For those interested in the health aspect, the basic concept of bento is packing food in a lunch container in the ratio of roughly 3-2-1 carbohydrate, vegetable/fruit, and protein, that minimizes the need to count calories or determine whether you are getting optimal nutrition.

The idea of this is that if you have say a 600 ml container, your caloric intake will be roughly 600 calories if you stick to the ratio and avoid greasy or fatty foods. This isn’t always going to be perfectly accurate, but it is a helpful guideline. The second idea is to get as many colors in your lunch as possible, and to help do this, you plug up the spaces between food with extra veggies or fruits, or nuts, such as cherry tomatoes, grapes, and almonds.

While bento making isn’t as quick as say a sandwich or a microwave meal for lunch, it makes for a much happier, healthier lunch time, and the prep can be done either the night before, or for less than a half hour in the morning. Some bento are truly works of art, and combine many ingredients to create a highly decorative box, but more practically nice looking bento can be made without a lot of effort or artistic prowess.

While the traditional bento is filled with Japanese food, it’s not hard to use bento guidelines for any type of food type. I personally like as much variation as possible, and my last few lunches have included middle eastern food, seasonal vegetables and fruits from my farmer’s market, and the ever useful mix and match of frozen Trader Joe’s appetizers. Generally, I pack two bento boxes for lunch: a larger bento, and a smaller “snack” bento, filled for example with yogurt and fruit for a quick afternoon bite to tide me over between meals.