted  as requested :) , apples and strawberries and a cookie.

 
On Wednesday,  I packed corn and spinach quesadillas with ketchup (in the small white box), carrot sticks and some cake cubes.

 
On Thursday,  lunch consisted of toasted peanut butter and apple sandwiches, homemade semolina cake, cantaloupe and strawberries and dried fruits and almonds.

 
On Friday, I packed lunch in the 2-tier bento box. The bigger container contained spicy vermicelli noodles and the smaller one had apples, strawberries and blackberries.

What are your plans for Valentine's Day ? Although we dont celebrate it in any special way, it is impossible to miss the hype and hoopla surrounding this day all around you ! My children also celebrate it in school and this year I sent cute cards and non-candy treats like tops and stencils.
You dont really need a special day to tell your loved ones or show them that you care, but tell them today anyway !
Have a sweet Valentine's Day !!

Dora's Delicious Blueberry Muffins !

During my last visit to the local library, as I was walking the aisles, selecting books for my family; I noticed that my younger son(aged 3) had selected a few himself. I gave them all a cursory glance, making sure that they would be suitable for his age and his interests and then checked them out. When I came back home and sat with LG3 to read the books, I realized that the Dora and Diego book that I had assumed was a storybook, was in actuality a recipe book for kids ! When I asked the little one why he had selected that book, he quipped that he wanted to see all the snack pictures in there !!
Then last week, I decided to bake the yummy looking blueberry muffins listed in the book. I already had some fresh blueberries and the cornmeal needed in the recipe. The batter was extremely easy to whip up and took me about 15 minutes to get into the oven. 20 minutes later, we had piping hot scrumptious looking mini muffins on the cooling rack.



Ingredients:
½ C unbleached all purpose flour
½ C white whole wheat flour
⅓ C cornmeal
⅓ C packed brown sugar
2 tsp baking powder
¼ tsp salt
⅔ C low fat plain yogurt ( I used homemade)
¼ C canola oil
1 flax egg (1 Tbsp ground flax + 3 Tbsp water, beaten well)
1 tsp cornstarch
½ tsp pure vanilla extract
1 C fresh or frozen blueberries (I used fresh)

Method:
1. Preheat the oven to &deg(375);F. Line a mini muffin pan with liners or spray lightly with cooking spray.
2.Combine the flours, cornmeal, baking powder, salt and cornstarch. Whisk well. Reserve two tablespoons of this mixture.
3.In another bowl, combine the yogurt, oil, flax egg and vanilla. Add the flour mixture to the wet mixture and combine gently. Add the blueberries to the reserved flour mixture and coat well. Then add the blueberries to the batter and fold in gently.
4. Divide the batter among the muffin cups and bake for about 15 - 17 minutes, until tops are golden brown.
5. Cool in the pan for about 5 minutes, before removing onto a wire rack to cool completely.
6. Enjoy lovely muffins, bursting with juicy blueberries !


Notes:
1. The addition of cornmeal to the batter gave a wonderful texture to the muffins. They weren't pasty or dense, instead they were really light and airy, bursting with the goodness of fresh blueberries.
2. As usual, these mini goodies made their way into lunchboxes and traveled really well.
3. These can be frozen nicely too and will keep for several days(if they stay undiscovered that long !