Back to the
Photos

Bento boxes are usually filled with leftovers from recent dinners. They certainly are for me; I cook dinners with the next day's lunch in mind. This time, however, I got super-lazy and packed some leftover beef teriyaki with veggies over lo mein noodles that I took home from Tokyo Express. Their meals are fast food, so I don't eat there often, but occasionally I do indulge myself there. The servings they give are so huge, I can get two meals out of one easily. Hence this lunch.

On the other side, cradled in a lettuce leaf to protect them from the juiciness of the main course, are a few pieces of Vietnamese steamed cassava cake that I bought at 99 Ranch Market. They look something like gummy worms rolled in coconut and sprinkled with sesame seeds, but they are very soft and the flavor is mild and desserty, not candylike. (They are actually called "bánh tâm" with an extra accent over the second A that my keyboard can't reproduce. I'll stick with calling them "cassava cake.")

Sorry, no recipes for these 'cause I didn't actually cook them, but you can approximate the beef teriyaki part (with loads less grease and calories!) by cooking the broccoli beef recipe and serving it over lo mein noodles.

Wanna talk about it?