{Pretty, Happy, Funny, Real}

This past July was Dancing Child's birthday.  I decided, since he is all about Asian everything - especially Japanese everything - that I would give him some Japanese gifts.  He likes to mess in the kitchen and he also has spoken a lot about a Japanese lunchbox called a BENTO.  Well, I found him one and I was very intrigued by it.  It is so cleverly compact and beautiful at the same time.  And imagine my delight when I found a cookbook for him with all BENTO recipes.  On our first home school co-op day yesterday, he inaugurated his lunchbox and filled it with rice and Chicken Teriyaki that he cooked all by himself from his cookbook.  Our kitchen has never smelled that good so early in the morning.  He did a great job.  It was Pretty, Happy, Funny, and Real all in one! Well done, Dancing Child!

 さようなら

sayonara!

Here is the Bento.  It is quite PRETTY.  It contains three rectangular boxes with lids that stack on top of each other  and are wrapped in a band of elastic.  They are then  clicked into the frame.  A pair of chopsticks is conveniently attached to the top.  I call that INGENIOUS and PRETTY all at the same time.

 We set the rice cooker cooking!

Dancing Child then found his chicken recipe in his handy dandy Bento cookbook and filled my kitchen with Ginger smell.  HMMMM!

He unstacked the boxes and filled each one with rice and chicken.

He wrapped them in the elastic band and clicked them in the frame

And there you have it.............a pretty happy, fun, and real lunch to bring to co op! 

This is one of the loveliest ideas I have ever seen. The Bento.