Mini pumpkin and cat sandwiches (what, you can't see them?? Look closely and...well, you can kinda tell) and kiwis protected by pumpkin raven as well as halloween Annie Bunny Graham's, a Full Moon Brownie Zbar, and a little box of raisins accompanied a thermos of chicken and rice soup. Not super halloween but close! Those were Mondays bentos.

Muahahaha Jack-O-Lantern mini oranges and a ghoul yard of rice and beans to go with homemade monster pizzas and chicken spinach noodle soup. Those were today's! Have a happy happy halloween!!

Well, kind of anyway. Annie has homemade turkey jerky from the reservation (dried flesh) and both have rice and beans (guts). I added some tomato soup, Penzeys 4S salt, garlic, and bay leaves to the cooking rice and beans. Annie ate three plates last night and that was after dinner! Instead of flesh, Nissa has an organic cup of cinnamon apple sauce and some pumpkin bites of bread. Annie has pretzels and both have apple slices. Two more days to halloween!!!!!

Quoth the raven. Dumplings, soybeans, and pickles for Nissa with pretzel sticks for Annie decorated by a few raven picks are all that is in these bentos. Simple and quick. These are from last Friday but I'm just getting to posting. Can't wait for halloween but after this past weekend of parties and skating, I've got to say, I'm pooped out!

Halloween is approaching so I got a little ghoulish. It's a graveyard of rice hot dish (rice cooked in chicken stock with shiitake mushrooms and broccoli) with a bit of grapes, carrots, and rotted flesh (okay, it's chicken jerky we got at the mille lacs band of ojibwe grocery store last week) in this lunch. Hope the find it spookily tasty.

Yep, green tea soba noodles, how excited can a person get?? Norby found these at United Noodle and finally tired of waiting on me to cook them. He made them himself and dressed them with one part sesame oil to two parts soy sauce, so good. The green tea adds a whole new dimension to the dish. So along with the noodles are carrot and orange slices along with a few picked rolls of meat. Finally, I threw in a favorite pair of chopsticks and voila, lunch!

Yum! Noodles, beef, and wine make for a bit of love in my book. Beef bourginone is such a comfort food that I can't believe there was any left to put in the lunches. Of course when I talk about love, it's mostly MY love for noodles of just about any kind. But the girls liked it too so that and salted & dilled cucumbers are in the top. The bottom is all fruity with kiwi, grapes, and pear slices. Should have made one for me!

The deli at United Noodle now sells Omusubi (I only knew them as onigiri or rice balls) and they were so good that Norby made a batch. They're basically, in this case, pre-seasoned rice that is pressed and shaped when it is still steamy and hot. I have molds I have to use but Norby, who's a lot better at making them than I, just uses his hands to shape and press them. The girls love onigiri so they are the main item in their lunches today. There's also a mini summer sausage, pickles, carrot decorations, and kiwis. Most of Nissa's extras are in her snack tower thingy that is three little snack chambers that screw together. In there and, for Annie, the little metal hello kitty take out box are some chocolate mushrooms. It's lunchtime now so hopefully they're enjoying them!

I spent Saturday baking and cooking from scratch. It was a blast but very time consuming. First I made focaccia, second I made lasagna, and third, fettuccine noodles hung to dry with the leftover lasagna noodle dough. It's been forever since I made lasagna and forever is too long. I don't know why my husband laughed when I talked to my food? All I said was... "Oh lasagna, how I've missed you." I did! Anyway, there was enough leftover lasagna to make their lunches today but I had to make more focaccia. We gobbled the last loaf all up. In the bottom container is just kiwi slices and mandarin orange pieces. Now I'm feeling challenged to make something else "from scratch". I kind of dislike that phrase really but I like the process.

Technically, this isn't a bento but couldn't resist. It's mini bratwurst and fried quail eggs with a mini mug of juice! Annie said she almost couldn't eat it but.... she did. I used two methods cooking them that are floating out on the net and frying the quail eggs in a greased ladle was by far the best. In a regular pan, they spread out too thin for me and I found it nearly impossible to get them out. Anyway, here's to mini foods!

Norby and Nissa headed up to the cabin ahead of us since Nissa has tomorrow off so I only made one bento tonight. There's leftover rice, chicken, and bean hotdish with cheese and carrot heart/trees on the left. Two hardboiled quail eggs with chocolate cones and mushrooms in the middle. The last one is straight forward, mandarin orange wedges and a mini Nutella. Given it's October, I threw in a witch pick and given it's a hotdish, I threw in a mini spoon. So proud of Annie who gets to wear jeans tomorrow since she turned in all her homework and wasn't in detention! It's a fun reward. I just heard that its already snowing in Ely and am super jealous they're hanging out by the fire drinking hot chocolate. But, what a fun time for Nissa to have with papa!

So, those bentos I made that had a mooncake for Annie and not for Nissa, I messed up. I gave the wrong one to the wrong girl. D'oh! The best part is, however, Nissa, who shriveled up her nose at them, ate most of it! She really did like them after all. Now today, I made copycat lunches so I'd at least be certain Annie got her mooncake. I threw in a couple pictures of their extras so you could see, 1. The size of the bentos and 2. Some of the extras I include for each girl. Nissa has the mandarin orange and milk. Annie has the apple and coconut milk. That's it!

Yesterday was the Moon Festival which we celebrated by eating mooncakes and looking for the lady on the moon. When we got the mooncakes from united noodle, Nissa was the first to want one in her lunch. All weekend she kept asking if we could eat them and when it was finally time, she bit into one, scrunched her nose, and put it back. She didn't like the lotus paste one or the other two flavors, bean paste and date paste either. So today, it's only Annie getting a mooncake in her lunch. The picture shows the bean paste cake but I actually put the lotus paste, her favorite one in hers. She also got a wedge of cheddar cheese in hers otherwise everything else is the same in their lunches. Green grapes and grape grapes with mandarin orange wedges, zipper beans (or as they are generally known, soy beans), half a mini summer sausage and a handful of mini chocolate covered mushroom and tree crackers! Those are a surprise so I hope the girls like them. That's it for the mooncakes and mushrooms!