Bento Links

Here are links I've collected to other useful bento resources around the Web.

About Bento
Lunch in a Box - A fun, helpful site with a friendly approach and practical tips.

Cooking Cute - this site kicks my site's arse ten ways from Tuesday. I find it tremendously intimidating, but it's an excellent resource. Pictures, recipes, etcetera, etcetera. Like the Martha Stewart of bento.

SushiSushi.co.uk - A useful site for those of you based in the United Kingdom, with information, recipes and a store full of the bits you need to prepare lovely sushi for your bento.

Japanese Box Lunches - Virtual Japanese Culture - I love this site! Full of information and lovely images, clearly explained. It's designed as an educational resource for kids, but is plenty interesting enough for adult readers. The Virtual Bento packing game can be a bit frustrating but you can certainly learn a lot from it.

Modern Traditional Bento feature - Another good general information source, with clear explanations and lists. And diagrams showing how to fashion frankfurters into octopi, prawns, crabs or squiddlydids! WOOHOO! COCKTAIL CTHULHU!

bento moblog - A Japanese-American academic and mother keeps a blog, with the aid of her camera cellphone, of the lunches she packs for her kids. A great source of practical ideas for your lunches - and her 'reflections on bento cultural politics' are fascinating.

www.bento.com - It's really a general site about Japanese food and drink, but hey, they've got the domain name.

Bento Shopping Online
Jbox Bento Search - Jbox is a company run by an American living in Japan, offering unique Japanese items to people in the English-speaking world. So far most of my bento boxes have come from their excellent, frequently changing range. Good prices and reliable delivery.

Ichiban Kan Online Store - Retail and wholesale bento gear and Japanese lifestyle goods. An excellent range and good prices - I only wish they shipped to New Zealand. Ichiban means 'number one' or 'first,' and I have no clue what the 'kan' part means :)

Bento Boxes - Japanese Meals on the Go - You can buy this excellent recipe book from Amazon.com. Translated in English, with full, illustrated instructions to prepare authentic bento recipes. I've got it!

The Bento Store - A superb-looking eBay store (meaning that you can buy the items immediately, rather than waiting to win an auction) offering a wide and attractive range of bento boxes and accessories. It's especially the range of accessories that impresses me - all the little doodads like sauce bottles in cute shapes, food dividers, moulds and cutters.

Bento Obento Shop - Another eBay store with a very appealing range of stock - you can also find Japanese stationery. You have no idea how sites like this tempt me.

Tokyo Gift bento range - More eBay goodness. This is just one section of a larger store which also offers such delights as kimono-silk (chirimen) purses and Studio Ghibli anime merchandise.

Aranzi Aronzo Online Shop - An extremely cute Japanese shopping site, translated in English. Their aluminium bento boxes look adorable, and they have a wide range of other products that are useful in daily life, while adding a bit of unique style. Their motto is 'cute, strange, cool, silly, a little bit horrible, stupid and comfortable ARANZI ARONZO.' I think that's great. Their service when I bought a pair of slippers was charming and efficient.

Hakoya - the site of a Japanese manufacturer of stylish and charming bento boxes. I don't think you can order directly from the site (I can't read Japanese and have navigated by clicking links and seeing what happens) but you can see some lovely examples of their work and get ideas about what you want. I have two Hakoya boxes (bought from import stores here in New Zealand) and they are great.

Asianawest - Asian shopping site's selection of bento boxes including yay! Hakoya! Not a wide range but some very nice pieces.