Happy Valentines Day!
My daughter and I made these easy cookies for our school bake sale. I am the laziest baker on earth. I love cooking meals, but baking just drives me insane. I haven't yet delved into my inner self to figure out why. The thought of rolling out cookie dough would be unthinkable.
So I found these Pillsbury Sugar Cookie Dough Sheets on sale at the market. Just cut out the cookies, decorate, and bake them. That sounded fun! How hard could baking be?
We decorated them by pouring the sprinkles into small bowls, and pressing one side of the cut out dough into it, so the it's fully covered with sprinkles.
Two packs of dough made about 6 batches of cookies.
What felt like 14 hours later, we had these beautiful cookies. And I don't own a rolling pin. I packed them in little cello bags, gave half to the bake sale, and kept the rest!
Are Plastic Japanese Bento Boxes Safe?
Hakoya elephant bento box from Ichiban Kan.
I've been hearing for a while about toxic plastics like BPA's. I thought it was an urban myth. But after seeing this episode of Expose on PBS, it convinced me to start getting rid of toxic plastics from my home, starting with my kitchen. I know it may take years to rid my entire home of toxic stuff.
For starters, I went through my daughter's dishes, cups, and containers. Anything with a label of #1, #2, #4, and #5 got to stay. Anything with #3, #6, and #7 got tossed. Then I examined all my bento gear...no numbers on the bottom. What to do?
I found a very informative post What are plastic Japanese bento boxes made of? on one of my favorite blogs, JustBento. JustBento says "None of the major Japanese bento box manufacturers use polycarbonate...any bento box from a reputable Japanese maker should be perfectly safe."
For now, I'm keeping my bento gear made in Japan. And I'm tossing out the questionable gear made in China, or ones without numbers on the bottom.
For more info, via JustBento, check out The Green Guide.
