totoro

Non-bento #44: Chocolate covered strawberry Totoro

December 25, 2011 bento

After I got my job at the Behemoth, I’ve been traveling back and forth between New York and San Diego. I have a fully functional kitchen at my temporary living space in San Diego but Derek (the person I cook cutesy food for) is in New York, and it just hasn’t been fun making character food for myself. :/ But! I came back to New [...]

Our Japan trip in 10 minutes!

June 23, 2011 Blog

Some of you may know that Derek and I went to Japan in November last year. We met wonderful people, ate delicious food, drank every night, saw amazing stuff, visited incredible places, and oh yeah, Derek proposed to me in front of the Laputa robot statue at the Ghibli Museum. It was the most unforgettable two weeks of our life. On my blog I wrote [...]

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Non-bento #36 & 37: Totoro egg in the blanket & cookies

May 9, 2011 Baking

It’s so much fun to play with the Totoro cookie cutter/food mold I made, I couldn’t stop playing with it. I made two different dishes with the Totoro food cutter/food shaper, but I’m going to post both of them in here. Non-bento #36: Totoro egg in the blanket Created and eaten on 5/5/2011 Whenever I see an egg shaper, I see an “egg in the [...]

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Non-bento #35: Totoro breakfast

May 4, 2011 bento

I posted a sneak preview photo on my twitter and my facebook fan page so some of you might already know what I made with the Totoro metal cutter I made the other day, but I learned some stuff while I was using it, so I decided to write a post. Non-bento #35: Totoro breakfast Created and eaten on: 5/4/2011 My Totoro themed breakfast contains [...]

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How to make Totoro inari-zushi

April 11, 2011 bento

A couple of weeks after it officially became Spring, it’s finally starting to get warm! Cherry blossoms will start blooming soon at the Brooklyn Botanical Garden. So I’ll do a how-to on great picnic food for Hanami (Cherry blossom viewing). Character inari-zushi #1: Totoro inari-zushi Inari is fried bean curd cooked in soy sauce, sugar, mirin and water. The skin is juicy and sweet and the [...]

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Non-bento #32: Totoro chocolate 2

February 23, 2011 Baking

The day after I made Non-bento #31: Totoro chocolate I made this for my second bit of practice. Non-bento #32: Totoro chocolate 2 Created on: 2/15/2011 So, after I made Totoro chocolate using two colors (milk chocolate and white chocolate), I decided to put some colors on it and make it more like kyarachoco (short for “character chocolate”, like “kyaraben”) I looked at some images of [...]

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Non-bento #31: Totoro chocolate

February 16, 2011 Baking

I hope everyone had wonderful Valentine’s day. I made Domo-kun brownies last week but I still wanted to surprise Derek on the 14th… so I decided to make something I’ve always wanted to try. Non-bento #31: Totoro chocolate Created and eaten on: 2/14/2011 I took some photos while making it, so I’m going to post them here. Just like the Domo-kun brownies, I don’t think [...]

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Bento #81: Year of the Totoro bunny

January 22, 2011 bento

January is still considered the beginning of the year 2011, right? RIGHT?? I finally got to make the first bento of the year 2011! 2011 is the year of the rabbit. I could’ve just made a rabbit bento but I’m so bad at making original bento… so I decided to ask help from my bento savior, Totoro! Bento #81: Year of Totoro Bunny Created and [...]

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Bento #80: Santa Totoro!

December 31, 2010 bento

It’s a little late but with all the blizzard stuff going on, and going up to Boston for a couple of days to hang out with Derek’s sister’s family, I finally found the time to post this. Bento #80: Santa Totoro! Created and eaten on: 12/25/2010 I can’t believe it’s been a year since I made Bento #31: Totoro snowman last year but it was [...]

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Japan 2010 – Day 13

December 8, 2010 Japan

11/14/2010 (Sun) -> Lunch with my friends in Ikebukuro -> Shopping! -> Dinner with my friends and brother in Nerima This was our last day in Japan! We couldn’t believe it but we still had a lot to do! We went out in the morning and bought some more instant ramen at a convenience store for souvenirs and a couple of boxes of caramel candy. [...]

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Ghibli feast #5: My Neighbor Totoro

May 17, 2010 bento

Day 2 of Ghibli feast Ghibli feast #5: My Neighbor Totoro What food can you think of from the film My Neighbor Totoro? The vegetables they chilled in the river look great, don’t they? But unfortunately, I HATE cucumber. There are two foods I don’t like and will not eat. Cucumber and cilantro. I don’t just HATE them I DESPISE them. It’s not like I’ve [...]

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bento #75: Totoro temari zushi

March 25, 2010 bento

Wow it’s been more than a week since I blogged?! I didn’t mean to turn this into a weekly blog, but things been even more chaotic around me recently. I have so many things I want to write about, but since I haven’t written any bento/food related blog posts recently, I’m going to post this one. Bento(?) #75: Totoro temari-zushi bento Created and eaten on: [...]

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busy wonderful week and Bento workshop

March 4, 2010 bento

Oh where do I start… The short version of the story is, I’ve been super busy and so many wonderful things happened! Here’s the long version.

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Bento #72: Setsubun Totoro

February 3, 2010 bento

Today, February 3rd, is the day of Setsubun in Japan. It’s the day to drive away evil spirits, which means to throw roasted soybeans at Oni (evil creature/ogres from Japanese myths). In almost all kindergartens and schools, students make an Oni mask for Setsubun, so that kids can take the mask home, have someone wear it, and throw soybeans at them. “Roasted soybeans are thrown [...]

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Bento #69: Nekobus #3

January 19, 2010 bento

Hooray! I finally made the first kyaraben of this year! I wanted to make it a lot sooner, but I just couldn’t come up with an idea. I thought of making a different/easier bento but I really wanted the first kyaraben to be “new year themed.” I was worried about not finishing it on time since I was so out of touch, so I made [...]

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non-bento #21: kagami-"onigiri" Totoro

January 7, 2010 bento

For those who have missed my previous post… Kagami-mochi is a decoration for the New Year in Japan. It’s made with 2~3 round rice cakes stacked on top of each other. Traditionally, you break it and eat it on the second Saturday or Sunday of January. I wanted to make some easy non-bento food on January 1st. It was really nothing special but I thought I’d [...]

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Happy Happy New Year!

January 1, 2010 bento

We didn’t go out on New year’s eve. We stayed home and I cooked “toshikoshi soba,” and we just watched the ball drop on TV. “Toshikoshi-soba” means “the end of the year soba noodle.” In Japan, people eat soba at night before the year’s over. Any soba eaten on the night of December 31st is “toshikoshi-soba.” What kind of soba you’ll eat depends on your [...]

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bento #61: Summer Totoro

September 11, 2009 bento

I made kyaraben the day I left for PAX. It had been awhile since the last time I made one… but the weather was getting no so summery, and I wanted to make something before the summer was over. Bento #61: Summer Totoro Created and eaten on: 9/3/2009

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bento #58: Sitting Totoro

July 14, 2009 bento

Since my previous bento was a big failure, I needed to make something I’m more comfortable with. And nothing makes me feel better than this guy. Bento #58: Totoro sitting on a tree Created and eaten on : 7/14/2009

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bento #56: Moving day Totoro

July 2, 2009 bento

Like I mentioned in my previous blog post, my company has been in the process of moving for the past week, and because of this we had July 1st off. I knew I wouldn’t be able to make bento until next week, so I decided to try making a “stay-home” bento. When I decided to make a bento to eat at home, I realized something. [...]

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bento #52: Rainy day Totoro

June 4, 2009 bento

I wasn’t planning on making a bento this morning. I didn’t do any drawing the night before and I woke up late. (the time I usually wake up when I don’t make bento) I looked outside and it was raining. Again. So I decided to make a bento to cheer my boyfriend (and me) up. Bento #52: Rainy Day Totoro Created and eaten on: 6/4/2009

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bento #46: Totoro with cherry blossoms

April 30, 2009 bento

After making three Castle Crashers related bento in a row, I needed to take a break. I do adore the characters from the game, but every bento is a challenge for me. I struggle, get frustrated and learn (from big mistakes, usually) while making them. Those three bento definitely were not an easy challenge. So, again, it was time for Totoro for me. Bento #46: [...]

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non-bento #13: makkurokurosuke cream puffs

April 9, 2009 Baking

The other night, I realized that I had forgotten to make this very obvious Ghibli character with cream puffs, and I had to make them. Non-bento #13: Makkurokurosuke cream puffs…? Created and eaten on: 4/9/2009

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how to make Totoro cream puffs

April 7, 2009 Baking

I know there are many recipes for cream puffs, and it’s not like you must use this recipe to make Totoro cream puffs. If you’re using your own cream puff recipe, make cream puff dough and jump to Step 5. A blog post about my very first batch of Totoro cream puffs can be found on “non-bento #12: Totoro cream puffs.” [How to make Totoro [...]

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bento #42: Totoro parade

April 4, 2009 bento

I had been working on a sketch of a kyaraben for a week, but it just didn’t look like it’d work out, and I was feeling pretty bummed. (I can’t tell you what it is yet! I hope I can make it next week.) You know what always makes me feel better? Totoro! Bento#41: Totoro parade bento Created and eaten on: 4/4/2009

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non-bento #12: Totoro cream puffs

March 31, 2009 Baking

Today was my friend/co-worker’s last day (for full-time) at work. I’ve known her since art school, and she’s the one who made me the picture book of my bento. She had a baby last year, and recently she decided to work part-time from home and be with her baby. So it’s a good good-bye. I know she loves sweets, but cookies seemed a little boring… [...]

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how to make Totoro peanut butter sandwich

March 15, 2009 characters

My boyfriend loves eating peanut butter sandwiches as a snack. He eats one before he goes to kung fu class on Saturday or late afternoon on Sunday. I was thinking there’s gotta be an easy way to make his plain peanut butter sandwich cuter. Easy and cute = Totoro! So I was looking around the house, thinking what I could use to make a sandwich cutter [...]

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bento #31: Totoro snowman

January 29, 2009 bento

After I posted how to make a Wall-E sandwich on December 21, I started getting a lot of traffic to my blog, my flickr and my boyfriend’s flickr. At the time, I was still writing about my older bento on my blog and using my flickr to post pictures for my blog, so I decided to make a bento for people who were visiting my [...]

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How to make Totoro with rice

January 18, 2009 characters

Today’s how-to requires basic Asian ingredients, so it may not be for everyone, but if you enjoy cooking & eating sticky rice (Japanese, Chinese, Korean rice), this is a great way to make a main character for your bento! [How to make a Totoro rice ball] (used in “Sleeping Totoro”, “Flying Totoro”) – rice mixed with ground black sesame seed and salt (see “How to [...]

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bento #26: Nekobus part 2

January 13, 2009 bento

Remember my very first attempt to make a Nekobus bento? It was embarrassing and horrifying. It was an utter failure. So I decided to make it again. Bento#26: Nekobus part2 Created and eaten on: 11/21/2008

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bento #25: Flying Totoro

January 10, 2009 bento

After getting my game bento rush out of my system I decided to go back to my all time favorite theme. Totoro! I wrote in my blog before, but I think I’m best at copying things. I like figuring out how to make food into a character or how to recreate a certain scene, but I’m not good at coming up with something original. So [...]

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bento #16: Sleeping Totoro

December 13, 2008 bento

After my Katamari bento and Super Smash Bros. Brawl bento, some video game sites put the pictures of my bento on their sites. Even though I’m making bento for my boyfriend, any compliments are always encouraging. So, I gathered my courage to revisit “bento #1: Totoro made out of rice”, which was my very first and the most embarrassing kyaraben I’ve ever made. It wouldn’t be interesting [...]

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bento #10: The Path to Totoro’s Forest

November 29, 2008 bento

When I made my first Totoro bento, I used bonito flakes for his gray body color, but it didn’t look quite right.　So I thought, “What food is gray?” The first food that came to my mind was konnyaku. I searched the web for “Totoro made out of konnyaku”, but to my surprise I couldn’t find anyone using konnyaku for Totoro… so of course, I had [...]

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How to make mini-totoro

November 23, 2008 characters

Now you can make your own mini-Totoro! I’m using quail eggs because they sell quail eggs at local supermarkets by where I live. They cost about the same as normal eggs, so some people might find them expensive. Quail eggs are very good for bento, and I always have them in my fridge. If you can’t find it, you can use a normal sized egg. [...]

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How to make makkurokurosuke

November 23, 2008 characters

Makkurokurosuke and mini-Totoro can come in super handy when you’re making a Miyazaki film themed bento. They are so easy to make and small enough to fill the space in a bento. They may be too easy to do how-to on, but I thought I’d just do it anyway. [Makkurokurosuke ver.1] – rice – seaweed (1/4 sheet) – kamaboko (fish cake) or cheese if you don’t [...]

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bento #2: Makkurokurosuke

November 13, 2008 bento

This is my second kyaraben. That’s right. After my failure, I didn’t give up, but decided to make something different and easier. So, I looked around the internet, and found how to make Makkurokurosuke and mini-Totoro. Bento #2: Makkurokurosuke and mini-Totoro (from My Neighbor Totoro) Created and eaten on: 9/17/2008

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bento #1: Totoro

November 11, 2008 bento

Today (11/11) is apparently International Pocky day! Yay, Pocky! Well, I’ve been meaning to do this blog for the past 3 months, but then my day job has gotten in the way,,, Anyway, better late than never, so I’ll start blogging today. I’ve been into making bento (“lunch box” in Japanese) recently, and I’m actually having a lot of fun with it. Here is my [...]

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