Ok, I promised I'd blog more, and then Murphy's Law happened - our hard drive crashed and I lost the majority of my recipes and menus!! I hadn't back up my stuff because I wanted it to be a certain way, blah, blah. Well, I've learned my lesson and I'm saving to our server often!!
     Now, back to the food!! lol  I am crazy ga-ga over Bento. I came across this and said, "OMG! I already do this!" I just don't have all those fancy containers and doo dads, but I'm building a wish list, lol!! So I decided to take some pictures of the boxes I make for Eva's snack and Gerald's breakfast and lunch (he never gets up in time to actually eat at home, so now I pack him a breakfast too so he can eat SOMETHING for breakfast!) So without further ado, here they are:

This is Eva's snack box. She has a tropical fruit cup, green pepper strips, goldfish, fruit roll-up, yogurt, and an Easter Brownie. And it's all gone when she comes home!! LOVE that!

I had no leftover's for Gerald, so I dug in the freezer and found I still had some soup left. So he got some white chicken chili, lemon cookies, carrots, apples, a Market Day Turkey and cheese pretzel sandwhich, and saltines for the soup. Oh yeah, and some chocolate that I hadn't eaten yet, lol!! I forgot to take a picture of his breakfast, but I had blueberry pancakes (dollar size), 2 sausage patties, maple syrup, and Schwan's Berry Blend (strawberries/blueberries). I had made the pancakes ahead of time and threw them in the fridge. I used my Pampered Chef's medium scoop so they'd all be the same size. What I didn't use for Gerald, I gave to the trips for breakfast. And speaking of that, here's today's menu:
     Breakfast: Eva - cheerios and a banana. Trips, dad and I - blueberry pancakes and breakfast sausage patties.
     Lunch: Trips had turkey and cheese roll-ups (whole wheat tortilla, spread with cream cheese, then turkey lunch meat, then american cheese slice, then roll it up!!) and some cut up apples. I was naughty today and stopped at Kwik Trip because it was Dollar Wednesday and it was on my way to Joey's therapy session. I had a bbq pork sandwhich, with carrot sticks and grapes (I tried to balance it out, lol)
     Dinner: Caribbean Chicken with Lime Coconut Rice. This was AWESOME! I had every intention of taking a picture of it, but I had to get Eva to CCD. I DID have leftovers, so you can see a picture of it as Gerald's lunch! For the kids, I just made plain rice. Here's the recipe:

Crock Pot Caribbean Chicken Recipe # 148388

5 ½ hours cook time | 30 min prep  SERV ES 6
      Ingredients
3 lbs ch icken pieces (I used thighs)
salt and pepper
2  t ablespoons oil
2  t ablespoons butter
2  la rge onions, chopped  (I was in a hurry and used 3/4 c dried onions)
1-2  tablespoon minced garlic
1  large green bell pepper, seeded and chopped (I used frozen cut up green pepper)
1  teaspoon dried thyme
1 -2  teaspoon dried chili pepper flakes (use only if you prefer extreme spicy ) (I didn't use,I
         used a couple of shakes of  tabasco sauce)
1 tablespoon brown sugar
1 teaspoon ginger powder (can use more)  (I used a full tablespoon)
3 large tomatoes, chopped (or use a 28 -ounce can of diced tomatoes, drained)
3/4 cup chicken broth
1 1/2 cups coconut milk
      Procedure:
1 .  Season the chicken pieces with salt and pepper.
2 . In a skillet, saute onions, garlic, brown sugar, green bell pepper, thyme and chili flakes 
      (if using ) until soft (about 4 minutes).
3.  Stir in the chicken broth to the skillet and stir with a wooden spoon on low heat, scraping up 
      any browned bits in the skillet .
4.  Pour half the broth/veggie mixture in the crock pot. Then transfer to the crockpot along with  the chopped tomatoes. Then pour the other half over the chicken.
5.  Cover crock pot and cook on high heat for about 3 -4 hours (adding in the coconut milk and season with salt and pepper the last 40 minutes of cooking).
6.  Serve over coconut rice.
© 2 0 0 9 Recipeza a r . A ll Rig h t s Reser v ed. (where I got the idea from)

Coconut Rice
I saw A LOT of recipes out there and they were all pretty easy. Basically, just make your rice the way you normally do, but substitute the water with coconut milk. I then added 4 packets of True Lime (since I didn't have any lime juice) Subtle, but nice.
Don't have any? Or does the stuff in the can look suspicious (like mine did tonite!)? Well, here's how you make coconut milk from scratch!

Home made Coconut Milk
     Ingredients
2 cups grated fresh coconut  (I used the shredded, bagged stuff)
1¼ cups hot water, or as needed
     Procedure1. In a blender (or food processor fitted with the metal blade), process the coconut and hot water for about 2 minutes.  Let  cool for 5 minutes.
2. Strain the mixture through a coffee filter into a small bowl, pressing down hard on the solid grated coconut flesh to squeeze out all the liquid. For thinner milk, add a little more water.
3. Use immediately in any recipe calling for coconut milk.