0 Bento #277 - "I Made It" New Series and Linky

This is the first in a little series I'd like to call "I Made It" - lunches made by Ella herself! After all, she's a mature second-grader now. :-) I really love that she is interested in healthy eating, and making her own food.  Encouraging good food choices starts early.  And hey...gives me a little break once in a while! We might even make this a weekly thing.  Ella also is taking her own pictures, which she loves!

Her entree is garlic-buttered egg noodles tossed with fresh cherry tomatoes and cucumbers, topped with grated parmesan cheese.

Her favorite melons.

And the carrot-berry smoothies we made together.

Bento #277 - Egg noodles, cucumbers, tomatoes, cantaloupe, watermelon and a smoothie.

Want to see more from Ella? I'd love to see your kid-created bento lunches!

An InLinkz Link-up

In this lunch:

0 Bento #253 & #254 - Sandwich Plates

Today we have a two-fer, because neither is really creatively worthy of their own post, haha!  Above is a bento plate with a turkey breakfast patty sandwich and one of the 4 tomatoes that my plant produced on my back porch. Yum!

Bento #253 - Turkey patty sandwich, homegrown organic tomato, organic celery sticks and ranch dip.

Next is another bento on a Greentainer stainless plate. The black beans are from a Mexican place near us, and they are super tasty, and E loves them.  I also tackled a huge watermelon that this slice came from.  I don't think I've cut up a larger watermelon in my life!  Good thing at least two of us in the house like melon.

Bento #254 - Turkey & cheese sandwich on White Mountain bread, fresh watermelon and black beans.

0 Bento #226 - Gyoza & Tomatoes

This one's been hanging out in my bento folder for a few weeks now.  We've been on vacation from school and work, and enjoying our time off and relaxing!  Hope everyone else has been enjoying their time too.  My husband and I spend our 10th wedding anniversary at the Brasstown Valley Resort & Spa in the North Georgia mountains for a few days.  We went horseback riding, had spa treatments, a wine tasting at a local vineyard and more.  We even had our very own fireplace in our suite.  Heaven!

For this Planetbox bento, we have E's favourite chicken gyoza here, cut in half.

E has been bugging me about fresh tomatoes for the last few weeks.  She loves Romas!

Accompanying the tomatoes and gyoza are little cute bottles of ponzu sauce and ranch dressing.

All loaded up in her Planetbox!

Bento #226 - Chicken gyoza, ponzu sauce, celery sticks, ranch dip, roma tomatoes and multi vitamins.  Snack - Focaccia croutons and dried cranberries.

18 Bento #151 - Moose Mac n' Cheese

I whipped up a batch of whole wheat mac n' cheese - so simple!  Takes 10 minutes, including the pasta cook time.  While the pasta is cooking, add 2 Tbs heavy cream, 4 oz cream cheese and a handful of shredded or cubed hard yellow cheese (I used cubed Colby Jack.)  Gently melt it together, and toss pasta in with it (about 1.5 cups.)  Salt and pepper to taste.

Today I picked up my first produce basket from Farmers Market Baskets.  I got so many great things for $20! I got a small organic basket which included 1 whole head each spinach & fancy lettuce, 3 stalks broccoli, 2 pears, 4 unripe bananas, 3 cameo apples, 3 oranges, 3 white potatoes, 2 tomatoes, 1 acorn squash and 1 onion, all organic or a 'clean 15'. It's really the perfect size for our family! Next time I will get extra apples, we eat tons of them in our house.

Last thing, I picked up a sweet masala dabba spice tin from World Market today, love it!  I can put any variety of spices and herbs in there I want, but I went the traditional Indian route and filled it with mustard seed, cumin seed, ground cardamom (don't have whole pods), curry, garam masala, coriander seeds and tumeric.  I get a hankering for one every time I watch Aarti Paarti on the Food Network.

Bento #151 - Whole wheat mac n' cheese, cherry tomatoes, organic steamed broccoli, clementine and a twin cherry gummy.

1 Bento #80 - Mini Gyoza & Lettuce

 

Ahh, bittersweet!  This was the bento I packed for E's last school lunch of the year.  Her last day is today, but since it's a half day, no lunch.  It's a little reprisal of the first school bento I packed for her.

Bento #80 - Mini pork & leek gyoza with soy sauce on a bed of organic lettuce, tomato wedges and blackberries.