Today is going to be a great day!  I just know it.  My morning has started off really well, and it’s all because what I planned actually happened, which is a very uncommon occurrence.  After yesterday’s sadly packed and photographed bento offering, I decided last night I wanted to share something better with you today.  I went to bed early and woke the same, bright-eyed and ready to put together this morning’s bento.  My goal: to document the progress as I went along.

I’m not a real planner when it comes to my bentos.  At the most, I might cook something the night before with a bento in mind for the next day.  Mostly, I’m an “open the fridge and hope something is in there” sort.  This means as I get ready for my bentos in the morning I’ll pull out all sorts of things and lay them out on my counter to see what’s going to go into the box.  This morning’s offerings are plentiful because I went to the grocery store yesterday.  Some mornings are really, really sad (like yesterday’s).

My plan this morning was to pack a full day of bento for me.  I don’t often do this.  Step 1: pack a morning snack bento.  My morning snack bento consists of frozen blueberries with yogurt.  This concoction is mixed with plain granola.  I add toasted pecans (not pictured) to the mix as well.  It’s yum and keeps me going in the mornings.

For an afternoon snack, I often like to partake of Feisty Foodie‘s apple and cheese sandwich.  There are a few things I’ve learned I like to do for myself as I’ve made this sandwich over and over again.  First, I like to keep the peel on, so I use an apple corer to get rid of the stuff I don’t want.  This makes making the sandwich in the morning much quicker.  As well, I like to purchase small blocks of cheese and use my vegetable peeler to get one long strip of cheese that fits perfectly on my homemade bread!  This works much better than the cheese slicer I seem to have wasted money on!

I layer the sandwich up and throw it into a pan with a wee bit of butter (or margarine) to toast on both sides.  While I do this, I start packing my lunch bento.  Here’s another tip I’ve found when bringing a toasted sandwich for lunch: don’t pack it into your bento and let it cool before putting the top on.  Where the warm toast touches the sides of the bento collects heat and makes the toast soggy.  Place the toasted sandwich on a cooling rack and once cool pack into your bento box.

Now, it’s time to pack my bento box.  Today, I’m having white beans and rice with chicken and veggies.  First, I packed in a bit of rice and placed a food divider next to it.  Two chicken tenders were cut up and placed in the box on the other side of the rice.  Finally, I topped the rice with the white beans (btw, thanks for lunch Mom!).  Oh, and the apple sandwich is about done.  I transferred it to its cooling rack at this point.

The second tier of the bento was just as simple.  First, half a banana is placed on one end of the box.  I wrapped it in cellophane to hopefully prevent too much browning.  Next, came a layer of my everyday carrot intake.  I placed a food divider next to the carrots to keep their slight moisture from disturbing my dessert: 3/4 of a chocolate graham cracker, broken to fit into my bento box.

This is today’s bento in all its tasty glory.  YUM!  I’m ready for lunch now.  How about you?

Be the bento everyone!  See you tomorrow.