Lunch at Kaz Sushi

During a busy day of meetings with colleagues from NY, we stopped off for a brief lunch before heading out to our next engagement with USDA. Since Kaz Sushi is next door, we set off there.

 Vegetable Bento 

 Friday lunch special: Beef Teriyaki and Sushi.

Cold Ramen Special

***

The nicest part about an early lunch at Kaz is their promotion to take off 10% of the bill for diners who pay before 12:30 pm. With lunch finished, we set out for more ethanol discussions. The fascinating part about the ethanol industry is, the more you learn, the more questions you have. 

Cooking at Home

March has been a busy month for us.  We've been settling into our new place, and figuring out some of the quirks.  I'm slowly learning that opening a hot oven will set off the two fire alarms without reason.  Fun times. I am enjoying experimenting at home, and try to have something ready for him to eat the nights he has to work late.

Oven-roasted pork belly and kimchi bundles with Japanese-style potato salad and a tortellini-vegetable salad.  My Japanese potato salad included chopped egg, onion, carrots, apple and a slightly sweeter Japanese mayonnaise. 

 We like Korean soups and stews a lot. This creation blended soon dubu and kimchee chige.  I made a dashi with katsubushi flakes and konbu (dried bonito fish flakes and seaweed), added some leftover fresh kimchi, tofu, rayu-spiced green beans, cabbage, onion, carrots, leftover sesame-crusted tuna and Korean chili powder.

Today's Bento.  Mapo Nasu with rice and pickled ginger.  Cook-Do is a brand of sauces by Ajinomoto  that I used to buy when I lived in Japan.  You can find some at area Asian markets like Super H Mart. We recently received the sauce with some Japanese staples from a coworker who returned to live in Japan.  I added some fresh vegetables, mixed in the Cook-Do sauce packet, and cooked some rice.  It's a pretty fast and versatile meal, although a bit high sodium content-wise.

Sushiko Bento

Helping out with interviews, we had a choice of bento lunches last week.  Every year the meat, fish and vegetarian bentos are ordered from different Japanese restaurants.  Sometimes they are gloriously transcendant, other times I'm left feeling like I should have chosen better. 

 Thursday's Fish Bento.  Nice, fresh, but paltry in size compared to the steak bento that came with rice, potato salad, spinach and mashed sweet potato.  Even the vegetarian bento was more substantial.

 Friday's Fish Bento.  Despite the organizer calling and pleading for something different, only the orientation of the maki changed. I should have jumped ship with the others to the Vegetarian option.

 Vegetarian Bento.  2 maki, vegetarian nigiri and inari-zushi.

Plus! a lovely seaweed salad.

Sakana in Dupont

Post-office move, my boss and I headed out in our new neighborhood for lunch at Sakana.  We should have continued on down P Street to Uni, which has fresher sushi.  Everything was fine, very filling, but I'm still searching for an affordable and consistently good sushi-ya. 

Sushi bento lunch $15 with rice, tsukemono, tempura shrimp and vegetables, tamagoyaki, yakitori and breaded and fried fish. 

Today's Bento

Mushrooms and bell pepper in kochujang-soy sauce, rolled egg, broccoli with soy-sesame sauce.

Arugula with lemon and garlic, rice with shiso furikake and salmon flakes.

Today's Bento

Leftover dressing topped with turkey and a mushroom gravy. 

Mixed vegetables with mango and cranberry chutney.

Today's Bento

Yakisoba with Napa cabbage, shrimp, mushrooms, onion and pickled ginger.

In preparation for Needless Turkey Murder Day, I used up some leftover vegetables in my yakisoba to make more room in the refrigerator.  Yakisoba is a great dish for improvising and incorporating leftover bits of vegetables and proteins.

Today's Bento

With the arrival of colder weather, we've been eating a lot more lately. Even though we went for an hour run and took an 18 mile bike ride this weekend, it's good to adjust food content and quantities.  To lighten up today's bento, I made a meat-free lunch with half the amount of rice and more fresh fruits and vegetables.

 Umeboshi, quick-pickled cucumber, grapes, persimmon, mandarin orange, spicy bean sesame sprouts with pickled ginger.

Sauteed cabbage with shiitake mushrooms, garlic and ginger; edamame, and rice topped with salmon furikake.

Today's Bento

Persian cucumbers (much smaller and crunchy) with miso paste, tangerine, cavatappi pasta in tomato sauce and lighter eggplant parmesan.  The eggplant was coated in a flour, egg wash and panko mixture, then baked for 40 minutes at 350F instead of panfried in oil.  It takes a bit longer, but the crunchy texture from the panko was nice.  With a little tomato sauce topped with mozzarella and grated parmesan cheese between each layer, I assembled the eggplant stacks and baked for another 30 minutes.  A lighter, meat-free lunch.

Today's Bento

After a few hodge-podge packed lunches, I finally put together a nice bento for my boyfriend.  There's a mixture of all of the food groups and hopefully it'll satisfy him during his lunch break.  It's especially nice to bring a bento when it's a messy and rainy day and I needed to borrow his umbrella.

 Sweet potato fries, cucumber with miso paste, bratwurst, sauteed cabbage and red pepper.

 Orange wedges and Japanese potato salad.

In hindsight I should have put the cucumbers in the bottom section. 

Hopefully he'll take them out before he reheats the top half.

Lunchtime Bentos

When I lived in Japan, I heard that you could see how much a mother cared about her child by the bento she made for school lunch.  The artistry involved astounded me.  There are people who can create super cute bentos with apples cut like rabbits, mini-sausage octopi and panda face onigiri.  I am not one of those people.  I'm more focused on packing a lunchtime meal for my boyfriend that incorporates nutritious elements that taste good and travel well. 

 Korean bibimbap-inspired bento. 

Kochujang, cherry tomato, sliced tamagoyaki, sauteed spinach, mushrooms and carrots to be placed ontop of the rice in its separate compartment.

Sesame-soy baby bok choy, rice, bundles of grilled seasoned pork belly wrapped around kimchi.

The first lunch bento I made for him.

Hiking Adventures

Recently we started hiking different trails in the Shenandoah. It's wonderful to get out in woods, traverse some challenging elevation changes and enjoy some clean, fresh air. In addition to carrying enough water and mugi-cha, we like to bring something good to eat for lunch.

The Very Hungry Caterpillar bento set is perfect for packing lunch for bigger appetites.Hello Kitty bento set works well too.
hand-made onigiri with salmon and shiso furikake

kiwi fruit, blueberries and a tangerine

mixed fruit, grape tomatoes, edamame and onigiri