GOODBYE JUNE (BENTO RECAP!)

June is over and I have but a measly few bentos that I never posted. I was a little bit passive about my bentoing in June. There weren't very many that were made or, I forgot to take photos of the ones that were. These are the ones I have photographic evidence of.

Here we have rice with an egg white scramble which includes zucchini, mushrooms and yellow pepper. Along with that we have cherries, blueberries, strawberries and kiwi:
Next up is a concoction of leftovers from Freshii. Freshii is some sort of food court "fast food" where you pick your base (burrito, wrap, salad, soup or rice) and toppings. Or, you can do what I did and order a pre-made option. I opted for the Bliss Bowl which contains brown rice, avocado, portobello mushrooms, red pepper, tomato, red onions and goat cheese. For $7.95 plus tax, it's not that bad. It is really filling, especially the brown rice bowl options. Anyhoo, I had a bunch of it leftover so I mixed in some leftover steak that I cut into chunks and added some yellow pepper and mushrooms. I also have a side of okra--my fave, yum!
The last bento I have for you all is this one...a simple pasta salad with cucumber, red pepper, celery and organic italian dressing.
That's all the bentos from June, folks!

STARTING OFF ON THE RIGHT FOOT...

I ran out of buckwheat cereal sometime last week and ever since then, my stomach has not been a happy camper. My tastebuds either as they really liked the combo of toasted buckwheat (kasha), almond butter, agave nectar, organic milk or yogurt and whatever fruits tickled my fancy that morning.

I decided to try out another Eat-Clean recipe, this time, the Quinoa with Oats. It's basically soaked quinoa and steel-cut oats simmered for 30 minutes with cinnamon, vanilla and raisins added in afterwards. Since I wasn't smart enough to read the instructions beforehand, I skipped the quinoa since I hadn't pre-soaked them for 2 hours and also cut the recipe in half.

I have been reading lots on the benefits of steel-cut oats and seeing as how I don't really like normal oatmeal, I thought I would give this nuttier, chewier version a try. I was hoping this would satisfy me enough in the next few days to gather enough energy to make more buckwheat cereal. And mind you, it's not that it really takes a long time to make buckwheat cereal, it's just that "babysitting" buckwheat in an oven for a little over an hour isn't my idea of a good time.

Here's the steel-cut oats after 30 minutes of cooking and a little organic skim milk added to the mix:And here's my cupcake pixie cup of deliciousness:Mine actually contains agave nectar, raisins, cut canned peach slices and a dribble (or two) of heavy cream.

To tell you the truth, it's actually not that delicious. I can't get past the texture. It's actually a little bit too chewy for my tastes and I would rather eat regular oatmeal. And now I have a whole pot full of this stuff. Oh well.

$65 BUYS YOU WHAT EXACTLY?

Well, it buys you this:And that my friends, is a bag of goodies from Whole Foods. Pictured are ginger lime chicken strips, proscuitto, chicken cordon bleu, a box of Grape Nuts, a Kombucha jasmine tea and grape drink, lavender essential oil, orzo with feta salad along with a couple boxes of my newest addiction, organic water crackers. Crack(ers), it is.

Sean and I watched a special screening of The Iron Giant, downtown on Friday afternoon and from there we went to Whole Foods to grab some eats and then drive back to Markham's (or Unionville's, if you prefer) Toogood Pond, so we could enjoy the view and our eats. Wow, grammatically, that is the worst sentence ever.

My dinner consisted of a Kombucha drink (not going to be a repurchase), orzo and feta salad (with olives, baby spinach, onions and pine nuts), ginger lime chicken strips and oops, how'd that get there...an Oreo McFlurry. Sean's dinner consisted of a Harmony organic chocolate milk, medium fries, a double cheeseburger "like a Mac" and some provolone cheese.
This is what you get when you order fast food, a nasty French fry:Now I leave you with the happy couple:

WHERE'S THE BUCKWHEAT??

I miss my buckwheat groats. I ran out of the toasted cereal kind that I make that includes almond butter and agave nectar so I my back-up was the next best thing, already-toasted buckwheat (now kasha) from Bulk Barn. I have mixed feelings about this stuff. It's good when you're lazy but the groats are a little too toasted for my liking. I like little hints of green here and there, reminding me of their rawness. Plus, for some reason I think it has better crunch.

Anyhoo, after seven consecutive days of work I had today off to take my dad to the hospital (cataract surgery, all went well), but I had forgotten my kasha at work. So what the heck was left for me to eat for breakfast in a jiffy (while in the car on the way to the hospital)? Cheerios with blueberries and 2% milk. Not such a bad idea except that a) I miss the fiber in the buckwheat and b) I haven't had non-organic or non-lactose-free milk in months.

As a result, my stomach was not a fan of me for the rest of the day. I felt at times bloated, full of heartburn and a bit of acid reflux. Not a fun experience.

I decided to try out a recipe from The Eat-Clean Diet Book, hoping that my stomach would stop hating me. I settled on a smoothie recipe since dinner was about to be ready and I couldn't pass up my dad's tomato sauce, plus, I had a carton of almond milk lying around and half of the smoothie recipes call for alternatives to cow milk. Not specifically but Tosca Reno, the author, does give suggestions for other options.

This is my smoothie:
And to be honest, I'm not crazy about it. It contains oatmeal. Oatmeal, for pete's sake! Like what the hell is oatmeal doing in a smoothie? Apparently it's good thing but my tastebuds think not. Other than the oatmeal there's protein powder (my choice was from Vega), almond milk, wheat germ, ground flax seeds, a banana, some blueberries (my addition) and agave nectar (substitute for applesauce which I do not have on hand).

I think I used too much protein powder. I also think I will not use oatmeal again. Ever. Well, maybe not ever but it's definitely an acquired taste. I'm still in the middle of drinking this thing. It's still 3/4 full. Oops. Ah well. Cheers anyway.

Oh and here's another photo just for the hell of it:

KITTENS!!!

We have kittens in our backyard. My dad called me at work sometime last week to talk to me about something and then started calling out excitedly. After he calmed down, he explained to me that there were six kittens crawling around, just outside the patio door. I started getting excited too and then told him to go grab a camera and take pictures.

I patiently waited for the rest of my work shift to end in order to see photos of these six kittens but alas, my dad opened the patio door to get a good photo of them and they scurried away into our bushy backyard. (It's bushy because there's a plethora of plants growing along one side of a fence that's ideal for cats to give birth and raise their young.)

I decided to test my luck and went outside with my own camera and this is what I came back inside with:
And here are two that were just a little bit curious:And a couple of photos of one of my cats, Ogre.

BENTO RECAP!

Whoa, I cannot believe the first post of the month is occuring almost two weeks in. Clearly I've been busy. Or distracting. It's probably a combination of both.

Here's some bentos from the past two weeks. There aren't as many photos as usual because I've been hungrier than usual and would have rather eaten than photographed.

This lunch was courtesy of the George Foreman grill. There's grilled zucchini, a portabello mushroom and an organic beef burger from The Healthy Butcher. Beside that is asparagus and melon salad. Goddamn these vertical photos. Blogger, why can't I rotate my own photos?!
This bowl of deliciousness contains leftover spicy pork bone soup with some Catelli Smart macaroni. Seriously the best bowl of food this year. Well okay, maybe not the absolute best but pretty high up there.

Please excuse the following crappy photo. I don't know what the heck was happening with the focus. This comes from The Eat Clean Diet book. I picked it up recently while purchasing Martha Stewart's Cupcakes and I'm glad I did. It has a bunch of great recipes that I will be cooking up in the near future. The following is supposed to be the turkey egg white scramble but I didn't have any turkey on hand so I substituted with some pancetta that I really have to finish up. Along with that are egg whites, zucchini, cucumber, orange and yellow pepper and that's all I can remember. Fruits include strawberries and grapes.

The following is a case of food that tastes better than it looks. It's a container filled with leftovers of rice, steamed free-range chicken and some kind of veg that I can't remember. Fruits include grapes and golden kiwi.
That's all!