Stir Fry Vegetables & Rice

Today I sent the boys stir fried chicken, eggs, and vegetables. They also had rice balls with nori decorations (these are not filled onigiri, they are just plain rice, but plain rice can still be cute ;-) ) granny smith apple slices (after I took the pic I splashed them with O.J. and put press and seal over the container to keep them from browning) and oatmeal (they also are made from whole wheat flour, wheat germ, and oat bran) chocolate & butterscotch chip cookies.

Shepherd's Pie

Having just attended the Highland Games and knowing that we were going to be getting a package of wool from a friend, we felt like doing a meal that tied in. The lunches for today; Shepherd's pie (recipe from Whole Foods for the Whole Family- LLL) organic baby greens salad, containers of ranch dressing and parmesan cheese and a slice of bread we baked yesterday. (It's white bread and I'm Ok with that occasionally as long as it's homemade ;-) ) The 8y/o took steamed broccoli and trail mix in place of the salad, dressing and cheese.

Lunches from Thursday, Sept 4th

Nothing fancy, but still a little fun. Whole grain mini bagel with cream cheese, (and of course the lovely face made with a food coloring marker) steamed broccoli with butter, tomato ranch chips, unsweetened applesauce. I'm very lucky that my kids don't react to dyes. It's not like we have a lot of food that contain them, so I can feel Ok with the occasional exposure.

PB & Honey Can be Fun Too

I had hoped to do more with this lunch, (I have no idea what the "more" was) but I ran out of time. Luckily the food markers came in handy and I wrote Ds a little note. I'm so glad that he still loves that sort of thing and hasn't decided that he's too big for it yet. The 10 y/o's lunch for today (he doesn't like crab); Organic peanut butter and local honey on whole grain bread, organic mixed baby greens with ranch dressing and parmesan cheese in the small containers, cheese flowers and Kashi crackers. I could have fit a tiny bit more of the greens in if I had used an un-lidded container, but sending the lidded means that he can shake his salad to mix it after adding the dressing and cheese. When I was trying to get the kids more open to greens, the shake mix was a fun thing that helped.

Crab Rangoon

This is the 8 y/o's lunch today; Crab Rangoon, rice with peas and soy sauce, flower shaped cheese with Kashi crackers, and pineapple. He's finicky about peas, sometimes I can get him to eat them and sometimes he flat out refuses. I just keep offering and assume that eventually he'll get used to them. Update; When he got home he proudly showed me that he had eaten 1/2 of the peas and rice and only didn't finish because he ran out of time. He asked if it would be Ok for him to eat them now. :-D

I made pancakes today

I thought I'd continue with the breakfast theme since I had to make another batch of pancakes today anyway. My basic pancake recipe is from Whole Foods for the Whole Family.
It's flexible and adaptable. The basic recipe is;

2 C milk
1-3 eggs
2 t. baking soda
1/2 t. salt
2 C whole wheat flour
Optional: Up to 1/4 C honey, maple syrup, molasses or brown sugar

I needed to make a triple batch today and ended up using;
6 C milk
6 eggs
6 t baking soda
1 1/2 t. salt
4 3/4 C whole wheat flour
1 3/4 C flax meal
1 C oat bran
1/4 C honey
1/2 C carob powder

I started off with even measures of the dry ingredients but saw that the batter was much too runny. I added the 3/4 cups of flax meal and 3/4 C flour slowly until I felt like the batter was the right consistency. I used a 1/3 measuring scoop to dish them into the pan. I feel like this size is big enough and smaller sizes don't stack well for storing in my containers. Once these were all cooked, and cooled a bit I took a half sheet pan, spray it with no-stick spray and put about 11 pancakes on it. Then I popped it into the freezer for around 15 min, just long enough to freeze them a bit so that they wouldn't stick together. (I keep the stack in the fridge and just keep freezing batches of 11 till they're all frozen and stored) Then I put them in containers like this (about 5 to a container) and store in the freezer. I could store them in plastic bags and I have done that in the past, but it seems wasteful. I was able to get these in 2 per pack for $1 at Dollar Tree and I can use them over and over again. The Take Alongs are my favorite "disposable" storage container. I've found that they hold up the best. Today I filled 8 containers. Now over the next month or so I can move 1-2 containers out the night before from the freezer to the fridge for breakfast.

Just a quick post to add my Flickr link

My previous bentos/lunches can be found here.