Sushi Popcorn

My husband wanted to go see Kyle Kinane doing stand-up at a local venue last week so Monstro and I had a date day.  Turns out he was more interested in playing Lego than hanging out with me but we did manage to make some really fun snacks and watched Puss In Boots (my favorite part of the movie was the trailer for Madagascar 3 at the beginning!).  You have to have popcorn when you watch a movie and Monstro is hardcore about this "rule."  As I was shaking-shaking-shaking the popcorn I asked what he wanted on the popcorn and he ran through the house screaming "SUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUSHIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII."  

Ummm, how do I put sushi on popcorn?!  Well, my answer was to toss the popcorn in wasabi powder that my brother sent me and crunch up some spicy nori strips over top.  I have to say it was pretty good!  Monstro loved it and made me promise that I would 1.  make Daddy try it when he came home and 2. save some for his lunch.

I packed some sushi popcorn in a little treat bag with some extra nori strips tucked in around it.  For the "meal" (I use the term loosely because I'm sure that to Monstro the popcorn was lunch and all the rest were "sides") he has a "triple decker" sandwich (a Hawaiian sweet roll cut in thirds with cajun turkey, spicy mustard, and romaine), kamaboko twists, orange peppers, purple cauliflower and some kiwi slices.  Even though I popped the popcorn in part butter I think the addition of nori makes it a little healthier so I was pretty pleased with the nutrition level of the lunch.  I was definitely worried when he asked for popcorn for lunch!

Goodies again...

Here are two more lunches that test out my new supplies.  I'm so excited about all of the things I got and I'm having a hard time restraining myself so that Monstro doesn't end up with just ludicrous lunches (stamped hotdogs AND bunny ham rolls??!?)!

The first of this set is the soy wrap.  They come in natural colors and I've seen them in colors besides the ones that come in this particular set.  I posted Monstro's Leap Day lunch over on the PepperMilk FB but I think it deserves a nod here as well.  I was beyond happy with how the little frog turned out.  The soy paper was a little hard to wrestle with to be honest.  I cut it in 1/2 because I didn't want a big wad of it bunched up on the back side of the onigiri.  I had to keep making my rice ball smaller and smaller and I never really got the back to stick to itself.  It looks cute though!  The rest of the lunch is meatballs, enoki, carrots, kamaboko twists and a little cup of Indian Rice Pudding.  The adorable cherry stem pick also came out of my bento spree!

The next little gadget was the set of sausage stamps.  Of course, here hot dogs are much easier to find and use than the little sausages I see in Asian bento so that's what I used them for.  I cut a hot dog into thirds and made one into a cat face and the other 2 bits I randomly stamped with hearts, music notes and spirals.  Unfortunately, the spirals and music notes ended up being too close to nicks in the hotdog and they just exploded into nothingness when I cooked them!  So all you get to see is kittyface and hearts.  The instructions are not in English but I gleaned that you should pan fry the hot dogs.  I tried boiling them like a critter and it worked a little bit but once I tossed them into a skillet with a smidge of oil the stamps really started to show up.  You just have to keep turning and moving them so they get evenly browned around the stamped images.

I also added in a little Octo-dog pick that was part of my birthday gift too.  There are orange peppers, avocado, a Hawaiian sweet roll and purple cauliflower in the bottom tier of the box.  On the top tier Monstro has Indian Rice Pudding, orange segments and some Black Pepper Cherry trail mix.

I still have more goodies to get to!  YAY!

Mr. Oinkers and his buddy Drain

I had so much fun making today's lunches!  We just bought a Ninja Pulse so while the boys were drinking up green smoothies I was able to have some fun.  The idea for Mr. Oinkers actually came pretty much by surprise.  I was cutting eyes from kamaboko and the resulting "tree" looked like a pig nose!  Score!

Monstro has a pita sandwich filled with spicy mustard, a slice of cajun turkey and colby-jack cheese.  Mr. Oinkers' nose, eyes and ears are all made from kamaboko with nori punches for the pupils and small bits of spaghetti to hold on the ears.  I giggled when I uploaded the pictures because I hadn't noticed that Mr. Oinkers has a little beauty mark!  I tucked in some sliced cucumber and sugar snap peas but Monstro said it wouldn't be enough so I gave him a "sidecar" filled with bits of other veggies - purple cauliflower, orange pepper, plus more cucumber and snap peas.

Here's Mr. Oinkers in all his glory ;-)

And here's the full lunch:

For myself, I ran with the kamaboko eyes on a pita sandwich idea and Drain was born.  He's a vampire.... see his tiny little cheese fangs hanging out?

I used nori punches on top of whole slices of kamaboko then turned the nori mouth upside down for a nose.  My sandwich is spicy mustard, cajun turkey, colby-jack and pepperoni.  I've also got snap peas, orange peppers and cucumbers in my lunch.  My husband said that he looks very sad... I kind of agree... a mopey little vampire dude. (for the record, I tried to find an "Edward Cullen" photo to link there)