Soboro Obento and weekend baking - July 10-17, 2010

My digital camera has a full of pictures - it's time to update my blog entry. Here are some pictures from last week.

Breakfast on Saturday, July 10

Yeast-donuts! Very soft and not greasy - fresh donuts are great in the morning. We had these in our back yard patio. Simple sugar coating (my choice), plain (for Mira), and of course, chocolate graze for Stan.





Yes, they are deep fried :-) but ingredients are all organic - even I used Organic Canola oil for frying. Tasted so good!

Then, I baked some sweet rolls for our friends - we had a dinner get together with them. I thought it will be nice to bring some treats :-)

Chocolate Rolls (for our Friends)


Cinnamon Rolls (for Mira)


Challah Roll (for Mira and Brooke at dinner)


I was happy to learn that everyone enjoyed these treats.

Opps - this is a blog for my Japanese Obento. Here is Stan's Soboro Obento from last week.

• Bed of Japanese steamed rice
• Topping - Soboro (cooked in sweet soy and ginger graze) Ground Turkey Meat, carrots, and snap peas
• Marinated tomato
• Mushed potato
• Kabocha squash cooked with Shiitake mushrooms, Lentil beans, Hijiki-sea weeds, fish caked in sweet soy based sauce

Stan loved it!

Here is our breakfast this morning - Saturday, July 17, 2010

Fresh Baked Bagels!!!


I tried baking bagels for the first time two weeks ago - did not look too pretty. I made some improvements - here there are! I try to make them soft for Mira (not too chewy) - sacrificing the shiny look of the traditional bagels. The most important things - Taste! and be able to enjoy them. They tasted great and still soft for her.
Mira had a half bagel - Stan had a bagel and a half with cream cheese :-)



Happy Weekend!

Holiday Obento (for dinner) and Challah

During the last holiday weekend, I found a few containers of leftovers in the refrigerator. A little bit of this and that - so difficult to serve as dinner. Well, I decided to use my "Makunouchi Bento Box" to serve the leftovers. Here they are! After our holiday lunch (with burgers), it was perfect dinner.

Holiday Dinner Makunouchi Obento

• Bottom left - Chirashi-sushi (make over of the leftover steamed rice)
• Botoom left - Unagi-kabayaki (frozen - warmed up in the oven)
• Bottom right - Cucumber slices and sauteed vegetable and enoki-mushroom
• Top left - Kabocha squash (cooked with soy, mirin, Dashi (fish broth) and fish cake
• Top middle - Ingen Mame no shi ra a-e (boiled green beans with creamy tofu & sesame dressing)
• Top right - Cabbage and tomato salad with herbs (Fried fish cakes for Stan)

Here is Stan's Chicken Obento on July 7

• Japanese steamed rice (bottom of the chicken and eggs)
• Drunken chicken & flavored eggs (leftovers from dining out)
• Cucumbers and Red peppers
• Pickled ginger - "Gari"
• Boiled new potatoes with fresh dill

Home baked cupcake with hazelnut chocolate creme with fresh strawberries for dessert (Yum!)



It's Friday - Fresh Baked Challah
New recipe - I love the texture - very fluffy! I baked one big loaf (six-breaded) and two mini-loaves (three-breaded).





Shabbat Shalom.

Holiday Special - July 4th, 2010

I have some pictures of Obento and treats. Here are some of my recent creations.

July 4th - Holiday Lunch

Let's start with today's special lunch - July 4th, 2010. Celebration of the holiday and Iowa summer produce! We got some beautiful and fresh Iowa produce from a Farmers' Market yesterday. I cooked most of our purchased produces for lunch.

• Burgers with home baked buns: I baked fluffy buns last Friday. Cooked grass-fed ground beef with graded onions, carrots, and ginger. Add egg, Japanese panko bread crumbs, a touch of soy & mirin for seasoning. Made patties - boiled once to remove excess fat and cooked in a pan. A slice of fresh Iowa tomato and lettuce leaf.
• Iowa corn!: Boiled with salt.
• Iowa new potato with fresh dill: Boiled, tossed with extra virgin olive oil, with salt & pepper for tastes. Wonderful alternative to the mayo-based potato salad.
• Asparagus with corn: (sorry, forgot to take a picture) boiled asparagus and corn tossed with 10-year aged Balsamic vinegar, extra virgin oil, salt & pepper for tastes.

Too bad that it was raining, otherwise, we could be in our back yard patio. Anyway, lunch was delicious!


Treats - Baked Goods

Some treats I baked last month when our friends from Ohio visited us for dinner. I packed these treats for them so that they can eat as dessert or breakfast next day :-)



Custard cream rolls



Chocolate - Mocha cream rolls with chocolate chips



Cinnamon rolls - Croissant style



We also tasted these treats. They were soooo good :-)

Here are Stan's Obento pictures from last week.

June 28, 2010 - Chicken sandwich Obento in our home office

He was working at home. I make a tray of lunch and brought it to a study room where he worked.

• Organic Chicken sandwich on Ciabatta bread
• Carrot and Red pepper sticks
• Potato chips
• Beets, cucumber & artichoke salad
• Green grapes
• A glass of roasted barley tea (Mugi-cha)

June 29, 2010 -Potato Croquettes "Potato Korokke" Obento
I used left-over mushed potato to make some potato croquettes. Added boiled cod fillet. Mira loves it - so do we :-)

• Fried rice (chicken and veggies)
• Potato croquettes
• Mini-tomato
• Cucumbers
• Pickled ginger "gari"

July 1, 2010 - Soko's tender Teriyaki-chicken Obento

• Japanese steamed rice with Furikate-topping
• Tender Teriyaki-chicken
• Sauteed vegetables with fish sausage
• Cucumbers
• Mini-tomato

Last words for today - This morning, I baked my first Bagles. They tasted great! I made them "soft" not too hard & chewy for Mira. As a result, they came not too attractive looking :-(
Did not take any pictures. I'm going to some research and practice more...stay tuned for my bagle baking.

Happy Holiday Weekend!