A bento lunch box:the art of eating or eating art? Are you or do you know that mother who makes those beautiful bento lunch boxes? Who makes works of art every day from the food of her son or daughter? I'll be honest:secretly I want that too. A healthy lunch with vegetables, homemade oatmeal cakes or a piece of omelette. And that your child eats everything. Yes, that seems great to me. Then food becomes a breeze and art becomes delicious to eat. But where do I get the time? And is my child interested in that? I dive into the world of the bento lunch… the dutch bento 😉 .
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If you have never heard of it, I will briefly explain what a bento lunch actually is. “Bento” is the Japanese word for packed lunch. In Japan it is a challenge to make a healthy and fun lunch for your child. They are convinced that if food looks nice, your child will eat it sooner.
The idea of the bento lunch has also spread to the Netherlands. The term 'Dutch Bento' now stands for the Dutch variant of the beautiful packed lunch. For example, think of cucumber slices in the shape of a star or flower, a stuffed egg or a sliced bread.
The question that comes to my mind is:'what do I do with the leftovers?'. When I cut out a sandwich, I'm left with crusts. If I want to make a flower from a slice of cucumber, I'm left with a peel. I wonder if you're not wasting a lot of food with all the cutting. That would be a shame, right? There goes all my effort to get the kids to eat their crusts (“Crusts are bread too!”). And eating salad every day because of leftovers of cucumber, tomato and carrot is also something.
tip:What to do with the bread crusts: Of course you can eat them yourself, give them to the ducks or to the dog? But you can also make bread fries, croutons for soup, a bread pudding or a bread cake. You can give the crusts with a healthy dipping sauce or jam in the drum. And oh well, doing nothing with it every now and then is also possible 😉
You can still make a bento lunch with little time. The morning rush hour is already busy enough and I don't have time to make bugs out of cucumber. Sometimes I prepare the drums the night before, which saves time. But I have noticed that even if you have little time, you can make the lunch box attractive.
First of all, I provided a lunch box with compartments. You have those beautiful stainless steel lunch boxes that are already divided into compartments. They are expensive, but they will last for several years. BPA-free, without plasticizers or lead. The food stays nice and fresh and the compartments automatically divide the food. A large compartment for bread and small compartments for vegetables, fruit, olives, pieces of cheese, etc.
tip:You can buy nice skewers via the internet that you can stick in the food. Eyes, for example, which make that snack cucumber look like a bug. Or edible eyes, nice too! That works faster than cutting and no food is wasted!
You can also brighten up your lunch box with silicone cake molds. Then fill the mold with pieces of fruit or cheese. Voila, super cute! You can also buy cheerful dividers to separate your food with.
I myself sometimes write notes with "tasty food" or "kiss from mom" to put in the lunch box. But did you know that there are also ready-made laminated cards from lunchbox love that you can use? Created by a mother whose daughter found it difficult to eat at school because of her eczema she had a different kind of lunch box content than the children in her class. The tickets comforted her. Yes, this will be the finishing touch to my lunch boxes, I suspect. Beautiful!
There's a voice in my head that wonders if it's not just about whose child gets the most beautiful drum. Whether it is not a bit part of the struggle between mothers themselves. For some mothers this may be the case, but for me it's about having my child eat a healthy lunch. And that is allowed with sandwiches, a lost homemade oatmeal cake and some vegetables, as far as I'm concerned. Maybe they are right in Japan and food that looks nice is indeed more likely to be eaten by a child. We will notice in the near future!
At the Leukste Lunch, for example, you will in any case find a lot of things that make the life of a bento lunch producing mother a bit easier (and more fun)!
tip:How do you make bread fries? Dip the bread crusts in honey, olive oil with herbs, or olive oil with garlic (also very tasty!). Roast gently in the pan until they are nicely browned and voilà, your bread fries are ready!
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* Featured image of bento lunch via Shutterstock
