Aubergine with Mushrooms

For this day I tried out some new stuff - my main dish was a mix of fried aubergine and mushrooms on tomato rice (I just cooked the rice in tomato juice, which was nice, but it took much longer than usual). My side dish was this Carrot Slaw from Healthy. Happy. Life: http://kblog.lunchboxbunch.com/2014/06/turmeric-curried-golden-carrot-slaw-11.html
As dessert I made a fruity pudding with orange juice and chia seeds.

Polenta and Pumpkin Goulash

 For this lunch I brought polenta with pumpkin goulash, I still had to urgently use a piece of pumpkin and found this recipe on the internet.
I also brought a little container for a mushroom-tofu filling for my second breakfast - I bought rolls a the bakery before I went to the office.
As an afternoon snack I brought these incredible healty-looking cookies and some early cherries my mother-in-law gave me.

Soup and Tomato Rolls

I finally had time to make a bigger lunch again. Here we have a millet soup accompanied by homemade tomato rolls. I just used my usual recipe for wholemeal rolls, but used a little less water, instead I added tomato paste and also some chopped dried tomatoes and dried fried onions. They turned out delicious, although the taste of the onion was more dominant than the tomato flavour.
As a snack I brought oven champignons with a filling based on bread and some raw vegetables.

Aburage and Strawberries

On this day I made aburage, Japanese tofu pockets filled with sushi rice. They were accompanied by a side dish of marinated champignons with cherry tomatoes. My snack / dessert was very strawberry-ish - I not only brought some berries, but also a piece of puff pastry filled with marzipan and homemade strawberry jam.

Japanese Box, Italian Lunch

So, I bought myself a bento box! This is a three tiered model by Unit Colors.
I had been tempted by this line ever since I saw it first on the internet, because of its beautiful colours.
I actually did not think these boxes would be superpractical for my style of life, but then I found one with a 50% discount in a fancy-schmancy shop just around the corner from my office and succumbed.
It has one big container and two slightly smaller ones. I like the fact that you can pack things that are going to be reheated and those that are eaten cold separately, and that I can transport everything vertically.
But although the box has a total volume of nearly one liter, which is a lot, I feel kind of restricted by the form of the containers.
Here is what I packed into the bento box on its first outing:

In the middle we have my lunch, which consisted of gnocci with a vegan mushroom-sauce,
on the left a skewer with cherry tomatoes and pieces of marinated mozzarella and on the right puff pastry with a filling of fresh spinach.

Mittwochsbox - 12th of March, 2014: Mexican

Today I'm participating in my first blog event, I'm really exited! On two wednesdays a month Simone from the German blog http://blog.leckerbox.com/ invites everybody to show a lunchbox about a theme she proposes.
This week it's Mexican cuisine. I already had a Mexican lunch with my standard dishes not long ago, and I did not want to just repeat all those typical variations on tortillas and avocado (although they finally make an appearance...), so I did a bit of research.
It's not easy to find authentic vegetarian/vegan Mexican dishes that are a bit different, so I ended up chosing some ideas inspired by Mexico on the German website http://veganwelt.de/ .
On the right you have a potato stirfry and two mini bell peppers filled with quinoa on a bed of chimichurri champignons.
On the left you can see my midmorning snacks and dessert: burrito-"sushi" filled with homemade zucchini-salsa, seitan and avocado, two tangerines and sweet empanadas with pineapple filling.
So ... that's a lot of food. I'm not an ambitious person, but I always want to do things "right", so I might have overdone it a bit. At least today I will not have to buy a chocolate bar on my way home because I've run out of provisions!

Leek Soup and Mushroom Sandwich

For this little lunch I prepared a leek soup with some soy milk and a sandwich with a mushroom-seitan filling. I brought two tangerines for second breakfast.