A better organised week since some of the items were cooked in large batches on the Sunday. Given into a random inclination, Yvan went off to cook his interpretation of a potato dauphinoise; it did not help as a similar dish I’ve encountered in the past had cheese and bacon. As we had picked up quite a lot of potato (and cheese, and cream) there was quite a lot left over, some of which was portioned into lunchbox-sized squares. In addition, we found the chicken on the cheap so I had to hurry in cooking them since they were close to “due date” (and cooking them makes them last a bit longer, though unfortunately I defaulted to the ‘fry’ treatment).
I’m probably not a good food advisor as I did use the last of the sakura denbu on the Monday, which Maki advises to eat within 3 days (either it was fine or my stomach is more robust than I imagined). It did allow the opportunity to practise my decorative roll making – I can say I am pleased with the result but my skill needs improving. In anticipation to adding an egg layer to the outside I did use some mayo to glue it more firmly to the nori but naturally this made it a little wet – not unlike letting a normal roll sit around anyway. For repeatability the petals are 16-17g of pink sushi rice in making a ‘half nori sheet length’ roll – around 2 sheets were used, where the first was divided into 1/6ths (fold a sheet lengthways, then in 1/3rds).
I had picked up some peanuts with the intention of making pad thai but on reading it would not be lunch compatible – but I did find that kung pao chicken does use some hence my interpretation (since I was using pre-cooked chicken, it obviously deviated from the original recipe).
The Friday ‘eclipse’ was pretty much a non-event in my neck of the woods – a piss-poor attempt given the morning haze and grey sky; which was rather annoying as later the clouds cleared. Oh well. Hopefully the local farm shop would have more exciting veggies for next week..
March 16
I am no speed bento maker but I think some people have concluded I spend hours on my lunch every day. This is not one example to prove them wrong though as per usual some of the 2.5 hours yesterday was spent making dinner & for preparing items later this week (rice, portioning leftover dauphinoise, marinating & frying excess chicken)
The sides are steamed & seasoned purple sprouting broccoli, dressed steamed carrot, mini dauphinoise, tomato and chicken karaage. The plum flower kazarimaki has sakura denbu, egg crêpe, mayo, steamed carrot, yukari furikake and cucumber. Practice makes perfect; looks like more practice needed!
March 17
Looks like I ate’nt dead yet from using up the last of the sakura denbu yesterday, so today’s lunch will go ahead. It’s chicken karaage with green onion sauce as from The Just Bento Cookbook, mini dauphinoise, steamed purple sprouting broccoli, tomato, coleslaw and cucumber
March 18
Losing steam but not in flavour, nothing like chilli and bacon to stimulate the appetite. The sides for this lunch is chilli karaage chicken, steamed broccoli, mini dauphinoise, stewed carrot & button mushrooms and tomato
March 19
Looked up a recipe that might be compatible with my stock karaage. Lunch is not-very-traditional kung pao chicken, mini dauphinoise, steamed broccoli, hijiki & carrot salad, cucumber and tomato.
March 20
Packed this one mildly intoxicated so there’s a lot more rice than usual, not helped that it contains chorizo and spring onion. Lunch is quick-pickle cucumber, tomato, mini dauphinoise, hijiki & carrot salad, steamed broccoli and beef stew. Yes, the stew didn’t start of with capsicum or spring onion…
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