Bento #167... Gigging

I've spent an awful lot of time gigging recently... working with companies who do big corporate gigs.  It's great fun.  This past week, for instance, I spent a few days in Vegas.  No bentos for that because... it was Vegas.  Doing shows on the road means a 'per diem', which means that they gave me money for eating out and such.  Just one of the many perks of travel...  I spent two days working at a much closer convention center.  I took lunch the first day...  And again, was the weird one for having a healthy, tasty meal instead of a sandwich.  I did liberate a couple of cookies from the craft services table.  Because... cookies.

I have a salad of asparagus and white beans with a balsamic glaze.  It was incredibly tasty.  The purple potatoes came from my parents' garden.  I happened to be standing there while my dad was digging up the red potatoes, and when he would come across a purple potato that was out of place, he'd toss it to me.  I forgot about them until I got home and found I had a pocket full of purple potatoes...

I also have the last of the farmer's market stuff for the year... a selection of baby tomatoes (the orange ones are my favorite) and a purple carrot.  They are accompanied by grapes and gouda.

Bentos #165 and #166... Weekend away...

I spent last weekend in a small town in central Utah. I was working a gig at an events center down there. They brought me in because I know what i'm doing, and the rest of the crew was going to be college students.  I left Provo at 5am on Friday to make it to an 8am call time.  And I was there until 7pm Saturday afternoon.

I didn't want to spend a ton eating out, so I packed a cooler for the weekend... Mostly drinks, but also two Bentos!  They are exactly the same, which is fine by me, as they are made with tasty food...

I broke out the rubbermaid take-alongs for these meals. Since they were going in a cooler, I wanted a watertight seal.

I've got pasta salad... It looks like a ton, but it's 50% cucumber and tomato.  I just packed the entire bottle of Italian dressing in the cooler instead of pre-dressing it.  I find that pasta salad gets a funny after taste if left for too long.  I topped it with some bacon bits for protein.  And because bacon!

The sides are jicama with hummus (kind of an odd combination) and strawberries.

I had planned to eat one for lunch each day, but that didn't work out... My gig provided lunch on Friday. I was going to eat it for dinner instead, but on the way to the hotel I passed a diner that I just had to try... I can't resist a small town diner.  This over had everything you could want; great atmosphere, amazing food... A cranky lady who fills the water glasses...

I didn't have to be to work until 4pm the next day... I slept in, went running, and then went for a long drive through the mountains.  I had lunch on a pull-off, overlooking a valley full of sagebrush. 

I made it back to town in time for pumpkin chocolate chip cookie ice cream at the local dairy.  That ice cream alone might make it worth the drive back out there...

I ended up eating my other bento after I got home.  Yay for not having to cook after a 2.5 hour drive!

Bentos #160-164... Playing catch up much?

I have a serious lack of internet going on. And I haven't been working, so mooching off of work internet hadn't been an option. I may actually have to get internet one of these days. Because my current option is to post from my phone. And I really dislike the blogger program on my phone.  I can't format posts the way I like.  I also can't edit pictures. So they will look kind of crummy until I can get to a computer to edit them...  *sigh*

So until then, bear with me.
It finally got cold around here... I say that like i'm happy about it... Let me try again. 
Its #@$& cold!  It was hot for Weeks! near triple digits! And then one day, mother nature decided it would be funny to randomly drop the temperature by thirty degrees.  Overnight.
I do like fall.  Fall smells good. Fall is pretty. Fall means pumpkin flavored everything.  But I would have loved to ease into the temp change...
Whatever. Fall means soup weather!  I had been slacking off on my veggie consumption, and they were building up in the fridge, so I thought... Soup!
I just roasted everything I had... Three bags of carrots, seven tomatoes, two onions, three peppers,a zucchini... For how ever long it took me to do the dishes, threw them all in the blender with some hot water to thin it out, and seasoned it up with whatever spices were in the front of the cupboard!
I've been eating it all week. I think I have enough left for lunch today.
I packed it for lunch three times this week.  The first two are identical... Because it was good the first day, and since I knew it was a winner, I managed to pack it the second day in less then four minutes...  Soup with feta, a side of peppered pretzel pieces and a handful of  grapes.  And a dessert... I used three pretzels as croutons.  It was a great combination!
The last time I packed the soup, I was out of both feta and pretzels. Sad day. I plunked a pumpkin cutout into the bowl to make it fun, and packed strawberries, grapes, cucumbers, and sesame crackers to go with it.
The last bento has a combination of whole wheat fettuccine tossed with smoked garlic, spinach, and feta.  It's accompanied by strawberries, cherry tomatoes, and grapes.  I realized as I was packing it that my grapes and some of those tomatoes look exactly the same. :)

Bentos #158 and #159...

These are both warehouse bentos... one from Tuesday, one for Thursday.  I get interesting reactions to my lunches at the warehouse.  At the theatre, people expect random artsy, cutesy things from other people... because... we're all theatre people.  We're artsy, and creative, and all that junk.  At the warehouse?  They are, for the most part, warehouse people.

For instance... Tuesday I took out this bento...

It's nothing special... cream cheese chicken salad (with sesame seed 'spatter') and sesame crackers... baby orange tomatoes, strawberries, jicama, muenster cheese, and some biscoff cookies.

I was sitting on the steps outside and one of the warehouse guys came out.  He wanted to know what the $(*# I was eating.  I started with 'chicken salad and crackers' ... and realized he didn't really care, and I didn't really want to or have to explain myself, so I trailed off with '... healthy stuff'.  Because I knew he would go away.  And he did.  But not before saying, "Ew."

Don't get me wrong... I like the warehouse guys.  It's just an interesting dynamic.  Not only am I the only female there, but I don't eat out everyday, I bring healthy lunches, I don't swear like a sailor, I don't need to have social activities going on in order to get work done... I don't think they know quite how to handle it.  Mostly we smile and nod and sometimes I curse a little bit just so they won't feel self conscious around me.  As much.

Here's my lunch for tomorrow... I'm kind of wondering what reaction I would get to actual 'face food'.  They already think I'm kind of weird...  Mashed sweet potatoes with a poppy seed face, collards, a bastardization of my rosemary pulled pork recipe... I was feeling lazy and just wanted to test my new smaller crockpot.  The pork turned out good, but next time I'll actually do it right...

The strawberry box contains... strawberries, jicama, baby tomatoes, and a sauce container of orange barbecue sauce I got from my very first foodie penpal.

Don't forget to enter my small giveaway HERE...