Fastest lunch ever

I'm studying to be a teacher for the after school program, and as part of the education we have internships for four weeks every semester. We are assigned to the same school during the whole education, and we are allowed to fill in when they need help. My school have called or texted me a bunch of times already and I love it! It's a great extra job to fill in one or two afternoons a week, plus it means I won't forget the kids, the teachers or the schools routines.

Last week they texted me in the morning to ask if I could fill in that afternoon. I was getting ready to go to class in the morning, but working that afternoon would mean I'd need to pack a lunch. And it needed to be packed in less than ten minutes and I'd need to eat it on the bus to make it from class to work in time.

So this is what I came up with:

I threw a kaviar (smoked and salted fish roe mix, very swedish and very yummy) sandwich and some meatballs in my Mickey Mouse box. Might be the most uninspired lunch box ever, and no fruit or veggies. But it was food and I made it in time to both class and work.

Exambento

Last friday I had a big midterm exam from 8 am to 1 pm. Since I know that I'm a stress eater I packed a big bento with lot's of snacky food. Turned out I didn't need all that food, so about half of it ended up being an afternoon snack instead.

Three boxes! My lovely retro Mickey Mouse box, one of the inner containers from my Laptop Lunch box and a beautiful metal box with a tree etched in the lid (bad picture, so the tree isn't too visible, but if you look closely you can see it).

And here's what's inside: In the Mickey Mouse box I packed a whole grain rye sandwich with hummus and smoked ham, mini meatballs with hamburger dressing in the little box and carrot sticks. I had apple slices and almond butter in the Laptop Lunches container. I the metal tree box I packed cauliflower with hummus in the panda, a heart shaped egg with salt in the little panda and a few more mini meatballs. I threw a sweet protein bar in the bag as well. I found tiny cocktails forks at my grocery store and I love them!

Food swap tasting

So, it's been a while since I got the package from The Student turned doctor and I've eaten a lot of the things - mostly the sweets! (To see what I got just go to the next entry on the blog!)

So I thought I would write a bit about what I thought about it.

Salt water taffy - a little disappointed about them not being salty at all, but I liked them. I got chocolate and grape (I think the purple were grape, it's not a common flavor here so I'm not sure) and even though they were very sweet they tasted nice and was not as sticky as I thought.

Charleston chew - I didn't really know what to expect from these, but I really liked them! Also really sweet, but in a good way. Very yummy!

The jellies - Sweeter than I expected, and very different from each other. Some had a lot of flavor and were really good, but some just tasted overly sweet and those I didn't really like. My favorite was the orange one, very nice citrus flavor!

Minnie Mouse Jelly beans - Green, orange and two different purple kinds of jelly beans. Well, the purple and orange ones were nice even if they had a little strange flavors. But the green ones, that were supposed to taste like kiwi, were really, really disgusting! They had the worst artificial flavoring ever, and didn't taste at all like kiwi. Luckily there was only four of the green ones.

Rice krispies treat - This I liked a lot! Sweet, but with a tiny hint of savory from the rice krispies. Not as sticky as I had expected, so that was really nice.

Candy corn - Oh my god, those were SWEET! Very nice honey flavor, but the sweetness was a bit overwhelming. The small bag lasted over a week here, and both me and my boyfriend are sweet tooths, but the candy corn was a bit too much for both of us. But one every now and then was nice. And I was surprised at the texture, I expected them to be chewy, but they were crumbly.

Pumpkin peeps - Also extremely sweet. We do have marshmallow candy in sweden, but not as sweet as these! It was like it was sweeter than sugar! But very cute!

Fig Newtons - Nice. Sweet, but fruity. Very soft. Was a nice snack with a cup of tea, but didn't make any big impression on me.

Good Earth Sweet & spicy original tea - This smelled sooo good! I like cinnamon and it both smelled and tasted a lot of cinnamon. The tea was very sweet in it self, and the taste was very good, but it was a little too much. I could only drink about half my cup. Maybe I let it steep a little too long, and maybe it might be a little less intense if I put a little milk in it.

Moon pie - They surprised my by NOT being as sweet as I expected! The cookie part reminded me slightly of a swedish bread called Vörtbröd that we eat at christmas. It's a sweet bread made with spices and "vört", which I think is a kind of byproduct from the malt when making beer. I liked the Moon pies a lot, and if I come to the USA any time I might buy them as a snack.

I have also tried the Cream wheat for breafast. I decided to start with the original and it was kind of blah… but I poured some maple syrup on it and that made it yummy! I think the flavored kinds are better than the non flavored. I have Cinnabun and Maple brown sugar left to try.

So far I've had a lot of fun trying all the american sweets. I mostly have seasoning things left and the crispy peas. I'm looking forward to be able to put some of those things in future lunches!

Food swap!

There won't be any lunches here for this week and the next. We are at midterm and have exams coming up, so it's all studying at home these weeks. So instead I'll show you a lot of exotic stuff! At least it's exotic to me… :)

A few weeks ago I had a comment on my blog from The Student (now turned Doctor - congratulations!) at Food for dissertation. She had seen my lunches featuring strawberry cream and was intrigued by this.

This kind of cream has nothing to do with dairy, it's fruit or berries boiled with water and sugar and thickened with potato starch so it gets a creamy consistency, almost like yoghurt, but it's clear. We serve it in a bowl with some milk or cream on top, or just plain. We eat it for dessert or as a snack meal in the afternoon. In the summer when it's hot I like to eat it for lunch with a sandwich or some snacky food and veggies for sides.

Anyway, The Student was curious and I offered to send her some so she could try it. This offer of mine then turned into a food swap with both of us sending stuff. I sent typical Swedish stuff, as well as the strawberry cream (it comes in a powdered version!) and I received a package full of American stuff. I told her I was curious about the crispy snack peas I've seen in a lot of bentos and that some friends and I had discussed salt water taffy.

This is the box when I opened it. There was a card on top as well, but I forgot to put it back to take the picture. Opening and unpacking all this felt like christmas!

Here are all the things I got! The taffy was cleverly used as packing peanuts, so I gathered them in a bowl when I unpacked. I had to try it right away! I was surprised when I didn't taste any salt, I expected them to be a tiny bit salty, but no. Just sweet and a bit sticky. The purple ones scared me a little, it looked like polymer clay and not like something you should put in your mouth. But it tasted good.

So, I got a few kinds of tea, Fig Newtons, Candy corn, Charleston chew, Rice Krispies treat, some very pretty jellies, Minnie Mouse jelly beans, three different kinds of Almond butter and two lollipops. Candy corn and Fig Newtons are things I've seen in movies and on TV, but never tried so I'm extra excited about them!

Some more of the stuff I got: Dark chocolate peanut butter, Moon pies, the taffy, three different kinds of Cream Wheat, Ranch dressing mix, Sloppy joe mix, Chili mix and Taco seasoning mix. We do have peanut butter and other kinds of nut butters in Sweden, but they are relatively new here and are found on the health food section in the stores and they DON'T come in chocolate flavor! The Moon pies made me giggle, me and my boyfriend are big fans of The Big Bang Theory and Sheldon's grandmother calls him Moon pie, but I had no idea what it really was! But now I do, and I get to taste it too!

I'm also excited to see if there is a difference in taste in the spice mixes, if American taco mix taste like Swedish taco mix, and the same with the chili.

I also got Onion dip mix, Corn muffin mix, mini taco boats and some very, very orange pumpkin marshmallow candy (at least I think it's marshmallow, it felt soft when I poked it through the plastic cover).

Inner peas, I love the pun in the name! I'm really curious about these crispy pea snacks, they seem so good! Also a closer picture of the taffy and the moon pies (there is a vanilla one underneath the chocolate one). You can also see the pretty card I got in the package.

Thank you so much to The Student at Food for dissertation for sending me all this American food, snacks and candies!

Bentos of week 43

So, the bentos on this blog are not really coming at regular intervals. A lot of the days in school I only have one class, either in the morning or in the afternoon. On those days I eat lunch at home and don't pack any bento boxes.

But this week I have some to show you!

Monday's lunch:

I've packed my Laptop lunches box with greek yoghurt (there's some honey in there too, but it decided to hide in the bottom), carrot sticks, grapes, homemade tsatiski, a meat filled Burtek (eastern European savory pastry) and a few leftover potato wedges.

It turned out that I packed a bit too much and the yoghurt and the grapes ended up being my afternoon snack instead of lunch.


Wedensday's lunch:

So yesterday I went with a tapas style lunch: apple wedges, olives and feta cheese in olive oil and spices, tomato and olive tapenade in the yellow heart cup, half a multigrain baguette and some almond butter in the small container. There is a nakd berry bar in the side of the box, but I never ate it.

I packed this lunch the night before and the photo is taken at lunch time. I dipped the apple wedges in lemon juice and they really do not brown, even after about 16 hours!


Today's lunch:

This lunch was packed in a new bento box that I just got (ordered it online and it took almost two months to get it in the mail, Japan is far away!). It's a really cute retro Mickey Mouse box and I loved it right away! I packed it with a meat filled Burtek, yellow cherry tomatoes, tiny little meatballs and some grapes. It was really easy to pack, a perfect size for me and it's soooo cute! This box will most likely show up a lot on this blog.

Laptop lunch

This is my lunch for today. I had a similar lunch this monday, but I forgot to take a picture of it… I was too hungry. I'm a bad food blogger for that reason. I'll ohh and ahh over beautiful food when I got to restaurants, but I always forget to take a picture! And then when I'm finished, or half way through, I'd think "oh, I should have taken a photo of this!".

But today I remembered, so here is my lunch (not the sharpest picture, but I realized that too late):

It's packed in my Laptop Lunches system and starting from en top left and going clockwise I've got kiwi berries, carrot sticks with caesar dressing, frozen mango, a meat filled Burtek (eastern european savory pastry thing) and yellow cherry tomatoes.

I was really excited to find kiwi berries in my grocery store this week! I've seen them on a few blogs and I was really curious about them. I like kiwis, and anything mini is always fun. They do taste just like kiwi, maybe a little bit sweeter. I liked them! I might not buy them very much, they were expensive and I like to buy organic fruits and veggies.

No bentos for a while

There have been no packed lunches for the last two weeks. Last week i was out on my placement school, where I will practice being a teacher out in the real world. I'm placed on a cute little school with just under 100 students from kindergarten to year 3, so between 6 and 9 years old.

In Sweden all elementary schools offers free lunches to every student, and it's always a hot meal with bread and veggies at the side. And I'm lucky enough to be placed at a school that lets all the teachers eat for free too, including me!

Also, the after school program, which most of the kids attend, starts with a healthy snack meal. It's different every day and can be yoghurt with muesli, sandwiches or fruit salad and always has veggies as a side. The snack is also free for teachers and for me!

This week only had haft days in school, so I had lunch at home every day. But the coming week will bring a few packed lunches.