Yum-Yum Bento Box: Fresh Recipes for Adorable Lunches

by Maki Ogawa, Crystal Watanabe

Creating colorful, cute, and tasty Japanese-style bento box lunches has never been this easy and fun!

Learn how to craft your favorite foods into a variety of shapes—from caterpillars, cars, and puppy dogs to pretty flowers, princesses, and kitty cats to make the yummy, healthy lunches that are all the rage in Japan.
 
Featuring chapters on Cuties & Critters, Fairy-Tale Friends, and Special Day Treats, plus a handy shopping guide, easy recipes for mini snacks, general tips and tricks, and so much more, Yum-Yum Bento Box is the perfect guide for beginner bento makers and expert chefs alike. Stop wasting money on pre-packaged lunches—and start making beautiful, healthy bentos!
 

• An introduction to Japanese Lunches
• Packing a Bento Box
• Bento Boxes, Tools, And Accessories
• Ingredients
• Cuties & Critters
• Fairy-Tale Friends
• Special-Day Treats

Genres: Cookbooks, Cooking, Nonfiction, Food, Japan, Ebooks, Reference

144 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2010

Reviews

[Stacy]

I'm familiar with Bento and expected to see 12 ingredients used in tiny amounts and arranged in an artistic way. Completely expected that.

What I was expected was something besides colored rice and pieces of nori. This book was more of a design manual that a recipe idea, which is fine...just not what I expected. I thought this book would include a wider variety of food and give me ideas of healthy lunches to pack for school. Instead, it's little snacks with pink rice, 2 pieces of cheese, a raisin, a noodle and some carrots. If you need help making a face out of nori, this is the book for you. If not, another book would be a better choice.

[Arlian]

As a person who cooks vegan, many omnivorous cook books aren't helpful to me. This cookbook (which pretty accurately reflects current Japanese trends in bento) uses a lot of meat and cheese. Of course, the vegan/vegetarian industry is ever growing and thus more and more meat, egg, and dairy substitutes exist. However, I'm not interested in eating those products. Yes, I *could* buy vegan deli 'meat' and follow the recipes located in this book, but I'm more interested in using the decoration and presentation ideas as jumping-off-point to create my own (more whole-food-centric) lunches. If you are interested in using this book in the same way I am (as inspiration, not COOKbook) this book is pretty good! The layout is easy on the eyes, there are a great many photos which are not only lovely, but skillfully taken so as to helpfully illustrate more complicated techniques, but it's also mostly recipes. While this book is chock-full of tips, tricks, ideas, and photos to help you to make your 'brown bags' stylish, it's still of limited usefulness to confident cooks who have a different diet than the authors.

[Andrea]

Very cute ideas for children's lunches or for anyone who loves kuwaii bento. This one had a few more recipes for actual, home-cooked food to include but was mostly focused on creating cute foodscapes. Since I'm not very interested in adding food-coloring to my meals or cutting animal ears and noses out of lunchmeat or fish cakes, this was a picture book for me.

[Cyndi]

Some people have a lot of time...

[Danielle Booey]

Oh my gosh, SO CUTE!! I loved looking at all of the Bento recipes in this book. Everything was detailed and cute. I never knew there were so many amazing ways to characterize rice balls. Frogs, pigs, bears, people, these women are incredible artists.

I would love to make something so beautiful and unique for my cold lunch times. But it probably says something about me that it seems like too much work to waste on myself.

My sister and I always talk about having a picnics lunch together sometime she is in town. I would love to surprise her with a bento box lunch like one of these!

[Angel]

I picked this up out of curiosity at my local public library. I admit I mostly took it because of the photos; the book has excellent photography. However, the recipes are not exactly easy to make, and for some folks, you may have to put in some extra work to shop for some of the ingredients which your local grocery store may lack. If you have a bit of an artistic bent and like cooking, you may like this book. However, it is a nice one to look at. The book does include a glossary and list of places online you can shop for some items.

[Kimikimi]

Part of my new eating healthy kick, some small portions (so variety, yay!) fast to make recipes. pLUS ALL OF THE CUTE THINGS!! I'm less happy about the cute then I am about the easy and the fast, but still yay.

[Holly]

Certainly fun to look at, but more difficult than I hoped. Who has quail eggs on hand?!

[JC Cornell]

Super cute, and some interesting recipes, but nothing that I wanted to cook.

[Siri Olsen]

This basic introduction to "kyaraben" or character bento is colorful, easily comprehensible, creative, and clearly aimed at beginners, so it's a really good and easy way to get started in bento-making. I really enjoyed that almost all recipes either are made or can be made with many of the same basic ingredients, which means that it's easy to create a variety of bentos on a budget. The character-style of the bentos is probably mostly relevant for parents wanting to bring joy to their kids or children-at-heart willing to invest quite a bit of time making their own lunches extra cute, but the recipes are super easy and versatile, so you can totally just skip the character aspect and make a normal lunchbox with the combinations of ingredients and dishes suggested here, which is probably how I'm going to use the book. Highly recommended for people just starting out in bento-making (or even just regular lunch-making) who want some easy, budget-friendly ideas with a lot of nice tips and tricks along the way.

[Reading For Funs]

I originally bought Yum-Yum Bento Box: Fresh Recipes for Adorable Lunches during a health nut craze, and a newfound obsession with the adorable bento boxes I was seeing all over the internet. The photographs were adorable, and I loved the themes per box displayed in the book. The recipes were simple enough, although some ingredients are rather difficult to locate. Most of the recipes did fit in with my health craze, and I was thrilled by that.

Unfortunately, despite the cute photographs and the delicious recipes I still have a difficult time recommending this book. If you enjoy bento boxes and have artistic talent then this is most definitely the book for you. This may not be the book for the average person without the time and dedication to make the complicated artwork paired with the cooking. Personally, I enjoyed this cookbook, and I still use most of the recipes for my lunches without artistic flairs.

[Carrie]

I wasn't a big fan of this book. Maybe the recipes would be good for picky children, but they contain a bit too much processed meat and ketchup for my tastes. Plus if you wanted to recreate the bentos as presented in the book, be prepared to flip around to a lot of pages to get all the recipes. In some cases, the photographs make the food look unappetizing, because fried things appear undercooked. I'm not sure it spent any time on food safety either, such as washing any hole punches or other non-food utensils that you might use to cut shapes in food.

I did find a few recipes that I kept for later, and I got some ideas for bentos I might make in the future, so it is worth a read.

[Sara]

This really was a visually beautiful little book, full of ideas and creativity. Making these happy little lunches for my daughter sounds like a lot of fun...but also a lot of work. The one thing I really loved was the variety of veggies and fruit, made to look so cute and appetizing. Portion sizes in America are astronomical, so this was an adorable way to get kids to eat.

Now just to find the time.

[Ella De]

This isn't really a cookbook, it is an introduction to kawaii bento.
The "receipes" in this book are more about bringing rice into cute shapes than anything else. It's about cutting fruit, vegetables and other basic ingredients and arranging them and not really about cooking.
So if you are looking for inspiration for colouring and shaping rice, bread, eggs, etc, then this is a perfect book for you to start with. If you are looking for lunch recipes don't buy this one.

[Carissa]

This is a cute, simple guide to making bento boxes. Even if you don't want to put this much time and effort into your child (or yours!) lunch, there are some really good, easy recipes in here to take advantage of, and, at the least, some additional lunch ideas.

[Natasha]

Q

[Alex]

Good and cute
Recipes were kinda repetitive at times
A lot of egg rice and meat

[Orinoco Womble (tidy bag and all)]

I can't imagine going to so much effort for so little nutritional value. Obviously these bento boxes are for kids, but even in elementary school I wouldn't have had enough to eat with these. Half a slice of cheese; two or three small rice balls with nori faces; three tiny broccoli florets and a cherry tomato. No, don't think so. There are a few recipes that are useful, but I wonder how kids would react to finding fresh sage rolled up in the middle of two whole ounces of breaded chicken breast.

I know there are people out there who actually do go to all this trouble to make bento boxes for their kids, but I'd never be one of them; and I certainly wouldn't spend the time or the money on tracing nori patterns or buying in a bunch of craft supplies...for a snack-size meal that will be swallowed in five minutes flat.

The pictures are cute, and they are what sold the book, which is probably the point. But if you want solid bentobox recipes that will actually feed a growing child or an adult, I direct your attention to The Just Bento Cookbook: Everyday Lunches to Go

[Angela Holtz]

From Lilac Wolf and Stuff

I wanted this book for so long, but I have to admit I didn't think it was anything I'd be able to pull off. I still haven't tried anything yet, but the difference is now I think I can.

They break down lots of recipes to make these cute little bento lunches. They go into the history a bit, and all the tools of the trade. Then they give cost cutting ideas to get the same effect without having to buy a whole new kitchen. Crystal and Maki also encourage creativity and use of leftovers as well as balancing out the meal.

I also thought I'd need to get a special bento box, but this is another myth they slash. There are traditional and contemporary boxes, but you can simply buy a small storage container as well. Thanks goodness, I have boxes on hand for that.

I'm really looking forward to making these during time off from school, while we go on our adventures instead of just getting fast food. The small storage would easily pack up into coolers for us to enjoy later on.

[Pam]

Well, it is an interesting book. Mainly focused on putting cute things together though, I'm not sure it's entirely practical. I certainly don't have enough time to spend hours arranging rice into specific shapes & coloring it with dyes and so on.

Personally I was looking for a more practical book. Presentation is a big thing with bentos & I certainly want mine to look nice (I'm just starting by the way, pretty much a noob) but it still has to fit within a reasonable amount of time.

Also I was hoping for healthy recipes and it seems to me like a large number of the items in here are fried.

But it did have fun pictures, and was a nice enough little book that lends to the imagination. All depends on what you're looking for.

[Samantha]

I really liked this book even though I'm vegan and most if not all the recipes in this book aren't. But if your vegan like me, don't disrepair because this can easily be made vegan using mock meats and soy cheese. For a vegetarian, you wouldn't have to change too much seeing as there are lots of cheese and egg items. The main reason I bought the book was to get ideas on how to make cute packed lunches for both me and others. While most of the lunches would take a good chunk of time to complete, they would be so cute/perfect for a special day in someones life or to cheer someone up. The steps weren't complicated and made it easy to create the bentos. I really enjoyed this book.

[Stacie]

The photos in this book are ADORABLE! The directions are LEATHAL! I almost cut my hand off trying to shape a goldfish out of a carrot! Perfectionists beware!!!!If you have the time and patience some of these are very cute to do. Mostly colored rice receipes. Very disappointed as far as ingrediants. I definately expected a lot more for a Bento Box title. The only real blessing this book has had is to inspire my toddler to get excited about eating rice. I recommend it as a saturday afternoon treat/ or prepare very early for snacks.

[Lauren Pickering]

Very cute designs and a lot of cute and easy recipes to try! The pictures were colorful and artfully arranged. My favorite part of the book however is the section that lists and describes the different tools and objects that would be useful in creating these boxed lunches. Have tried a few of these recipes and they are all reasonable time-wise. The penguin onigiri are my favorite to make and were rather easy to assemble between waking up in the morning and heading off to school (about 10-20min average).

[Lindsey]

This book would be better titled _Yum-Yum Bento Box: ALL YOUR FOOD NEEDS FACES_. Special occasion food? Okay! Some of these recipes and... setups? would be great little snacks for a kids' party, but I have a very hard time seeing myself embellishing food this way. I'd rather practice my sushi-rolling skills than coloring rice or artfully slicing bologna into octopuses. I also found the five pages of tools and accessories to be a little overwhelming.

[Andrea]

I bought this book a while ago. I had never tried bento before but it looked like a cute way to get my picky 4 year old to eat healthier. I will admit most of the things in this book take longer to make than a normal lunch but my daughter loves getting a cute little bento box for lunch. It's more of a special occasion thing but none the less it does do what I had hoped it would do. She eats veggies and likes them! There are so many cute little ideas and awesome tips in this book.

[Alysa]

My kids have loved the few lunches I have made so far using this as a guide. Cute helpful tips like cook the carrots before you cut them, how to make checkerboard apples and sweetheart sushi Love the penguins.
Couldn't do it every day but a nice way to say I love you to kids while they are away at school for lunch. Clever and creative.

[Shelly]

Bento is just not my thing (too much work!) but if you are interested in starting Bento, this is a really good book to read. Gives you a run down on basic materials, lots of healthy recipes with complete instructions on making the characters and figures. Very cute :)

[Erin]

I loved this book. I don't actually think that I am crafty enough to do this but these ideas are so cute. Even if you aren't packing a bento box you could make cute sandwiches and snacks with the ideas in this book.

[Beth K]

I really enjoyed this book. More than just recipes, this is a book designed to make foods fun for the kids in their boxes. My kids thoroughly enjoyed these fun shapes and animals. Definitely a book I'm pleased to have added to my own collection.

[Mycala]

I love making beautiful lunches and this little book had some cute inspirations. I may not necessarily use the same items, but I love looking through here and thinking about how to personalize my own lunch box.