Weekly Bento

Our family loves baked french toast, especially for dinner. We've done several different recipes, and I've experimented to make my own variations. I know there are about a million recipes for baked french toast, but here is our latest favorite. Individual portions have already been frozen for future bentos, as this version tastes delicious cold!

Strawberry Shortcake Baked French Toast

(make ahead, and let sit in the fridge for several hours or overnight before baking)

1 large loaf of Texas Toast (got ours CHEAP at the bakery outlet!)
1 container of of strawberries
12-16 ounces of cream cheese
1 cup sour cream
1/2 cup white sugar
3 tsp vanilla (2 for cream cheese mixture, 1 for egg mixture)
7 eggs
1 can evaporated milk
1 cup heavy cream or half and half
1 tsp Pampered Chef Cinnamon Plus mix
Sprinkle of nutmeg
Sprinkle of ginger

Powdered Sugar for sprinkling over the top after baking, we keep ours in a shaker

Take a few slices of bread at at time and make about 3 to 4 slices both vertically and horizontally, to make about 1.5 inch cubes of bread. Cube about half of the loaf of bread, and spread it into a 9" x 13" pan that has been greased with either butter or cooking spray. Make sure to fill in the gaps and press down the cubes to create a nice solid layer on the bottom of the pan.

Wash, core, and slice strawberries, first in half, and then in about 1/4 inch thick slices. You want them to retain a bit of shape and substance during the baking process, and if the slices are too thin, you will just get jam instead of strawberry chunks. Sprinkle the strawberry slices evenly over the first bread layer. You can really use any fruit you have on hand. We've done canned peaches, frozen mixed berries, frozen blueberries, fresh blueberries. Whatever strikes your fancy, that you have on hand, or is in season :)

Warm up the cream cheese in the microwave for about a minute, stirring after a minute, until the cream cheese is nice and smooth. Add white sugar, sour cream, and 2 tsp vanilla, stir well. Pour mixture over strawberries and smooth over entire surface.

Cube the rest of the bread and add it over the cream cheese layer. It will probably be a tight fit, just squish it all in there and try to fill in the gaps. It's okay to press down a bit with the bread, once you add the egg mixture it will plump it up and soak all in to the layers of bread.

Whisk the eggs in a bowl really well, then add in the the spices and whisk to incorporate. Continue to whisk while adding in the evaporated milk (don't forget to shake the can well first!) and cream. We've also made this mixture using 2 cups soymilk only or 1.5 cups soymilk and a half cup of kefir or yogurt. Carefully pour over the bread, allowing it to soak in a bit if it seems like it will overflow. It really will go down and fill in all the little gaps!

Cover and refrigerate, 4 hours to overnight.

Bake at 350* on the middle rack covered in foil, for 45 minutes.

Uncover and rotate dish 180, bake another 15-20 minutes. The top will get nice and golden.

Remove from oven and let the dish set for about 10 minutes before slicing and serving. Sift powdered sugar over slices, and watch the family gobble it up!

You can also add a drizzle of warm fruit syrup or maple syrup over each slice. Serve with a slice of warm ham or a couple of pieces of bacon. YUM. This is also great to take to a breakfast potluck, just pop in the oven in the morning before you get in the shower and it's ready to go when you are!

Packs great in bentos, if you can get your family to leave any leftovers!

Well, I've been taking pictures of our bentos every week, fully intending to blog them, but never actually off-loading the pictures to my computer! I will work on getting back on track soon, but in the mean time, here is another meatball recipe.

I got a grinder attachment for my KitchenAid mixer for Christmas, and have been enjoying grinding my own meat. I've done ground chicken for tacos, ground leftover turkey to crumble over salad, last day meat on super clearance, and today a pork loin chop. I ground up one thick cut, partially frozen chop to add to my ground white meat turkey for these meatballs.

Ikea-like Turkey and Pork Meatballs

Preheat the Oven to 275*

1.5 lbs (or however much you have) Ground turkey
1 Pork loin ground twice (or about 1 lb ground pork)
2 eggs
3/4 to 1 cup plain yogurt
1 cup plain bread crumbs
1/4 tsp Ground Allspice
1/4 tsp Ground Nutmeg
1/2 tsp Ground Cinnamon
1 Tbs Garlic bread powder mix stuff from Costco, or just some Garlic powder
1/4 tsp Zesty Lemon Seasoning
2 Tbs Dried onion flakes
Sprinkle of flour over the top before you start mixing


All my measurements are completely approximate. I just sort of throw stuff in and sprinkle seasonings, just winging it with whatever sounds good, so feel free to throw in what you like!

Mix all the ingredients together in a bowl, adding more bread crumbs until the mixture has a dough-like consistency. Our meatballs were a little soft this time, and could have used less yogurt but I was just dumping in the last of the container.

Use a table spoon to scoop out about an ounce of meat, then grab a child to roll up the scoops into many, many balls of meat. In a saute pan over medium heat, melt a couple of Tbs of butter. Add the meatballs to the pan, and allow them to cook on each side until browned all over, about 10 minutes total. After they are browned, put them into a 9x13 pan that has been coated with cooking spray, and pop them into the oven to cook the rest of the way through.

Turn the pan down to low, and add 3 cups of chicken broth to the pan to deglaze. Dissolve 2Tbs cornstarch in 4 Tbs cold water and stir well to combine. Whisk cornstarch into broth and let it start to thicken. Add 3/4 cup of heavy cream after mixture starts to thicken and stir until it gets to a good gravy consistency. By the time the gravy is finished, the meatballs will be cooked through. Sometimes about halfway through the gravy cooking I will turn up the heat on the oven to about 325* if I've made the meatballs really big.

We serve this meal with a honey and jam sauce on the side and boiled red potatoes with lots of sea salt in the water. If I start the potatoes right before I get the meatballs going, they finish at the same time. The whole meal takes about 30 minutes to prepare! My girls just gobble the whole thing up. We always serve the gravy on the side because a couple of them are not huge fans of gravy.

I freeze the leftover meatballs for bentos as well as the gravy in an ice cube tray so that I can give them individual portions of gravy. The potatoes also freeze well or keep in the fridge for a couple of days, so that I can dice them up and make a potato salad for our bentos. Yum!

I promise to eventually get the last three months of bentos up! In the meantime, go make some meatballs!