Boston Bento

Sometimes when work is throwing me for a loop and I want to spend my lunch hours hiding from the world, I will use my bento as a way of a little pick-me-up. I’ll pack something extra special and it makes me remember that small moments and treats can have a really large effect.

And so I present, Shrimp Cocktail Bento…complete with the semi-homemade (with recipe posted at the end) cocktail sauce. Trust me, it’s hard not to feel awesome about your lunch when everyone else in the lunch room is eating boring sandwiches and brown/red smoosh in Gladware containers. You can start to feel the sophistication oozing out of your pores and creating an aura of kick-ass all around you.

Contents:
shrimp and cocktail sauce
sauteed spinach with garlic
wasabi peas
chickpeas with parsley, olive oil, and vinegar
raspberry gummies

Homemade cocktail sauce:
ketchup
horseradish to taste (I like mine pretty spicy)
squeeze of lemon juice
hot sauce to taste

I wish there were a prettier way of saying this, but this post is about pig skin, and no I’m not talking about football.

Growing up in an Italian-American household, this meant that we had a lot of pasta dinners and the sauce of choice was tomato. My mother would cook her sauce for hours, slowly working out the acidity of the tomatoes without adding onions or sugar. Then towards the end, she would add her pan fried homemade meatballs, sausage made by my grandfather at his shop, and rolls of pig skin.

I know that this might sound horrible to some people, but I can’t explain how delicious this can be. And since pig skin can be kinda hard to find these days, I got really excited when my mother told me that she had some that she didn’t want.

The preparation is simple. Cut the skin into large rectangles so they can be rolled up nicely. Then just chop up some parsley, garlic, and add some good Parmesan cheese. Since I’m lazy, I like to do this in my food processor. Spread this mixture onto the rough side of the skin and roll the whole thing up. Tie the roll together so it won’t come apart later when you cook it. Lastly, quickly pan fry the whole roll quickly before adding it to the sauce. At this point, it will need to cook a long time. We are talking hours here, and as it cooks it will plump up and shrink. Once the roll is soft and kinda translucent, it should be done. Cut it into little wheels and serve with pasta and sauce.

Word to the wise though, eat these little guys while they are HOT, otherwise they can get kinda sticky and unappealing. Otherwise, they are pretty incredible. The skin soaks up all the flavor from the sauce, garlic, parsley, and cheese to make a really rich treat. If you are a more adventurous kinda eater, it is definitely worth trying.

Almost anyone who enjoys cooking and considers themselves a “foodie” will tell you that while taking the right shortcuts in the kitchen is not only encouraged but can be necessary due to space and time constraints, there are some things that are just not the same unless you make your own.  I would argue that roasted peppers are one of those things.  This might be because I like my peppers softer than the ones you find in the jars, but regardless, these are so easy to make that I can very rarely come up with an excuse not to do the roasting myself.

There are several methods you can use when roasting your peppers, but the overall principal remains the same. Roast the pepper until the skin turns black and can be peeled away. That’s pretty much it. I’ve roasted peppers on my bbq grill, in my toaster oven, in my conventional oven, and even directly on the burners themselves. (You can blame my mother for that one. She once told me a story where she said she and my grandmother used to roast peppers over the gas burner like marshmallows when she was a kid.)

During these colder months, the broiler can be your best friend. Wash and clean your bell peppers. I would I suggest using any color other than green. In fact, you can mix colors for a prettier presentation if you are so inclined. Place the whole pepper under the broiler and watch it as the skin starts to bubble up and turn black. Once it is black on one side, rotate the peppers until they are black all around.

Once the peppers are roasted to your liking, you can either try to peel it while it is still warm, or wait for them to cool. I personally like to wrap the peppers in some foil until they are cool enough to touch but still warm. Then, when I go to peel them and remove the core, all I need to do is pull on the stem and pretty much everything comes out of the middle. You might need to scrap the pepper a little with a knife to remove any stray seeds or patches of skin. Lastly, dress the peppers with some thinly sliced garlic, olive oil, and some salt before serving.

I prefer to slice my peppers into strips and eat them either in sandwiches or just with some great crusty bread. I always serve roasted peppers with antipasto and will sometimes add them to my bentos. But as I said in the beginning, using great fresh peppers to make your own are so much better than those you find in a jar.

So, it’s not a bento, but at least it’s something right? I’m not really sure what happened but I haven’t had the time to spend on my blog as maybe I should. So before I even start thinking about New Year’s Resolutions and all that crap, I am instead going to focus on updating this poor blog a few time before the new year even arrives.

Here is a picture of what my mother called an Icebox Cake. She used to make this every now and then when I was a kid for dessert. The trick to making this “cake” is to put it together hours before you are going to eat it so that the pudding has time to soak into the graham crackers and make the whole thing soft and gooey. The only real effort this recipe requires is choosing what flavor of pudding to use. In my version, we used Devil’s Food chocolate pudding.

Ice Box Cake (serves 2-4)

One package instant pudding and amount of milk required to make it
one package graham crackers (each box has about 2 packages inside)

Prepare pudding according to the directions on the box. Once pudding has set, spread pudding thickly over two graham crackers and place in a dish. Add two more graham crackers on top and continue to layer until you have about 5 levels or so. The top layer should be pudding so that you can crush up an extra graham cracker as the pretty topping. Place in refrigerator for at least 4 hours before serving.

Mind you, this recipe is as simple as they come, so feel free to get creative by adding extras like whipped cream, jam, or even Heath Bar pieces to it. Just remember that if you want anything to remain crunchy, it should be added right before eating.

This weekend my friends and I hold another one of our Iron Chef battles. Well, perhaps “battle” isn’t the best word to use here. Really they are more like themed ingredient potlucks. Each time we try to challenge ourselves with an ingredient that is going to be a stretch for us without it being something that (in the end) we realize we had no desire to eat that stuff with or without the wacky fun of the event. Trust me, we learned this the hard way with the Spam night that most of us went home hungry or nauseous from.

The ingredient this weekend was squash, any kind you like. Since I was chomping at the bit to give my KitchenAid a go, my contributions were both a pumpkin cheesecake and pumpkin spice martini’s.

The cheesecake was made using a Paula Deen recipe from the Food Network website. It was one of the easiest ones I could find, and since I was new to making cheesecake, I didn’t want to push myself over the cream cheese covered cliff.

The “Pumpkin-tinis” were really like drinking candy. So unless you like things like Appletinis and booze that doesn’t take like booze, you best steer clear. But, if you are one of those people who has been wondering why you can’t find more drinks that are the color of traffic cones, then this stuff is for you.

I made this quinoa salad the other day as a way to save some time and make sure I get enough protein.  I guess it worked because after eating a container of this for lunch, I barely wanted dinner.

This cold salad contains:

white beans
cucumber
chopped cilantro
red quinoa

Before cooking the quinoa, I made a simple dressing of lemon juice, olive oil, and some salt and pepper. Once the quinoa was cooked, I added the dressing while it was still warm so it would soak everything up. I made sure that the quinoa was mostly cool before I added the other ingredients because I didn’t want them to get cooked by the hot quinoa. And that’s pretty much it. It ended up being oddly refreshing and a great way to celebrate the end of the summer.

Next time though, more cilantro. I can’t help it, I have a thing for cilantro.

This is an older pic that I have leftover from last week. Since I had spent the weekend before I made this bento helping my mother after her knee injury, she made sure to send me home with food. I mean think about, what self-respecting Italian American mother wouldn’t do such a thing? The best part is that if I time it right, I get not only her food, but food from events and people at her Sons of Italy Lodge. Now before you shake you head in disappointment over me stealing food from the mouths of sweet ol’ Italian women, I suggest you taste the stuff first. Once you make it through you third stuffed artichoke and pass out on the couch in ecstasy…you will understand. Or die from overeating, whichever comes first.

Contents:
fresh mozzarella and tomatoes (thanks Mommy!)
olives
salami sandwich with “Lazy Girl’s Focaccia”
sixlets candy (another food obsession my mother supports)

“Lazy Girl’s Focaccia” is something my sister and I made for our first dinner party at our very first apartment. I wanted to be able to serve something warm and yummy, but I was limited with a kitchen the size of a port-o-potty. Using a mixture of pure brilliant laziness, we bought some pre-made pizza dough at the market and the rest is history. If you have time to let the dough rise, you are better off because you get a lighter final product, but it works just fine if you don’t. Stretch or roll the dough out and place it on a baking sheet greased with olive oil. Then dot (or poke) the top of the bread with your fingers. At this point, you can allow it to rise if you have the time. Otherwise just skip ahead and brush with olive oil and add coarse salt and your desired herbs. You can also put thin sliced tomatoes or onions on the top if you are so inclined.

Bake in a 350 degree oven until golden brown. Then cut, serve, and wait for people to be super impressed with your baking prowess. Hey, I won’t tell if you don’t.

Every once and a while, you stumble on a great idea, so great that when you finally see it come to life, it is grander and better than you ever dreamed.

After a discussion about gourmet hot dogs and an article in Bon Apetit magazine, my friend Sean and I decided to make banh mi hot dogs.  For those of you who might not be familiar with these truly delicious culinary wonders, they are a type of Vietnamese sandwich served on a baguette.  But rather than take up too much time explaining all the magic they hold, I will give you a chance to read the wikipedia article.

Back now? Great. The plan was made, and I got cracking on preparing the ingredients to make our banh mi dog a reality. I bought cilantro, mini cucumbers (but any seedless one would work fine), jalapenos, and prepared the marinated carrots. Some people would include mayo or pate, but assuming that the hot dog was bad enough for us, we skipped those options. I also got some french bread instead of the usual soft hot dog roll. Here is a pic of the results (already bitten into as you can see):

I can’t tell you enough how tasty these were. Almost as good as regular banh mi. I really think it is the carrots and cilantro that really make everything incredible. I should start putting that stuff on everything..in fact, maybe I will. Below I have put the recipe for the carrots because it is insanely easy and I want people to make these hot dogs stat! No hard to find or special ingredients required!

Pickled carrots

1/2 cup distilled white vinegar
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 tsp kosher salt
1 1/2 cups shredded carrot

Boil vinegar and add sugar. Stir until sugar is completely dissolved. Take off heat and let cool a bit before adding carrots. Stir to coat and let sit overnight in the fridge.

This month Just Bento is featuring vegetarian recipes. Though I am not a vegetarian myself, I do like to cut down on the amount of meat I eat when the summer rolls around. Call me crazy, but sometimes those grilled veggies can be just as exciting as some of burgers, hot dogs, and whatever else might frequent your bbq in the summer (unless your grill belongs to my friend Sean, then his bbq meats win every time).

This bento was mostly improvisation after a trip to Costco. I had a lot of veggies to use up, so I started by making the pasta salad. Pasta salad is the easiest thing in the word to make so I’m not going to waste anyone’s time with a recipe for this one. I will give you a hint though: Dress your pasta salad while it is still warm if you are not using mayo. The hot pasta will actually absorb the dressing and make for a much tastier salad. You might want to add more dressing later though, because sometimes too much gets absorbed and you can be left with something too dry. Also, never add your veggies until the pasta has cooled. The hot pasta could over cook your veggies or make them wilted and unappealing. My pasta salad contains the following: french beans, mushrooms, roasted red pepper (roasted myself on my gas range), and feta cheese. For dressing I just used some red wine vinaigrette.

Now since, I didn’t have any protein in my pasta salad, I made some spiced chickpeas for the side. I love making these and they taste even better the day after you cook them because the spices get a better chance to mix together. These spiced chickpeas are also great because you can pretty much make them different every time depending on what spices you have on hand. For my chickpeas, I used Turkish Spice from Penzey’s, but you can also use curry, cumin, or whatever you like.

Spiced Chickpeas

1 can of chickpeas (or equivalent soaked chickpeas)
2 tb olive oil
2 cups veggie stock
1 shallot, chopped
2 tbs tomato sauce (or even ketchup if you like things sweeter)
1 clove chopped garlic (optional)
spices of choice (cumin, coriander, parsley, paprika, cilantro, etc)
salt and pepper to taste

Heat olive oil in shallow pot (I use a small saucier). Add shallot and cook until it starts to become translucent, then add garlic if you choose. Continue to cook until garlic is cooked and shallots are translucent and a little brown. Add chickpeas. Next add enough stock so that it is level with the chickpeas. Once the stock begins to simmer, add tomato sauce and spices. Stir occasionally and allow the broth to reduce. Basically, all you are doing now is cooking things down so that the chickpeas and onions get soft and cooked. If you find that things get too dry and the chickpeas are soft enough to your liking, simply add more stock and continue to cook down. This is also a fun time to adjust the seasoning and make this dish really your own. Dish is done when chickpeas are relatively dry and start to come out of their skins a bit.

In my house we have to make a distinction between tuna salad and a tuna salad. They are not the same. Tuna salad is that stuff you usually put in a sandwich and includes mayo and whatever else you like. A tuna salad really includes salad (ie lettuce) and doesn’t have any mayo at all. My mother once told me that making tuna this way is another Italian-American recipe and that is why my friends would eye us suspiciously when they came over to lunch. Happily, it wins people over in the end and makes a great bento lunch. Just remember to keep the tuna-mix separate until it is time to eat if you are going to make it in advance.

Italian Tuna Salad

1 can or packet of tuna (if using a can, you will need to drain it first)
1 plum tomato, chopped
1 stalk of celery, chopped
lettuce of choice
2 tbs extra virgin olive oil
2 tbs red wine vinegar
salt and pepper to taste

Place tuna in a bowl and break it up a bit with a fork. Add olive oil and vinegar and mix to combine. Add tomato and celery and gently fold these in so that you don’t break up the tomato too much. Add salt and pepper to taste. At this point I will sometimes add more oil and vinegar too if I think it needs it.

In another bowl, tear up lettuce. If you are going to eat this right away, simply add the tuna mix to the lettuce and toss. Think of the tuna mix as dressing. If you are going to pack it in a bento, place the lettuce in your bento and then keep the tuna in a separate container until lunch time.

This type of tuna salad is very light and refreshing and makes a great summer/warm weather lunch.

Also in this bento:
olives
baby carrots
cheddar cheese