OMG I can't wait for lunch, even though I'm so full (I had 3 gyoza and two inari sushi for breakfast, haha).
Left: grilled eel over sushi/seasoned rice, sesame seeds sprinkled on top (I even "cut" the rice using my mold into bite size pieces); inari sushi
Right: bean sprouts; creamed corn croquettes; seafood gyoza with gyoza sauce- the GOOD brand of gyoza!
HOW GOOD DOES THAT LOOK!?!?!
Inari sushi is tofu skin, deep fried and soaked in this wonderfully sweet and syrupy liquid, then stuffed with sushi rice. You can fill it with other stuff as well, but I was in a rush and whipped these up this morning, so I didn't have masago on hand to add to it. The first time I made inari, I totally didn't follow the directions. Oops. Fantastic instructions can be found here for regular inari zushi, and here for slightly more fluffy frills (I have to try it with masago... drool!)
Unfortunately I forgot to pack some tonkatsu sauce for the croquettes, but maybe they'll be fine without - I often alternate plain bites with sauced bites anyway!
The good brand of gyoza is Ajinomoto, I love their pork gyoza, seafood gyoza is pretty good, and I also bought a bag of pork & chicken gyoza, will have to see how good those are as well.
As for the eel, I didn't buy the frozen kind, as I went to a Japanese supermarket on Sunday, I picked up a grilled eel that appeared to be somewhat fresh. It was only $4.75, which is actually cheaper than the frozen kinds, and this one had little to no hard bones, which I've found in the frozen ones before! (I ate part of it for dinner and then took about 1/4 for lunch; I was going to make onigiri but I was in a rush so unagi don is what worked.)
I also wanted to pick up the Asian style potato salad, but it was $12.99 a pound. YOU READ THAT RIGHT. I mean, they had small containers, so it was about $2-3 a container, but come on! I find $2/lb. for potato salad a bit outrageous already, what the heck?!
Anyway, HAPPY BENTO'ING!!!
That looks amazing! Great variety, too. :)
ReplyDeleteOuch. That's some mighty pricey tater salad.
ReplyDeleteWhere do you find the tofu skins for the inari? I live in Flushing too and tried two korean markets, and I really don't want to have to go into every store I see!!! :-) Thanks!
ReplyDeleteHey K, thanks for reading! I'm not sure I've seen these in Korean markets, but I haven't looked, either- actually, I bought these by St. Mark's Place (at Sunrise Mart, around the corner on Stuyvesant Street?, it's right next to Around the Clock!). I go there frequently for the food that makes up my bento- gyoza, eel, masago, croquettes, etc., great selection and by the number of actual Japanese people who shop there, I feel comfortable in saying it must be somewhat good (or the only option...?)
ReplyDeleteAnyway, I found these in the refrigerated section near the regular tofu. The selection of tofu skins is daunting to someone like me who can't read Japanese, and they had a ton of inari-looking tofu, but a lot were well, too big, so I was wandering around and found these next to the masago, right next to the freezer cases. It came in a pack of 20, split into 4 packs of 5 each, and was a few dollars. I only made 5 and froze the rest of the skins, will let you know how that works out...
Hope that helps!
I like how you put things together.
ReplyDeleteThis looks SO delicious! Great choices.
ReplyDelete