Hanamachi Lights: Bento & Food » Cookery http://hanamachi-lights.org Faith's Faboulous Bento and Food Blog Sat, 04 Feb 2012 22:55:00 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 Bento: #0001 – Baked Chicken, Broccoli & Meatballs http://hanamachi-lights.org/2011/11/23/bento-0001-baked-chicken-broccoli-meatballs/ http://hanamachi-lights.org/2011/11/23/bento-0001-baked-chicken-broccoli-meatballs/#comments Wed, 23 Nov 2011 14:41:51 +0000 Faith http://hanamachi-lights.org/?p=553 I’ve decided to start counting my bento all over again in an attempt to get back into the habit of blogging them – let’s hope it sticks this time!

Baked chicken, broccoli and rice with stir fried peppers, sausage crabs and meatballs.

Bento01-001 Bento01-002 Bento01-003

]]> http://hanamachi-lights.org/2011/11/23/bento-0001-baked-chicken-broccoli-meatballs/feed/ 0 Spa-Peggy and Meatballs! http://hanamachi-lights.org/2011/08/02/spa-peggy-and-meatballs/ http://hanamachi-lights.org/2011/08/02/spa-peggy-and-meatballs/#comments Tue, 02 Aug 2011 10:33:36 +0000 Faith http://hanamachi-lights.org/?p=542 Okay, so maybe not Spa-Peggy and Meatballs, but definitely a delicious plate of spaghetti with some even more delicious meat sauce.

Pasta and Meat Sauce

I can’t stand Hunt’s canned pasta sauce, there’s just something too bitter about it. So I cooked up some spaghetti, browned some ground beef and added the pasta sauce + about 2 T of honey to round out the flavor. Worked like a charm – I do so love spaghetti!

]]> http://hanamachi-lights.org/2011/08/02/spa-peggy-and-meatballs/feed/ 0 Home Made Pizza http://hanamachi-lights.org/2011/07/09/home-made-pizza/ http://hanamachi-lights.org/2011/07/09/home-made-pizza/#comments Sat, 09 Jul 2011 17:23:51 +0000 Faith http://hanamachi-lights.org/?p=535 Home made mushroom and olive pizza

Long time no see! I’ve been snapping pics of everything, but I haven’t had time to come on and post for a bit – sorry about that! I may yet still be a bit shaky getting back into it, but I’m giving it my best!

We made a couple of hand-tossed crust pizzas the other day, this pic is of the pizza with olives and mushrooms (both canned – which tasted surprisingly great on the pizza). The first pizza has cheese, the second has velveeta because we didn’t realize that Hubby had used up all the cheese in at breakfast – was still good!

]]> http://hanamachi-lights.org/2011/07/09/home-made-pizza/feed/ 1 Photos: Easy Bread Machine Cinnamon Rolls Recipe http://hanamachi-lights.org/2011/04/19/photos-easy-bread-machine-cinnamon-rolls-recipe/ http://hanamachi-lights.org/2011/04/19/photos-easy-bread-machine-cinnamon-rolls-recipe/#comments Wed, 20 Apr 2011 02:54:43 +0000 Faith http://hanamachi-lights.org/?p=462 I found this great recipe for cinnamon rolls at AllRecipes and it looked too easy to be very good – but it’s about the best dough recipe for cinnamon rolls I’ve ever come across! Here are the pics of my *almost* step by step process (my phone battery died on me, so no pictures of the cinnamon mixture spread out on the rolled out dough – sorry!) from start to finish. You make the dough in your bread machine, so no fuss and no muss!

Dough Recipe:

# 1/2 cup milk
# 1/2 cup water
# 2 tablespoons butter
# 3/4 teaspoon salt
# 3 cups all-purpose flour
# 2 1/4 teaspoons active dry yeast
# 1/4 cup white sugar
# 1 egg

The Rest at Allrecipes.com

These are a bit dark for cinnamon rolls, as they were in the oven for only 3 minutes longer than they should have been. I didn’t hear my timer go off, but 3 minutes was all it took. They were still delicious, but make sure to watch them carefully while they’re cooking!

001 - Add half a cup each of milk and water to a saucepan and turn the heat up to medium low 002 - Add 2 TB REAL butter to saucepan and heat until hot but not scalded 003 - To your bread machine pan add 3 C of all purpose flour, 2 and one fourth tsp of active dry yeast, one four cup of sugar and one lightly beaten egg 004 - Now let your bread machine, set to dough, have at it - let it run it's entire dough cycle 005 - Flour a surface - we use plastic wrap to avoid mess 006 - Take your dough out of the bread machine, turn it over onto the plastic wrap and punch it down 007 - With your hands, try to gently stretch the dough into a loose rectangle - no worries if it's not perfect 008 - Lightly dust the dough with flour and cover with another sheet of plastic wrap 009 - Melt 3 T of butter in the microwave for 10 seconds, add 1 tsp of cinnamon, one fourth cups each of white granulated sugar and chopped pecans and mix well 010 - Roll dough out on floured work surface into a large rectangle that is half an inch thick and spread with cinnamon mixture 011 - Roll the dough up into a long log and cut into one to one and a half inch pieces, place on parchment lined baking sheet cut side down and back on 375 for 20 to 25 minutes 012 - Watch them very closely, mine went 2 minutes over and got a little too dark ]]> http://hanamachi-lights.org/2011/04/19/photos-easy-bread-machine-cinnamon-rolls-recipe/feed/ 0 Two Types of Onigiri Bento http://hanamachi-lights.org/2011/02/25/two-types-of-onigiri-bento/ http://hanamachi-lights.org/2011/02/25/two-types-of-onigiri-bento/#comments Fri, 25 Feb 2011 14:04:06 +0000 Faith http://hanamachi-lights.org/?p=393

Not a very fancy bento today, in fact this awesome little ‘bento box’ is one of the plastic take-out containers from China King (which is why it’s a tad too big for my bento today). Here’s what deliciousness awaits you:

BBQ Lamb Onigiri, Sweet Wasabi Chicken Onigiri, Hard Boiled Egg, Carrot Slices, Almonds, Chocolate Chips:

BBQ Lamb Onigiri, Sweet Wasabi Chicken Onigiri, Hard Boiled Egg, Carrot Slices, Almonds, Chocolate Chips 01 BBQ Lamb Onigiri, Sweet Wasabi Chicken Onigiri, Hard Boiled Egg, Carrot Slices, Almonds, Chocolate Chips 02 ]]> http://hanamachi-lights.org/2011/02/25/two-types-of-onigiri-bento/feed/ 0 Bento Ideas – Goat Meat Pot Stickers? http://hanamachi-lights.org/2011/02/17/bento-ideas-goat-meat-pot-stickers/ http://hanamachi-lights.org/2011/02/17/bento-ideas-goat-meat-pot-stickers/#comments Thu, 17 Feb 2011 20:06:11 +0000 Faith http://hanamachi-lights.org/?p=375 Here’s something I haven’t had in a long, long time that I’d love to get my hands on for pot stickers – goat meat! In fact, I’ve only ever had it once or twice but it was fabulous!

Goat Leg MeatI’m actually reading the recipes on this website, all of which seem a bit on the complicated side (like Jerked Leg of Goat) and wondering if it’s something I could do? Some of the ingredients include ginger and dark brown sugar, it just sounds sweet, tangy and delicious. I’d love to try my hand at this, I wonder if it would be too hard to dress up goat meat for use in a bento box? I said pot stickers earlier, but this jerked leg of goat actually sounds like it would be great with rice if you cut it up into small pieces and filled out an empty niche in your bento box with it.

It would definitely be unique, plus goat is so good for you compared to other meats and is actually very low fat. The problem remains, as always, where do you buy goat meat? You can’t get it out here, though. I live in the middle of hog country and you’re lucky if you can get chicken or beef at a decent price, so until now I thought goat meat was out of the question because it was hard to come by out here. But the website I’m surfing right now, the one I’ve been talking about with all of these amazing goat recipes? It’s for a company called Gedalias that actually sells farm raised goat meat over the internet. It’s not expensive, they have a lot of different cuts including ground if you want to make burgers. It’s such a great idea! It would be a great gift for anyone you know who loves to cook and loves to try new things. If you’ve ordered from them, I’d love to hear about your experiences!

]]> http://hanamachi-lights.org/2011/02/17/bento-ideas-goat-meat-pot-stickers/feed/ 0 Recipe: Fixing Hunt’s Pasta Sauce http://hanamachi-lights.org/2011/02/17/recipe-fixing-hunts-pasta-sauce/ http://hanamachi-lights.org/2011/02/17/recipe-fixing-hunts-pasta-sauce/#comments Thu, 17 Feb 2011 13:43:56 +0000 Faith http://hanamachi-lights.org/?p=369

Pasta sauce is convenient these days. What used to take hours, sometimes days, now takes only the few minutes necessary to open up a can of red sauce and heat it up on the stove top. It would be great, delicious even, if Ben didn’t continually buy Hunt’s pasta sauce.

What’s wrong with Hunt’s? Is it cheap? Well, not bad at $1.10 per can. Is it red? It’s very red, there are even scales of redness. Is it sauce? Technically, yes, it is sauce. Is it tasty? Okay, herein lies the problem. Hunt’s pasta sauce is bland, bitter and tastes a bit like the sauce they put on canned ravioli. There’s no sweet, savory love like you get with Prego (I believe it really is in there), and no fruity, juicy goodness like you’d get with a similarly sized, 20 cent cheaper can of Del Monte which, incidentally, is my choice in cheap pasta sauces.

So how do we remedy this? Apparently it’s surprisingly easy. Here’s what you need:

1/2 can of Hunt’s pasta sauce
1/4 lb of browned ground beef
Sea salt and ground black pepper to taste
2 T clover honey

Basically, after you brown your ground beef you stir in your spices and pasta sauce over medium-low heat until the sauce barely starts to heat up. Pour in your honey and stir it in slowly. Keep stirring with the heat on for about 5 or 6 minutes, or until the sauce is thoroughly heated. Serve over your favorite pasta!

]]> http://hanamachi-lights.org/2011/02/17/recipe-fixing-hunts-pasta-sauce/feed/ 0 Recipe: Steamed Lemon-Pepper Tilapia – In The Microwave! http://hanamachi-lights.org/2010/12/13/recipe-steamed-lemon-pepper-tilapia-in-the-microwave/ http://hanamachi-lights.org/2010/12/13/recipe-steamed-lemon-pepper-tilapia-in-the-microwave/#comments Mon, 13 Dec 2010 07:55:56 +0000 Faith http://hanamachi-lights.org/?p=343

I’m absolutely crazy about seafood, and I don’t get it that often because it’s very expensive here. But there’s one treat I do get on occasion and that’s Tilapia, a tender and mildly sweet whitefish. It’s decently priced and incredibly tasty, but unfortunately the other treat I need to do any real cooking is time off – a treat which I rarely can afford.

The solution to this was simple, but it took me ages to figure it out – you can make many small fish fillets in the microwave! While I”m not an advocate of cooking just anything in the microwave (unless you know what you’re doing), this is one dish that comes out delicious and piping hot every time! Here’s what you’ll need:

  • 2 Tilapia Fillets, 6-8oz each (frozen)
  • Lemon Pepper to taste
  • Accent! to taste. (Yes this IS commercial MSG, but I’m actually a big advocate of MSG awareness and use. If you’d rather not use it, a little salt or soy sauce will do!)
  • 2 tablespoons of butter (one tablespoon for each fillet)
  • 2 slices of lemon (one for each fillet)

  • Prep: 1 minute
  • Cook: 4-6 minutes

Place your FROZEN tilapia fillet (one at a time, please) in a microwave safe dish with a cover – I place mine in a bowl and use plastic wrap, but I’m used to doing this and if you don’t watch the fish carefully you could end up with a melted plastic mess!

Liberally season both sides with your Lemon Pepper and Accent! then place a slice of lemon and portion of butter on top of the fillet. Now cover your fillet and place it in the microwave on high for 4-6 minutes (check after 5 minutes). Let stand for a full minute then re-plate. Great with salads, soups or by itself – makes a tasty sandwich, I hear!

We like to have this by itself as a midnight snack at our house, and Laota and I have been talking about having it with some wilted baby spinach and mashed sweet potatoes. If you try this, I’d love to hear your thoughts!

Yep, that’s really all there is to this dish. It’s tasty, and pretty – dinner in 5 minutes!

Related articles
talpia 001 talpia 002 talpia 003 talpia 004 talpia 005 talpia 006 talpia 007 talpia 008 talpia 009 talpia 010 talpia 011 talpia 012 ]]> http://hanamachi-lights.org/2010/12/13/recipe-steamed-lemon-pepper-tilapia-in-the-microwave/feed/ 0