About me and this blog

In the past I used to make bento’s for myself and my boyfriend. I was a sinologist and it was just the two of us.

Since then, a lot has happened 😉

Our first was born in 2009, a beautiful girl. Our second, also a girl, was born in 2011.

Since then I’m training to be a midwife. Being a midwife in the Netherlands is apparently somewhat different then being a midwife in other countries. I believe that the UK or New Zealand system is closest to ours. When I’m done
studying I’ll be guiding both pregnancies and births independently. Here women can choose to either have a home birth
or a hospital birth, we are thoroughly trained to do both, with four years of university training.
I love my future-job, cannot imagine myself ever doing something else.

first picture was taken at 4:30 in the morning, right before a caesarean section. Right is me daytime-ish 😉

Besides midwifery and spending time with my girls there’s a lot of other things I like. For instance making bento’s and cooking all kinds of food!
I like experimenting in the kitchen, I love our garden with its fresh produce and all things we can make from that

 

Other things that I love include, masking tape. 😀

I like knitting stuff, blankets, sweaters, cardigans, hats, all kinds of stuff. Find me on ravelry onder pleen.

that would be my neverending pile of yarn, pic is outdated though since I’ve bought new ones since.

I like sewing stuff, for the kids mostly, sometimes for me.

Meet my neverending pile of fabric ❤ :’)

And I adore the things my girls make me 😀

 

So that’s it for now.

Next time, How my experiment turned out, making gluten free bread in our rice cooker…

Lunch!

Avocado, shrimp, lettuce and tomato.

new bento’s coming soon!

Well it’s been a crazy long time since last time I’ve made any posts here. We’re in 2013 now and last post has been in 2008.

In the mean time, I’ve graduated as a sinologist, the boyfriend and I have welcomed to little girls (2009 and 2011) and I’ve started a new study in pursuit of becoming a midwife, I’m a little over halfway done now, still two years left though.

My youngest daughter has been diagnosed with celiac disease last year, so she had to be glutenfree. She suffered from serious constipation and failure to thrive to all kinds of stomach pains and signs of malnutrition. The left photo is her on her first birthday, a few months before being diagnosed, the right photo is her a little after her second birthday, a few months after diagnosis. What a difference!

 

 

So my lunches have taken a shift. Since from now on, not only do they need to be delicious, they also need to be childproof and glutenfree.

I’ll come back in a few days with new posts on gear and on glutenfree bentolunches!

Cheers~!

M.

Yay finally~!

I finally found some time to update about the lunches. As I said last time I’ve been crazy busy, but it’s been worth it. I’ve received an A+ for my BA-thesis so I’m really pleased with that!

Back to bentou-ing. I have seven pictures for you here, it really has been too long and I will update more regularly now that I’m a little less busy. A lot of the bentous feature mango, well, that’s what you get buying three fresh mango’s for $1,-. They look so yum but you do have to eat mango continuously for the next few days…

First off, my boyfriends bentou. It was supposed to be a busy day for him with classes and a presentation, but since he had to wait for one of his classmates to send in the powerpoint slides for the presentation (I hate it when they do that), he missed his first class and ate his bentou at home. It contains two onigiri with mixed in furikake, five tiny home-made meatballs, stars-shaped yellow bellpepper, starshaped cucumber, cheese cubes, half a kiwi and a hello kitty candy which he threw away :p Morning preparation time was longer then anticipated because I wanted to make him a pretty bentou so that somehow that would positively influence his presentation (which is stupid I know :p), I guess it took 20 minutes, waaaay too long for any other day, but for some occasions it’s okay I guess.

Please, behind the cut, six other bentou’s from the past days.

three is a crowd…

And three bento’s it is!

 I’ve been so crazy busy with work and studies, I haven’t had any time to post up my pictures from last week.

This bento was for me and it contained two onigiri with mixed in furikake; some home-made meatballs; some apple slices, which I dipped in water mixed with lemon juice to prevent them from browning; some cherry-tomatoes; a laughing cow cheese cube and some sugar snaps from last nights dinner. In a separate small container is a fishsauce/chili-dipping sauce for the veggies and meatballs.

Behind the cut, two more bento’s from last week…

feb. 13th bento, and look what my boyfriend made me!

Well, today didn’t feature a bento is I was really tired and decided to sleep a little longer. Stolen minutes and the fact that I didn’t have anything ready on hand irritated me, as did the fact that I had to peel my orange and was left with sticky hands afterwards…

Yesterday also didn’t feature a bento as I didn’t have to bring one since I was supposed
to have a business-lunch and my boyfriend had class only until 11 in the morning, so he said he’d rather eat some ramen at home. It turned out that he went home to cook me an amazing valentine’s diner, and he also mad me a desert-gift, a cherry-cheesecake with little sugarharts sprinkled next to it and chocolate letters on top saying I love you. Too cute, and most of all very yum~!  –>

This is my boyfriend’s bento of feb. 13th. Mine featured the same.

 

It contained two onigiri with mixed in fish-furikake and the ever reoccuring dumpling. some cherry-tomatoes to add vegetables and color, some seedless white grapes, a piece of ontbijtkoek as a snack and jummy home-made meatballs.

Morning preparation time was a little under 10 minutes. Used to microwave the rice, mix in the furikake and make onigiri out of them. In the mean time I also steamed the dumpling. Microwaved the meatballs and let them cool and cut up the fruit and vegetables.                                                                                                                                                                                 

 

Feb. 12 2008 Lunch and tips for cheap bastards ;)

Another busy day today, so I was glad to open my lunchbox around lunchtime and find all kinds of stuff that I enjoy eating and which gave me enough energy to pull through another four hours (I’m a student-assistent, so those were four long library hours).

 My Lunch pictured below contained: some frozen raspberries; a piece of ontbijtkoek, a bento-favorite; some star-shaped cucumber; a cheese triangle; onigiri with mixed in green and red shiso and a dumpling.

Well, since I am a student and seem to be constantly broke, I try to make my bento’s as cheap as possible. Because even though I really like my bento’s, if it costs more than a normal sandwhich and a piece of fruit would, I can’t afford it. Luckily, it doesn’t. Yay~!

It’s not really relevant to estimate what my lunch has cost my, because first of all it would be only an estimation, and second of all, prices vary from location to location and season to season. But I do have some tips!

 (Behind the cut, the promised tips and my boyfriend’s lunch)

11 feb. bento

Yay, today was another bento day~!

I tried frozen raspberries for my boyfriend’s lunch today, to see how they would hold up. Unfortunately they didn’t really hold up like I had hoped. Because the raspberries thawed in the bento during the day there was more fluid in and around the raspberries than normal, making them even more fragile and making everything else wet. But, since my boyfriend did really really like the raspberries he suggested I would put them in a small plastic bag or in some plastic foil. So I guess I’ll try that next time.

This bento contains a heart-shaped hard boiled egg with a small bag of salt; some grilled chicken with Italian herbs and spices, a small piece of ontbijtkoek and the raspberries. In the bottom tier are two onigiri with mixed in furikake and a piece of nori to prevent sticky fingers. And last but not least, a woo-tip dumpling.

(Behind the cut, my bento.)

Back-to-school boyfriend bento

As the second semester started last monday I made a bento for my boyfriend to take with him. It contained two onigiri, wrapped with nori and stuffed with a tiny home-made meatball. (Idea from lunchinabox.net here); some sautéed spring-onions and the infamous home-made meatballs; corn in a silicon baking cup; some grilled bell pepper; a cheese triangle and some halved green seedless grapes.

 Preparation time was about 20 minutes, mostly spent on cooking the rice, making the onigiri by hand and wrapping them with the nori. The meatballs were ready made the night before as were the corn, spring-onions, and the bellpepper. The grapes were cut so that more would fit into the box.

Normally I wouldn’t spend so much time on making a bento for a normal school day, but since this was his first bento in about two months and he really really likes the meatballs, I felt the need to make it something special. Fortunately he liked it. 🙂

Recipe for the meatballs behind the cut!

Gear

As I am a woman, and I do like to shop, I have an ever expanding collection of not-totally-necessary-but-totally-likeable bento gear and bento boxes. I find myself walking in shops, stores and even your average grocery stores thinking about what items would go well into my bento. It’s always in my head, I guess the bento-bug has caught me. Well to, for once, not give in to the temptation of buying new stuff I decided to arrange my bento stuff and make a picture of it to show it to you all. Hah, it is weekend after all so there’s no normal bento’s to take pictures of. Photo-heavy behind the cut~!