Geeky Bento Lunches Again...

Woah it's been a long time since I've made some bento lunches. As I've said in previous posts I've just been either lazy or too busy.

So here's some that I've made over the weeks and months...

These pics are all taken with my phone, so they are not the best of quality.

This first one is a healthy one of carrots, cucumber, and gherkins on top of a tuna pasta.

This is of some leftovers. Mushrooms, carrots and rice and I think there's some celery in this one! Yuck! I hate celery!!!

Ah, unhealthy white bread and peanut butter... But at least I added some fruits to this lunch. ^_^

This bento box I bought from Longdan isn't the greatest. The lid has loosened, so I had to use some ribbon to make sure it closed! ¬_¬

Here's what was inside... Loads of cucumber, oranges and some tuna pasta again!!

Ok, I had to make a very geeky bento for this blogpost, so in the end I made some pasta, and then fried an egg. Fried eggs don't usually go into a bento, but I wanted it for lunch. Plus there was nothing in the fridge... ¬_¬""

Last but not least is this bento with German salami with chilli cheese slices... and sliced apples doused with some lemon juice and a clementine! Nice for the Geek to eat!! ^_^ The chilli cheese was great too!!

Any suggestions on what I should make next for a geeky bento???!!!

Bento with a Hong Kong style sandwich

Tired of eating peanut butter sandwiches for the past few days at lunchtime, I decided to make something a different sandwich for today's lunch. ^_^ 
As usual I tend to miss Hong Kong's food once in a blue moon because it is just so good compared to the Chinese restaurants in London. 

Voila, here's my scrambled egg and "spam" sandwich.

Bento with scrambled egg and ham sandwiches plus oranges on the side- HK style!

Because I didn't have any spam, I used thin slices of ham to replicate the image. (^_^)v I lightly toasted them on a pan after scrambling the eggs.

Close up of my sandwiches

The sandwiches took me 10 minutes to make which included the prep time plus the peeling of the orange. I didn't toast the bread since it will get soggy...

Here's another picture bonus from Kwun Tong, Hong Kong, which is again taken from two years back...

HK style sandwich - spam and fried egg!

Soooo hungry now. Going to eat my lunch right now!

Geeky Bento Box Lunches

I have grown to love all things Asian (Chinese, Korean, Japanese - anything goes I guess). (^_^)v 

I have been a fan of bento style lunches for a little while now. Assuming you all know what bento lunches are, if not, they are just Japanese style lunch boxes of leftover food from your dinner etc. But sometimes I start mine from scratch.

My craze for bento started off from watching a few mangas and Japanese school dramas and then seeing them on Hong Kong dramas... Hahahahaha... Geek!!! Anyway, a friend of mine from China had a pretty neat lunch box with 3 compartments - and I wanted one for myself! So I searched high and low for something similar - but only found small bento boxes, or ones without compartments but eventually I found one in London's Japan Centre (but now broken and thrown away) and one in Hong Kong, which I knew I would use for a while ^^. Now, I have loads of lunch boxes (not intentional of course!). Some I have had to give away (they were too small) or thrown away (because they got broken after many uses!).

Well, I think it's about time I show you some recent bento lunches I have made this year (not many here since I've been a bit lazy and doing all of that crazy studying!).

Some of these pictures were taken using my phone, so here's a fishy salad to start off with in two different lunchboxes...

Fried Salmon and Salad (cucumber, radish, red cabbage, cherry tomatoes, cheese and a mustard and vinegar dressing)... My friend who is now in China taught me the salad dressing, and the little bottle was brought from jbox.com... ^^

Chinese style food...

Stir fried beef and green bell peppers with noodles in black bean sauce... This is making me hungry!!

Yummy pasta salad in the lunchbox I bought from Hong Kong!! You can find a box similar to this in MUJI at the moment.

Tuna pasta salad with cherry tomatoes, olive bought from Cyprus and home made pickled cucumber ^^

Here I used crustless bread for these sandwiches (I don't like crust). And usually I leave the skin on my tangerines, but the skin easily came off on these ones...

Ham and mayonnaise sandwiches with olives, crinkle cut gherkins, cherry tomatoes and peeled tangerine segments

Now I'm going to show off my culinary skills, (plus the use of my Olympus EPL-1 which gives these nice shots)...

Tuna sushi rolls, radishes cut into flowers, cherry tomatoes, gherkins and some home-made spicy pickled cucumber ^^

And here I made another 2 for some friends. The one of the left is in a re-usable takeaway container. The black bento box I got from MUJI, which they don't sell anymore.

Loads of sushi!

After making these, I ate the leftovers, yum yum!!^^

I will make some more bento style lunches in the future, so watch out for more posts of these!! ^^

Here's a couple of websites you may want to read which are dedicated to bento lunches:
http://justbento.com/
http://www.aibento.net/

A Quick Wasabi Lunch (^_^)v

Right, so it was lunch time on a weekday afternoon, both my colleague and I were craving for sushi the day before and we were both talking about the Japanese sushi chain  わさび Wasabi Sushi & Bento. Unfortunately, Wasabi stores can only be found in Central London, but there are 2 stores in the East and 1 store in the West of London. There are none further South or North, hence this trip from work was a trek and was well worth it! ^_^

Travelling from South London to Victoria Station via train took around 10 minutes, and the next train back to work was 10 minutes later. So we only had less than 10 minutes to decide what to eat and then get back on the train again! What a trek for sushi!

Wasabi's takeaway bag  

Wasabi Logo

The Wasabi branch in Victoria Station is a fairly small store compared to some of the other ones, like the Embankment branch. As you can see I'm a Wasabi fan, and I will find any opportunity to go into any of their stores to buy food - my first experience was in a branch in Oxford Street (the one near Tottenham Court Road). Inside this store on the left hand side there is the refrigerated sushi and drinks, and on the right hand side there's the till area and hot foods. It's very busy at lunchtime! I was deciding whether to have sushi or to have chicken katsu curry (breaded fried chicken with rice and curry sauce). In the end I chose sushi. I chose the box set (easy option) with salmon onigiri, chicken katsu with sweet chilli sauce on top, small versions of futomaki with one side covered in avocado and the other with orange masoko. Also included in the box set were some edamame and runner beans, a slice of pickled ginger, a pack of soy sauce and a pack of wasabi. Chopsticks and tissue were included during purchase. This cost £7.95. Each box set has a different price. At Wasabi, I wanted to get a bottled flavoured green tea, which they sell in some of the Wasabi branches, but unfortunately Victoria Station branch didn't have any :( no fair... So I got a Diet Coke instead.

My boxed set full of sushi and chicken katsu ^_^ 

My colleague had the harder option, he chose a selection of individual sushi which were wrapped in plastic, so if you do select your own prepare to unwrap a lot of sushi! (2 pieces of sushi cost £1.50). My colleague also chose a box of edamame beans and a triangular onigiri (can't remember the filling but I think it was Tuna and Mustard). My colleague's set ended up costing £5.80. 

My colleague's set: Salmon onigiri, Tuna onigiri, Tuna & Mustard onigiri and Edamame beans 

So back on the train we go. Stomachs rumbling like thunder. We sat back in our office and our faces glowed with the sushi in front of us.

My geeky mind said "We are definitely going to do this trek again!".

Here's a close up of my box set...

My Simple Geeky Summary:

Website	http://www.wasabi.uk.com/
Prices for individual selection	2 pieces for £1.50
Box sets (depending on branch)	£4.95 - £10.95 (approx.)
Hot foods (check menu)	Vary
Drinks	Vary (I wish they had the flavoured green tea in Victoria Station)