but I agree whole heartedly that its a unitasker item that is DEFFINATELY a must love item.

You know, they have a name for poking fun at different cultures, and it’s not usually “funny.”

And that, my friends, is a serious pain in the fanny. It’s not difficult, and I do know how to cut it off with a knife, but it’s so much easier to cut it off with one of those sandwich cutters.

Plus. They’re not unitaskers. They can be used as cookie cutters, too. And some of them, the ones made out of metals, can be used to mold pancakes. Because sometimes kids will only eat things that don’t look like food. And if you don’t believe that, just ask any Mom who gives her kids Play-Doh how often it gets eaten.

Gag me with a pink twinkie.

I for one would like to see some sort of editor’s apology…

As the gaijin (foreign) mom of a Japanese kid, I feel bad about not having the bento making chops of the other moms. Most Japanese schools have school lunches, so it’s only on outings that they carry a bento. But it is oh so important to have a fab looking bento full of a variety of shapes and foods. It really is an expression of love and social status. I won’t give up MY cute sandwich cutters or egg and rice ball molds. It’s the only way I can keep my kid from being shunned for having a boring bento.

She was shocked - shocked I tell you - when we went a museum in the States and saw a school group having a brown bag lunch outside. Chips! Sweets! COKES! Unimaginable to her - such things are not allowed by her school, and probably that goes for most Japanese schools. She would be mortified if I snuck in a little sweet -except sweet beans or fruit.

By the way - weird food is something of an obsession here. Here are two examples:
(some of the chocolate is imported, but is appreciated for the odd shapes etc.)
http://pingmag.jp/2007/07/12/strange-watermelon/
http://pingmag.jp/2008/02/12/strange-chocolate/

Then there’s the octopus ice cream…

Pat

We use the egg “unitasker” on a weekly basis. My children resisted bringing their lunches until we discovered obento. Although some lunches can take several minutes to prepare, it is so much healthier for the kids. Any parent of a school aged child can attest to, a healthy, inexpensive lunch is well worth the 3 inch by 3 inch by 1.5 inch storage space required for this accessory.

My kids love boiling eggs and using the egg molds to create fancy eggs. The will actually eat the eggs for lunch!! This lunch time phenomena (and its accessories) has changed the junk for lunch tradition we had in our home!

If you are interested in seeing obento in action, Google “bento,” the “o” is used by the Japanese.

Good try, but a miss for me.

In this aspect, you might view the mold as an artist’s tool, just as unitasker as a brush or pallette.

Makes me feel a little guilty for packing a tuna wrap, bean salad, and an orange this morning. But learn something new every day!

The Japanese pack a boxed lunch known as o-bento — the “o” prefix is a sign of great respect. As Nikki said, the preparation of these lunches is a way to show love, but it goes beyond that.

O-bento aren’t just lunches, they’re like a lunch, a love note, and art all at the same time. Young women get up early and spend hours packing bento boxes with carefully prepared food to impress a boy they like. The quality of a child’s bento results in the passage of judgment on the mother, and either praise or embarrassment from the child’s peers.

It may be clutter for us Americans, but it’s harder to make that judgment for a different culture.

We have the car and the fish, and, when your 3 year old refuses to eat anything more then the odd piece of fruit and a cracker, a car shaped egg is heaven in an egg. They just LOVE them!

They’re Plankton from Spongebob!