I’ve been very happy with the Anzacs recipe I’ve been using, except for the fact that I find the cookies fall apart too easily.

This time I tried making them in tiny paper cups, and it worked really well. I also used baby oats instead of rolled oats for a finer texture.

You don’t lose any oat crumbs as you can simply pour them into your mouth! Plus they look pretty and cute (^.^)

Recently I realised that my expensive Nalgene water bottles and ‘premium’ range Lock & Lock lunch box were all made of BPA-leeching polycarbonate. Many others have already blogged about unsafe food plastics and the BPA problem before (see Just Bento: What are Japanese plastic bento boxes made of? and The SIGG water bottle controversy and the water bottle conundrum) and there’s plenty of information on the web about how to choose safer plastics.

The good news is that newer Nalgene bottles are made from BPA-free Tritan. Look out for the ‘Nalgene Choice’ labelling that identifies the new-range bottles. The recycling category “7” includes both BPA-polycarbonates as well as Tritan, so don’t use that as a conclusive identification of the material used.

The two styles of Lock n Lock Sport bottles I have been using for some years are also categorised as a “7”, and as they are from the pre-BPA-consciousness days, there’s a high chance both are polycarbonate. Some other Lock & Lock bottles are safer “5” plastics.

However, Lock & Lock has come out with several new lines of bottles, made with Tritan and all marked with large ‘BPA-free’ labels. These are not yet found on the international website, but are in the Singapore stores. I picked up two types on 30% discount at NTUC Fairprice a few weeks ago.

500ml

600ml

My main gripe is that the largest bottle is only 600ml, and that only in the range where the screw-lid is not attached to the bottle itself, which means the chance of dropping the lid and having to wash it before screwing it back on, not very practical when one is outdoors.

I  do love the positive screw grooves on the green bottle, but there’s something else that annoys me, which is that the screw grooves result in a lot of water dripping when I drink! I’ve had the same problem with insulated mugs too. The problem seems to be much less when the screw top mouth is small, such as with this narrow-mouthed Nalgene style which I also have (unfortunately an old bottle, in polycarbonate).

So maybe I should stick to flip-top bottles? However, in my experience, the flip-tops can easily be accidentally popped open and I’ve had many spills inside my bags before :(. So I try to put them on the outside mesh pocket of my rucksack or placed upright at the side of handbag.

The other thing about flip-tops is that if the mouth is too small, such as this Lock & Lock sports bottle, it’s hard to drink without creating a vacuum seal with your mouth.

My water bottle wish list:
* 750ml
* BPA-free
* lid that is attached to bottle
* non-drip mouth
* mouth that’s not too small
* tall, slim shape that fits into standard water bottle pockets on sports bags
* and if it’s cute, that’s just a bonus ^^

Hello again after a long break! I have been away and will be travelling again soon so have some possibly helpful travel tips for anyone flying by Singapore Airlines.

The last time I went overseas by Cathay Pacific, I prepared an elaborate set of bento boxes to last me halfway round the globe, as I described here. This time, it was just a short 5-hour flight and I decided to order one of Singapore Airlines’ special ‘Medical Meals’.

Here is the amazing list of ‘Medical Meal’ choices:

• Bland Meal: No “irritants” (e.g. black pepper, chilli powder, caffeine, cocoa, alcohol)
• Diabetic Meal: No sugar; limited salt
• Fruit Platter Meal: Fresh fruits only
• Gluten Free Meal: No wheat, rye, barley, oats in any form
• Low Sodium, No Salt Added Meal: Avoid naturally-salted, sodium-added processed foods (e.g. Baking powder, soda, MSG); no salt added during preparation
• Low Calorie Meal: Limited fats, sauces, gravy and fried items; limited sugar-rich items
• Low Fat/Cholesterol Meal: No animal fats but poly-unsaturated fatty acids allowed; limited fats, sauces, and gravy fried items; no butter, cream, whole milk cheese; only lean meat allowed
• Low Fibre/Residue Meal: Limited fibrous items (e.g. fruit, legumes, vegetables, wholegrain products)
• Non-Carbohydrate Meal: No starch and carbohydrates in any form
• Non-Lactose Meal: No lactose and dairy products (e.g. milk, milk solids, casein, cheese, cream, butter, margarine)
• Soft Fluid Meal: Mainly sieved, soupy items
• Semi Fluid Meal: Mainly pureed, minced, easily digestible items (e.g. pureed vegetables, potatoes, fruits, minced, homogenized meat, porridge, congee)
• Ulcer Diet Meal: Contains easily digestive plain poached/broiled foods (e.g. white meat, fish); no acidic food and fruits
• Nut Free Meal: Please contact our Reservation Office for the necessary arrangement

After a short discussion on the phone with the airline staff, I chose the ‘Low Sodium, No Salt Added Meal’. On my return flight, the meal label was in Chinese, which said “無調味料”, which actually means  no added seasoning. I found out there is a option of Asian or Western versions, and I chose Western. It was a chicken breast with side vegetables and rice on the outgoing flight, and a very tender beef steak with side vegetables and potatoes on the return flight. There were also no sweet desserts. I loved the way they were all totally plain with no sauces or spices/herbs etc. yet the ingredients were flavourful enough on their own. Fabulous! Amines in the meats and salicylates in the vegetables aside, this is a pretty safe choice for me. No need to starve on long-distance travel anymore! (As long as I fly on Singapore Airlines, that is.)

P.S. Don’t forget Singapore Airlines offers also offers Religious Meals, Infant & Child Meals, a Seafood Meal and a range of Vegetarian Meals:

• Raw Vegetarian Meal: Only raw fruits and vegetables
• Vegetarian Oriental Meal: No meat or seafood of any sort; no dairy products; cooked Chinese-style
• Vegetarian Indian Meal (non-strict): No meat of any sort; can contain dairy products; cooked Indian-style
• Vegetarian Jain Meal (strict; suitable for Jain): No meat of any sort; no onion, garlic, ginger and all root vegetables; cooked Indian-style
• Western Vegetarian (non-strict; ovo-lacto): No meat of any sort; can contain dairy products; cooked Western-style
• Vegetarian Vegan Meal (strict): No meat of any sort; no dairy products; cooked Western-style

EZLock Ag+

Japanese bento boxes have come with anti-bacterial silver ions for some time, like these ones. This helps to prevent your food from going bad, especially in hot weather.

Now Lock n Lock’s EZ-Lock range also some with Ag+ ions. After you remove the cardboard packaging, the Ag+ boxes can be distinguished by their lids of a slightly lighter shade of blue compared to standard EZ-Lock. View the latest 2009-2010 Lock n Lock catalogue here (only works with Internet Explorer).

Here are some suitable sizes for bento.

EZlock Ag+: 520ml & 620ml

EZlock Ag+: 890ml & 965ml

Gluten-free waffles

I’m afraid I’ve been very slack at updating my blog. The truth is I have experimented with several gluten-free waffle recipes, one of which was wonderful – but because I didn’t make notes, I can’t remember which one it was now :(!

The last recipe I tried was from the book Gluten-Free Baking with The Culinary Institute of America. This recipe uses ‘Flour Blend #5′ which of all the flour blends in the book, is the one with the highest protein content. As you can read in my earlier notes, I modified the flour mix slightly too. If my inference is correct, this could be the reason for these waffles having a rather bread-like texture. I personally prefer my waffles more crisp, so perhaps I should experiment with using different flour blends with this same recipe.

This recipe also uses additional whisked egg whites to add more lift to the batter (just as my grandmother’s waffle recipe does). Actually I haven’t noticed a huge difference between waffle recipes that used the extra egg whites and those that don’t (although others swear that whipped egg whites are critical). Since I’m lazy and would also prefer not to use up four eggs on one batch of waffles, I’d probably choose another recipe as my basic waffle staple.

One thing I do like about this recipe is that it’s not as oily as the first waffle recipe I tried. Overall, it’s quite a good recipe.

1 1/3 cups (7.7 oz) Flour Blend #5: rice, tapioca, soy flours – see here.
1/2 Tbs baking powder
1/2 tsp salt [omitted]
1/2 cup (4 oz) sugar [omitted]
2 eggs
1/4 cup (2 oz.) butter, melted
3/4 cup (6 oz.) milk
2 egg whites

1. Mix together dry ingredients.
2. Mix together wet ingredients separately.
3. Pour wet ingredients into dry and mix thoroughly.
4. Whip egg whites to medium peaks.
5. Temper egg whites by adding one-third of batter to egg whites and mixing gently.
6. Fold tempered whites into remaining batter.
7. Bake in oiled waffle iron.

Related posts:
A waffles novice
Four-grain waffles

Pumpkin walnut sponge cake

This is one of the other things I made for my recent tea party. For food intolerance readers, sorry this one breaks all the rules — it’s got sugar, eggs, butter and wheat flour! I was baking for the eating pleasure of others…

I used this basic recipe with some modifications.

115g butter
60g castor sugar [or to taste, less is also ok, especially if you use sweet fruits]
115g flour — used all white flour and substituted two tablespoons with homemade dried okara (simply because I had some to use up)
1 tsp baking powder
2 eggs
1/2 cup mashed, cooked pumpkin [steam or microwave the pumpkin]
chopped walnuts to taste

To prepare the nuts: roast wholenuts over very low heat in a frying pan without oil. I like to chop them by placing in a deep bowl then using scissors. If you chop them first, the very small bits burn easily when roasting. Use a coarse sieve to remove bits of bitter skin or small burnt scraps.

Cream fat & sugar.
Beat in eggs one at a time.
Fold in sifted flour and baking power.
Add pumpkin and walnuts this to sponge mixture & mix well.
Put into 1 loaf tin.
Bake 40 mins at 375˚F / 180˚C or until done.

The final result was very light and spongy! However, I did use a bit more flour than the recipe amount and it was a bit dry. I’ve made this basic recipe countless times before and learnt the following:

1) It’s usually very moist, because of the high butter content, so an oily kind of moist.

2) Don’t overdo the amount of fruit puree (banana, pumpkin, peach etc. – anything soft and mashable) as it results in a batter that has too much liquid and you end up with a dense cake (canceling out all the hard work in creaming to introduce an airy texture!).

3) ALWAYS take the trouble to do the creaming stage properly, don’t rush the process. The light and airy creamed mixture will impact the final texture of the cake greatly.

Be careful of emulsification, which happens when you add too much egg at one time, as I experienced before. I now beat all the eggs in a bowl and add it to the creamed mixture one tablespoon at a time.

Read more about creaming here and here.

12 Sep 09 update: Made this cake again today using homemade red bean paste (sweetened to taste) instead of pumpkin. Very successful and delicious!

This was part of my menu for a tea party. I had to choose some foods to suit the extremely hot weather at the moment, as well as things that would go well with Chinese tea. I flipped through my summer wagashi recipe books and decided that a co0l, non-melting kanten/agar agar dish would go down well.

strawberry & pear agar-agar

Started out planning green tea and red bean agar, but found my matcha had expired and turned a dusky brown colour *yuck*. Looking around in the kitchen for tasty alternatives, I found  some strawberries in the fridge — small Korean strawberries which, if you’re lucky, can be very sweet. This batch wasn’t, so I didn’t mind using them to make agar-agar instead of enjoying fresh with crème frâiche (Carrefour’s La Reflets de France premium house brand, great with scones too).

I put the strawberries into the microwave for a short while, then mashed them with a potato masher (a fork will also do). As there were only  a few strawberries, I chucked in some canned pears leftover from the improvised gluten-free pear muffins, and mashed up the whole lot.

Measured the fruit puree then added water to make up 1 litre. Put in quite a lot of sugar, which I normally wouldn’t do but since these were for a party, the tastebuds of the guests took priority over my own food preferences.

Heated the mixture and added the agar-agar powder according to the packet instructions, then chilled it in moulds. Super easy and they were a big hit!

The full tea party menu:
Strawberry & pear agar-agar
Pumpkin walnut sponge cake [adapted from this]
Earl Grey creme caramel [using this basic recipe]
Chinese “gong fu” tea: oolong and pu-er

improvised gluten-free pear muffins

I remember the time when I was really scared to start gluten-free baking because it seemed so complicated, so many types of flour, so easy for things to go wrong, for the baking to fail. A couple of weeks ago, I baked some muffins (if you can call them that) without following any gluten-free recipe book and amazingly, the product was edible!

All I did was to try a direct substition of wheat flour with a gluten-free flour blend in my original basic muffin recipe. Yes, the very first basic muffin recipe, which I subsequently stopped using when I found basic recipe no. 2 gave better results. Basic muffin recipe no. 1 is so easy that you can easily by heart:

2 cups flour
1 cup milk/liquid
1/4 cup oil/butter
1 egg (2 , if you prefer)
1 tsp baking powder
other ingredients of choice – e.g. 1 chopped apple, handful of nuts/dried fruit etc.

I used exactly those quantities together with a few large chunks of tinned pears, and made up the 1 cup liquid with half milk and half pear juice from the tin. Apart from the pears and pear juice, no added sugar. (If you are avoiding salicylates, remember to choose pears in syrup as commercial pear juice contains the peel which has salicylates. Of course if you are on an anti-candida diet, the syrup is probably worse!)

The gluten-free flour blend is the one I described earlier:

8oz/225g brown rice flour
8oz/225g tapioca starch
8oz/225g soy flour

No xanthan gum, no gelatine.

The batter was extremely wet, but I decided to go ahead without adding extra flour. The consistency (and eventual effect) reminded on a crazy improvisation attempt when I dumped a load of mashed pumpkin into a gluten-free sponge cake recipe, thereby completely altering the ratio of liquid to other ingredients — a crazy attempt which I did not blog about because I can’t even remember exactly what I did (brain must have gone on strike, hence giving rise to the mad improvisation to begin with); started out being utterly disappointed with the result and subsequently very pleased when put aside my preconceptions and realised the texture was quite appealing and the taste pretty good.

The result:

It looked beautiful at the end of baking, but collapsed as it cooled after coming out of the oven, just as this gluten-free bean bread did. I’ve discovered the quick bread gluten-free recipe that doesn’t sink is this one that uses gelatine as well.

Taste-wise, I was very pleased although visitors to my home who tasted a bite responded only with a grimace masquerading as a polite smile :). Texture-wise, I’ll repeat what I’ve said in my other gluten-free baking entries; it reminds me of Southeast Asian kueh or steamed cakes, soft and very close-textured, no ‘crumb’, kind of squishy.

The overall effect of the non-wheat taste and texture is certainly very reminiscent of local desserts, so perhaps if I dropped names like ‘muffin’ or ‘cake’ and called it kueh, people would have different expectations and not react so negatively towards my gluten-free baking!

In my last posting giving a rice, tapioca and soy gluten-free flour mix, I provided the quantities in weight measures:

8oz/225g white rice flour
8oz/225g tapioca starch
8oz/225g defatted soy flour

These are also provided in the original recipe book,  Gluten-Free Baking with The Culinary Institute of America, in terms of volume measures:

1 1/2 cups white rice flour
1 3/4 cups  tapioca starch
2 1/4 cups defatted soy flour

However, it’s worth remembering that different flours have varying weight to volume ratios. Given that ‘alternative’ non-wheat flours can be prepared in many ways, one cannot be sure that the type used by the recipe book author is the same as the one you are using. For example, I’ve noticed that white rice flour produced for Chinese cooking seems to be finer and more white than white rice flour available in Indian grocery shops, and of course these are quite different from the brown rice flour from the organic shop.Even for regular, non-gluten-free baking, it’s always better to use weight measures for accuracy. (See also my page on Flours.)

In Gluten-Free Baking with The Culinary Institute of America, the base measurement is in weight, as each flour blend recipe makes up 1.5lb, so it’s better to go with the weight measures rather than the volume measures.

In my case, I also substitute flours a lot. As I mentioned, I replaced the white rice flour with brown rice flour and defatted soy flour with regular organic soy flour (US product, purchased in Phoon Huat; possibly different from Asian soy flours and homemade soy flours). So if you are a reckless substituter like me — I must be congenitally predisposed to being unable to follow recipes exactly :) — always use weight measures.

After substitution, these are the approximate weight-volume ratios I ended up with — quite different from the ones in the recipe book:

8oz/225g brown rice flour = slightly less than 1 3/4 cups
8oz/225g tapioca starch = 1 3/4 cups + 1 Tbs
8oz/225g soy flour = slightly less than 2 cups

When it comes to learning about baking, I swear by the detailed explanations of baking theory as well as excellent recipes in Baking at Home with the Culinary Institute of America, so I was thrilled to find a new book from the Culinary Institute of America on gluten-free baking, Gluten-Free Baking with The Culinary Institute of America by Richard J. Coppedge Jr.

The most important principle I’ve learnt from this book is considering the protein content of flour mixes, and then selecting flour of the appropriate protein-level for the recipe. This is similar to using standard wheat flour of differing protein levels in the form of cake flour, pastry flour, bread flour etc. In Chinese language, wheat flour is labelled as low, medium or high protein. Do take a look at the page I wrote earlier about flour, including points on protein levels.

In Gluten-Free Baking with The Culinary Institute of America, Richard Coppedge gives five different flour blends listed in order of protein content. In the 150 recipes in the book, he uses each flour blend according to the texture required. Often he also uses a mixture of the different flour blends to refine the final product.

The only flours he uses are:

white rice flour
brown rice flour
potato starch
tapioca starch
soy flour, defatted (the natural oil content has been removed resulting in a higher percentage of protein content; defatted soy flour is noted to improve crumb body resilience, produce a more tender crumb, crumb colour and toasting properties, make smoother batter and give a more even distribution of air cells; see here and here)

as well as:

guar gum
albumen
whey powder
[BTW, can anyone tell me where to find albumen and whey powder in Singapore?]

Not being quite as fussy or precise about my baking results, I haven’t been following his recipes exactly, but simply putting together the flour blend that I find most convenient. Besides, not having albumen and whey powder, I’ve been unable to make up Flour Blend #3 (moderately strong; made with white rice flour, potato starch, guar gum and albumen) not Flour Blend #5 (the strongest; white rice flour, tapioca starch, defatted soy flour, whey powder).

Having already tried Flour Blend #2 (second weakest; white rice flour, brown rice flour, potato starch, tapioca starch) several times, I got some soy flour (not defatted though) to try an adaptation of Flour Blend #4 (stronger; white rice flour, tapioca starch, defatted soy flour). The proportions are:

8oz/225g white rice flour [which I replaced with brown rice flour]
8oz/225g tapioca starch
8oz/225g defatted soy flour [I used regular soy flour; using brown rice flour instead of white rice flour helped to raise the overall protein conten]

As compared to the gluten-free recipes posted earlier which use bean flours liberally, this flour blend has less of a strong taste.

Report of muffin recipe using this rice, tapioca & soy flour mix coming soon.

I was terribly flattered when my food blogging inspiration, Maki of Just Hungry/Just Bento, recently asked me to contribute a guest post to Just Bento. I’ve learnt so much from her and am really glad to be able to share something with her too.

I decided to write about my general approach to bento-ing, which you can read here on Just Bento. It’s thanks to Maki that I made the effort to collate and summarise the basic principles that inform what I do and so fundamental are these to my blog that I have also included the information here as a series of “bento primer” tips.

One year and ten months since I started Main-Main Masak-Masak, and things seem to have come full circle :). This blog has matured and my food journey has slowed down, no longer the hectic, frantic pace to find ways to deal with my food sensitivities and the excitement of sharing new discoveries on this blog. I now know what works for me and there are reliable strategies and recipes I can turn to repeatedly. Hence the lower frequency of postings of late, but I will continue to add notes and ideas that are worth sharing — time permitting also!

I’ve loved the cooking and the world of ingredients, perhaps even the challenge of working around of food restrictions, but these things have now become internalised and my journey of food discovery has reached a plateau (for now). However, instead of having my mental and emotional energy consumed by thinking about food, I can turn my time and life to other pursuits. I was going to say ‘I got my life back’ but food & cooking is a still a wonderful and treasured part of my life, something I wish I could slow down and savour more *^_^*.

When I first started making bento, I would spend ages planning the combination of foods and how to pack them. Now, I don’t bother much with the intensive planning, I use the same foods from regular meals served at home and just try to pack them with a little bit of thought to presentation. After a while, you will develop better instincts at quickly sizing up the right box to choose and the best way to pack the food into the box.

Part of managing food sensitivites is also about developing a routine to make sure that you always have home-prepared food with you. This involves setting aside the time to cook and bake in large quantities, freeze them in individual portions which can then be quickly reheated and packed to go, as well as setting aside time before leaving the house to get it all together. Ever since I made the extra effort to always have food on me, even a small snack so that I’m never caught out, I hardly ever suffer unpleasant food reactions from eating something I wasn’t supposed to anymore. Feeling well makes the effort all worthwhile.

More bento tips:
Bento primer part 1: foods for bento
Bento primer part 2: planning bento meals
Bento primer part 3: packing bento
Bento primer 4: stocking up on bento equipment

It might seem indulgent to buy lots of different plastic boxes, but given the importance of choosing the right box, it is worthwhile to do so. Daiso and Lock n Lock provide good selections at affordable prices. Wherever possible, choose airtight boxes as they will prevent spillage of any sauce or liquid contents (I’ve packed soups and yoghurt before), while also keeping dry foods like biscuits crisp in humid weather.

Beside the main lunchbox, I also have a selection of other plastic boxes: smaller ones for pieces of cut fruit (which accompany every meal bento I have), a round box for a single muffin, a deep, rectangular box for two muffins, and shallow rectangular boxes for angular snacks like pieces of cake. Most of my plastic boxes are not reserved for bento use only as we use them for storing all sorts of foods at home, such as dried goods removed from plastic packaging or leftovers in the fridge/freezer. With a large variety of plastic boxes on hand, I can easily find one to suit anything I want to pack into my bento bag.

Aside from boxes, I regularly carry a small insulated mug/flask, and always have a wet towel (oshibori) and plastic cutlery –either a fork and spoon in a ziploc bag or foldable chopsticks which come in their own case.

You’ll need a bag to hold all these things. Again, it’s good to have bags in different sizes to accommodate the amount of food you’ll need. The bags I use most of the time hold my lunch, fruit and a snack. I also have one larger bag, which can also fit a one litre water bottle, and several smaller zipper or drawstring bags from Daiso which hold a single plastic box and cutlery and sometimes also an oshibori. Usually, the small zipper/drawstring bag will go inside my main holdall or backpack, where it helps to keep the food items together and hopefully, prevent the food boxes from being knocked open as well.

If you do mostly rice bento rather than sandwiches, it’s much better to find a bag that will allow you to hold the bento boxes horizontally. Briefcase-style lunchbags tilt your boxes on their side and may disturb the arrangement of food or increase the chance of spillage. It’s not necessary to go hunting for dedicated lunch bags, any small tote bag with a large enough flat base will do, although I am very partial to two-layer bags that enable easy access to the main lunchbox itself.

More bento tips:
Bento primer part 1: foods for bento
Bento primer part 2: planning bento meals
Bento primer part 3: packing bento

Perhaps the first thing many people associate with bento culture are the elaborate kyaraben (character bento), but everyday bento don’t have to be that difficult. However, the fundamental ideas of packing bento can take your lunchbox from unappetising mess to something to look forward to. It feels really good when instead of being pitied for one’s food intolerances, people think your food looks better than theirs!

You don’t need to do cutesy or complicated, but it helps to have some aesthetic sense to guide you in composition, arrangement and the juxtaposition of colours and shapes. Frank Tastes provides some excellent examples of simple, almost Zen-like bento arrangments. As with developing any kind of artistic sensibility, exposure to as many examples as possible will build up your visual ‘vocabulary’ to facilitate creativity. Apart from the plethora of bento websites, if you have access to a Japanese bookstore, do browse through Japanese-language books on bento for  inspiration — the bento examples and the overall art direction are usually absolutely excellent.

It’s also important to choose a box of the correct shape and size. A shallow box is better as it allows you to lay out the foods horizontally, almost like a painting. Also, if the foods come up to the lid when the box is sealed, they won’t move around during transportation and your bento will still be intact when you come to eating it.

Just Bento oftens discusses the usefulness of bento in controlling portion sizes, and Japanese guidelines on the optimal size for men, women and children are very useful. However, I have also discovered that the volume I can finish in one meal differs according to the type of food. The type of rice makes a huge difference, not so much in terms of managing the caloric value, but in terms of how much is enough to make me feel full. With brown rice, I eat much less than the half-box portion of sticky, short-grain Japanese white rice recommended for standard Japanese bento, and it’s likely you’ll find that with long-grain white rice typical of Southeast Asia and in southern Chinese cuisines, you’ll need quite a bit more than that. Any kind of glutinous rice would be the most filling of all.

Noodle dishes are a different ball game because not only do I consume a larger volume than if I had a meal of brown rice and side dishes, you need some empty space in your bento box to allow you to loosen the noodles and pick up the strands, or to toss the noodles with the topping ingredients (in terms of presentation, noodles look much nicer with the toppings heaped on top than ready mixed).

More bento tips:
Bento primer part 1: foods for bento
Bento primer part 2: planning bento meals

More bento tips:
Bento primer part 1: foods for bento

Although this is primarily a food intolerance blog, quite a lot of readers end up here whilst searching the term ‘bento’. It was because of increasingly complex food sensitivities that I was motivated to learn more about cooking and bento culture, so as to be able to adapt recipes and to make my packed meals from home more appetising. The principles of bento culture go a long way in making our food-intolerance-friendly lunchboxes more tasty and attractive. Learning to be creative in those two areas is particularly important when one is faced with the limitations of food restrictions.

So it’s about time I articulated my approach to making bento and this will be the first in a series of posts with my top tips.

Foods for bento

Food intolerances and special diets (including vegetarian, vegan, halal, kosher etc.) vary greatly from individual to individual, so only you know best what you can or can’t eat. Even if you do not have food sensitivities, one of the great advantages of making your own bento meals is having the opportunity to provide yourself with healthy, nutritious, fresh food that is free of processed products, preservatives and artificial additives.

Bento don’t have to be filled with Japanese food, as Lunch In A Box demonstrates. My main suggestion to managing food intolerances would be to seek out ingredients and cooking methods from a broad range of food cultures. For example, many gluten-free flours are commonplace in Indian cooking, so I head to an Indian supermarket to stock up on flours for western-style gluten-free baking, and also have the option of making Indian snacks from these same ingredients. Trying new foods and new tastes may take some getting used to but the more cosmopolitan your palate is, the wider your options for finding foods within your restrictions.

When it comes to unfamiliar cuisines, it’s worthwhile doing some background reading on the properties of ingredients and how to handle them, the principles of cooking methods, as well as to understand how tastes & textures are combined. For example, you might want to find out which dishes taste good at room temperature if you don’t have the opportunity to heat up your bento. Also, don’t forget that some ingredients turn rancid quickly, especially in hot weather, including coconut milk.Once you understand the fundamental principles of cooking across different food cultures, it will open up many possibilities for almost limitless experimentation. I’m not a purist when it comes to cuisines and tastes — one can’t afford to be when faced with wide-ranging food sensitivities — I’m only interested in creating a dish that is palatable to myself.

Thanks to a request by Canton Pixie, I made the effort to find out how to set up subscriptions by email for new entries to this blog.

If you want to receive email updates, please click this link:
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Thanks for being interested in my blog :) !

While we are on the subject of skin care, thought I’d slip in a post to say how terrific I’ve found manuka honey for seriously, critically dry skin connected with the kind of skin problems you might have as a result of food sensitivities.

I mentioned coconut oil for dry skin in my previous post, but I recently discovered that manuka honey (edible, straight out of the jar) is much much more effective. I knew about it as a wound dressing, but never thought to use it more generally on the skin. The downside is that it is of course, very sticky and messy, much more so than coconut oil.

Coconut oil is still a good natural moisturiser if you want something straightforward as an alternative to commercial lotions loaded with chemical additives. And also a good choice if you have candida problems.

One thing I found coconut oil was excellent for: conditioning extremely dry hair caused by perming, bleaching etc. No expensive serums and treatments needed :).

Those of you who have read Sue Dengate’s books on food intolerances or the discussions on the Failsafe food intolerance discussion lists will have come across mention of Epsom salts (magnesium sulphate) as one way of counteracting food reactions. This article explains how sulphates form a key element in a particular detoxification pathway in the body, which “processes other phenolic compounds including salicylates (salicylates are a subset of phenols), artificial food colorings, artificial flavorings, and some preservatives.” Sulphates are not necessarily absorbed into the body well via the gut, so skin absorbtion by using Epsom salts is a good alternative.

Epsom salt is also a magnesium compound and magnesium is helpful in reducing muscle aches and stiffness as well as the tension that causes teeth grinding (see here, here and here).

The Epsom Salt Industry Council summarizes the health benefits:

Magnesium:

• Ease stress and improves sleep and concentration
• Help muscles and nerves function properly
• Regulate activity of 325+ enzymes
• Help prevent artery hardening and blood clots
• Make insulin more effective
• Reduce inflammation to relieve pain and muscle cramps
• Improve oxygen use

Sulfates:

• Flush toxins
• Improve absorption of nutrients
• Help form joint proteins, brain tissue and mucin proteins
• Help prevent or ease migraine headaches

There are also beauty benefits to using Epsom salt because it can be used for exofoliating, as I learnt when I chanced upon this recipe for a DIY Epsom salt bath scrub on a great Singapore beauty blog which has a focus on natural & DIY skincare. She liked the Epsom salt scrub so much that she declared it her bath staple. (If you want to know where in Singapore to get cosmetics and toiletries with minimal/no chemical additives, you’ll find many suggestions on the Viva Woman blog.)

However, I would suggest leaving out the food colouring, and perhaps another option to jojoba/olive/almond oil might be coconut oil. Read about the benefits of coconut oil for skin here, here and here. I also happen to need to use up a huge 1 litre bottle of virgin coconut oil from Nature’s Glory :); I only use it occasionally or sparingly in baking and cooking as it imparts a very strong and distinctive flavour.

If you’re wondering where to get Epsom salt in Singapore (as I was for a long time), Viva Woman tells us “S$4.60 from Guardian Pharmacy”.

Dual Lock 550ml

On Boxing Day last year, my Asvel bento box died. The sad thing was, it wasn’t totally dead, just that a miniscule knob that held the hinge mechanism of the lock-tight lid broke off and that was the end of the lid.

So instead I turned to using this shallow Dualock box from Lock ‘n’ Lock. The shallow shape is ideal for packing bento, as I explained here. At 550ml, it’s relatively close in volume to the 630ml capacity of the Asvel one, and it has a watertight lid.

Japanese guidelines state 630ml as about the ideal size box for an adult woman’s meal, hence this is a standard size for many Japanese boxes. That’s true if I have white rice or a noodle dish. However, I’ve found that for a meal with brown rice, I usually can’t finish that amount of food, and instead, this 550ml box provides exactly the right amount for me.

I’ve since acquired a brand new Asvel box, but I shall continue using this one a lot more from now on, especially since I have brown rice for most of my meals.

Curious what’s for lunch inside the box :)?

Aubergine & pork brown rice bento

Brown rice, stir-fried pork (shabu-shabu or sukiyaki cut from the supermarket), with pan-fried brinjal (local aubergine).