0 Bento #276 - Noodles & Wontons

A lunchtime favorite! Chinese noodles with steamed veggies, and chicken cilantro wontons.

Carrots, grapes, and chocolate-covered sesame seeds.

Bento #276 - Chicken cilantro wontons, Chinese noodles with veggies, grapes, carrots, chocolate sesame seeds.

In this lunch:

24 Bento #274 - Talk Like A Pirate Day Samosa Brigantine & Blog Hop!

Ahoy mateys! I be welcomin' ye aboard me ship, Black Bread's Revenge! This be the hour for our second annual Talk Like a Pirate Day blog hop! I fashioned a delicious midday meal fer th' hop - a chicken samosa brigantine ship made 'o red bell pepper, cannons 'o organic grapes, a mast 'o bitty organic carrot, starfish 'n barnacles. Yum!

Me ship sails past a tropical island, led by our beauteous mermaid siren masthead. We have a scallywag stowaway monkey lurkin' 'bout th' sword-speared grapes.

Yogurt starfish  'n tenacious barnacles o' chocolate-covered sesame seeds.

YAAAARRR!! Grub up, me hearties! Samosa brigantine all trussed in an EasyLunchBox, wit' a sea lubbin' walrus Squooshi pouch, Choomee Sip'n-topped carrot n' berry smoothie for snack.

Bento #274 - Suhki's chicken samosas, red bell pepper, baby organic carrots, organic red grapes, yogurt stars, chocolate sesame seeds, and organic carrot/butternut squash/berry smoothie.

Yo ho! Next lunch ahoy! Be sure to check out the next bento on me ship Black Bread's Revenge by clicking the pirate flag below!

After ye've sailed 'round this hop, hang on to yer sea legs! Click 'ere to board t'next ship fer another hop on The Flying Lunchman!

If ye liked me lunch, please be followin' Bentobloggy on Facebook! If ye be interested in last year's shipwreck pirate lunch, click here.

Used in this lunch:

6 Bento #262 - Gyoza & Bell Peppers and Trader Joe's cookbook news!

First of all, I am so incredibly excited to announce that the cookbook I am featured in -  Cooking With Trader Joe's Cookbook: Easy Lunch Boxes - is now available for pre-order on Amazon! In fact, if you click "Look Inside" and check out the table of contents, Bentobloggy is listed on pages 157-162!! 

Just LOOK at this gorgeous spread!

Next, today is the very LAST day to enter for your chance to win the bento box starter pack I'm giving away, so enter here!

As for today's lunch, gyoza is the perennial favorite around these parts.  The brand we normally buy is Ling Ling all-natural chicken potstickers.  The sauce is in those cute flower sauce containers.

We also have sliced red bell pepper with ranch dip and frozen organic mixed berries.

The newly decorated Goodbyn Bynto!  Ella went all-out!

Bento #262 - Chicken gyoza with sauce, red bell pepper, ranch dip and organic mixed berries.

3 Summertime News

I'm here!  I've been on a hiatus since school ended, as you might have imagined.  Things are kind of crazy 'round these parts.  We've been traveling - Rochester, NY to Toronto, and then a crazy long road trip we just returned from to Maryland, NYC, upstate New York, Vermont and back down again!

I'm going to post a short series about our travels to each place.  I will talk about live blue crabs.  And s'mores.

In other exciting news...Miss Ella is going to be a big sister.  For real!  It's going to be kind of wild having two kids almost 7 years apart.  Ella is over-the-moon excited about her new role, and I know she's going to be a great helper.  Thankfully, I haven't been nearly as sick as I was with my first, but first trimester fatigue was sucking the energy right out of me.  Just another reason I haven't been posting - I've been sleeping pretty much the whole time.  I'm waiting for that fabled second trimester surge of energy.  Any day now hopefully....

I've also finished up the final edits for my recipes in the new Trader Joe's cookbook! I'm so excited!

From EasyLunchBoxes:

"Cooking with Trader Joe's - Easy Lunchboxes will be available in Sept. of 2012, wherever books are sold! Gorgeous full-color photographs by Marla Meridith. With mouth-watering recipe contributions from over 30 of my amazing lunch-packing and foodie friends! Now really, who doesn't love Trader Joe's? More info: http://bit.ly/K2iLY3"

I have some new bento plates and recipes to post soon! I hope you all are having a fabulous summer!

4 Bento #251 - Turkey & Sweet Corn

I'm so tickled that I've been nominated for a Top 25 Foodie Moms award on CircleofMoms.com!  I'd be flattered if you'd vote for Bentobloggy here:

We had our last school field trip yesterday, to the Atlanta Zoo!  There were so many parent volunteers that my group consisted of only one of Ella's little girlfriends, so we had a really nice and relaxing morning exploring together.  We started out in the opposite direction of everyone else, so we got most of the exhibits all to ourselves.  The panda bears were really active, which was so cool to see. It was also supposed to thunderstorm but we escaped it all, and the high temperatures with some cloud cover.

Today's lunch was one of only about five that I've ever made in the morning.  I usually make them right before I go to bed, because I'm barely functional at 6:30am.  She has a whole wheat White Mountain bread turkey and cheddar sandwich in the first box.

In the second she has some grape tomatoes, fresh sweet corn sprinkled with a little kosher sea salt and a cheddar Babybel.

Packed up with snack - Cat cookies and an organic gala apple.

Bento #251 - Turkey and cheddar on whole wheat, sweet corn, grape tomatoes and cheddar Babybel.  Snack - Organic gala apple and cat cookies.

1 Bento #249 - Gyoza & Pico de Gallo

I'm back from my sister's wedding in Maryland!  It was beautiful, and she was absolutely radiant!

For lunch today we have some homemade pico de gallo with chicken gyoza.

How CUTE are the little containers?!  I got them on clearance at Target in the seasonal aisle.

All packed up in Greentainers.  

Bento #249 - Chicken gyoza, ponzu sauce, tortilla chips, fresh pico de gallo, cheddar cheese cubes.  Snack - Yogurt stars and carrot apple Crusher.

I'm so happy for the new couple, and I hope they are enjoying their tropical honeymoon. A shot of all the girls in my family in the bridal room - my three gorgeous sisters, our stunning mother and my adorable little Ella. :-)

3 Bento #246 - Quesadilla, Pico de Gallo & Lime-Cilantro Crema

Sunday evening I made my delicious Baja shrimp tacos (and if you haven't tried them yet, you don't know what you are missing!)  For E's lunch I packed a small cheese quesadilla on a toasted corn tortilla, along with a small handful of chips.  Yummy and also vegetarian, and gluten-free.

Accompanying it is lime-cilantro crema, fresh cilantro and homemade pico de gallo, (roma tomatoes, white onion, cilantro, garlic, jalapeno, lime juice and salt.)  Dessert is raspberries!

All packed up.

Bento #246 - Corn cheese quesadilla and chips, raspberries, cilantro, lime-cilantro crema and pico de gallo.  Snack - Clementine and yogurt stars.

1 Bentobloggy Featured in a New Cookbook!

I've been really busy these last few weeks!  I'm working on a catch-up post, but I wanted this news to have its own billing - Bentobloggy is going to be featured in a brand-new Trader Joe's cookbook!

I am so excited that Bentobloggy will be represented in the newest book in their series - Cooking With Trader Joe's Cookbook Easy Lunchboxes - which will be available in August on Amazon.com.  How awesome is that?!

The amazing Kelly Lester, founder of Easy Lunchboxes, invited me and some other awesome bento-packing mamas to contribute to this great cookbook.  I'm dying to see which of my recipes made it into the book!  Keep an eye out for more cookbook news soon!

Emily


Cooking with Trader Joe's Cookbook: Easy Lunch Boxes

1 Bento #245 - Garlic Potatoes & Chicken Sausage

Another Trader Joe's lunch in an Easy Lunchbox.  This is their really delish garlic potatoes in Parmesan sauce and sauteed, sliced spicy Italian sausage.  I cook the potatoes in a skillet with a little olive oil until they are crispy on the outside.  Yum!

Accompanying the potatoes is half a sliced sweet red bell pepper and some blackberries.  Next to it is the day's snack which is an apple-carrot Crusher and organic mini peanut butter crackers.

Bento #245 - Garlic potatoes and Italian chicken sausage, blackberries, red bell pepper and Vidalia onion dressing.  Snack - Apple-carrot Crusher and peanut butter crackers.

1 Bento #244 - Spring Ribbons & Flowers

First day of Spring bento!  I had some lemon pepper pappardelle noodles left over from dinner last night (sans tuna and sauce) and I tossed them with a little extra-virgin olive oil and diced sweet Italian sausage.  On top are raw sugar snap peas and a few carrot "flowers."

Fresh blackberries with leaf picks.

Root veggie chips - these are delish!!  They are from Trader Joe's and made from sweet potato, taro, batata and parsnip pieces.  Just the right amount of salt, too.

Bento #244 - Lemon pepper pappardelle noodles, sweet Italian sausage, sugar snap peas, carrots, blackberries and root chips.  Snack - Nectarine.

0 Lemon Pepper Pappardelle with Tuna

I dreamed up this recipe several years ago. It was so good! Trader Joes has this delicious, tender pappardelle pasta infused with lemon pepper, and it's great by itself. It's also wonderful with tuna, and I decided to use two tuna steaks I had on hand, but you could use canned chunk tuna in a pinch. This dish is perfect for a spring or summer evening!

You'll need:

1 8oz package of Trader Joe's Lemon Pepper Pappardelle (cooked according to package instructions)
2 medium 1" thick tuna steaks
4 Tbs white wine
3 Tbs dijon mustard
3 Tbs lemon juice
1 1/2 Tbs mayonnaise
1 Tbs thyme
1/2 tsp salt
pepper to taste
olive oil

Set oven to broil on High.

In a small bowl whisk together wine, mustard, lemon juice, mayonnaise, thyme, salt and pepper to taste. Pour half of mixture over tuna steaks and let them marinate for 15 minutes.

Put tuna steaks on lightly oiled broiler pan and broil on High for 6 minutes (or according to thickness.) Turn and brush with additional marinade, broil for additional 4-5 minutes. Remove from oven and let rest for 10 minutes.

Cook pasta and transfer to serving bowl, and drizzle some olive oil. Lightly chunk tuna and place on top of pasta. Pour remaining sauce over pasta. Garnish with thyme and sliced lemons.