Recipes and Brown Bagging It

 

I've been trying to discipline myself to brown bag it more often.  We're really not eating out all that much anymore - too expensive, gas wise and everything else. I always make enough for leftovers and I have been carrying a tote bag with little bits of this and that tossed into plasticware, but I wanted something a bit more organized. I've recently started reading Vegan Homemade,  and I liked the idea about her laptop lunches and the containers looked like it kept everything separated.  I did some research online, and was ready to order when one day I stopped into the local Koren/Japanese grocery and.....Voila - my bento box:

What you can't see here is the lid that snaps on. It actually keeps stuff in place, one of the things I read were an issue with the laptop lunch case.  no place for chopsticks or plasticware, but I have them in my office, so it's no matter.  In this picture you see the leftover mango noodles salad (with kiwi because we ran out of mango), some BBQ tofu, hummus, carrots and a peach.

My lunch tomorrow will most certainly have this:

 

Lentil Salad (courtesy of the Moosewood Cookbook Low Fat Favorites)

Salad:

1 1/2 cups lentils

1/2 cup chopped red onion (chop it fine)

2 garlic cloves, chopped fine

4 cups of water

1 cup chopped red bell pepper

1 cup chopped celery

Note:  I didn't follow these measurements exactly. I wanted 1 cup of lentils and I chose to cook everything in my rice cooker because I had to run errands this afternoon.  The recipe calls for chopped red onion and white onion, which I thought would be killer, so I substituted a leek which definitely softened the flavor. If you have a decent rice cooker with the fuzzy logic (I have a sanyo) just program it like white rice.  If you're going to cook it on the stove, combine the lentils, the leeks and garlic with the water on the stove, bring it to a boil, then cover, lower to a simmer and cook for about 30 minutes or until tender.

Dressing

1 cup plain yogurt

3 T chutney (jarred is fine)

1 1/2 tsp curry owder

2 tsp finely minced red onion (I omitted because IMHO there was enough onion in it already).

Juice of one lime. 

Mix ingredients together and set aside until the lentils are done.  Optimally, you'll let the lentils cool to room temp. You can speed this up by refrigerating them until they are room temperature.

When everything is room temp, mix together and serve on top of lettuce leaves.  I added some pepadew peppers and sliced radish to balance the sweet taste of the lentils.