Bento #90... Oven-Fried Anything...

You may have noticed the recently added 'Recipes' tab at the top of the page.  I wanted to make all the lovely things I cook easy for you to find.  And then I went back through my posts and realized that I usually don't tell you exactly how I make things.  I throw things in a pan, add dashes of this or that... and that's it.  So I'm making an effort to actually put recipes in my posts.

This one might be a bit of over-compensation...

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I'm generally not allowed to fry things at home.  I nearly bought a countertop deep-fryer once.  And then realized that I would fry EVERYTHING.  Did you ever watch the 'King of the Hill' episode where Bill and Dale start playing with their fryer?  That would be me.  Because fried things are delicious.

So.  I decided I could oven-fry things.  And I had a package of mushrooms in my fridge that I really needed to do something with.

They're not exactly pretty, but they'd been in the fridge for a week.

I decided to do a zucchini as well.  In protest to Red Robin changing their fried zucchini recipe.

I put all my veggies in a ziploc bag with *1/2 cup of flour, *1/2 tsp paprika, *1/2 tsp pepper and *1 tsp salt.  Since these are not being fried, you have to add salt now... you can't do it later.  It won't stick.

Shake until the veggies are coated.

In a bowl, whisk an *egg with *1/3 cup milk.  Dunk your flour coated veggies in the mix and then...

Put them directly into a mixture of *1 cup panko bread crumbs and *1/3 cup Parmesan cheese.  Press the crumbs into the veggies.

Put your veggies onto a greased cookie sheet.  (I line everything with foil.  I don't really like washing dishes.)  And bake in a 350 degree oven until the outsides are crispy!  Mine were in for about 15 minutes.

I ate these with ranch dressing.  And I didn't feel bad about eating a lot of them.  They're oven-fried, after all.

Yeah... I totally did a turkey sausage.  I had leftover panko...  See?  You can oven fry anything!

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This is a little snack bento I did using some oven-fried goodness...  The zucchini and mushrooms are packed in a baking cup to keep them separate from the moist things.  Carrots, black pepper beef, and a tin of sliced plums make this a perfect snack.  It's got all the food groups in it!  I'm so amazing!

Eat bento and be happy!