Quick Cuboidal lunches

Wait, what? What is a cuboidal lunch.

Well, it's really just lunch tha's packed into rectangular tupperware. But using geometric words make things sound cooler for engineers!

Home made Indian lunch, placed in rectangular box tupperware, makes it easy to carry in another rectangular shaped lunch bag. That's all it is folks.

Pic 1: Assembled cuboidal lunch

Now, let's get on with the plan.

What you need already prepped/cooked:

1. Dal (lentil dish) - green mung+split chickpeas featured here. (Recipe for lentils).
2. Rice.
3. Vegetable curry or some side (Suggestion: cooked plantains) 
4. Fruits (your favorite). e.g. Peeled oranges, berries, chopped melon/cantaloupe etc.
5. 1/2 cup yoghurt - plain, whole & with live cultures. (optional, but highly recommended)
6. Chopped cucumber (optional) and radishes (optional, in season) or baby carrots. They add color!

Image of ruler embedded into pic 2 is sourced from http://nitasoesabdo.blogspot.com/2010_10_01_archive.html

Colorful Food is Appetizing!

A good mix of colors in the food I eat is always very appetizing to me. Even a simple salad made out of carrots, cucumbers (and you can add spinach, cilantro, walnuts or almonds for plant protein) looks great simply due to the contrast of bright colors. That is one of the items I made today for lunch along with a lentil-rice "pie" and a stir-fry with assorted vegetables.

Carrot-cucumber salad: Washed carrots (scrub well), washed cucumbers and then peeled. Sliced both into small pieces, mixed them up in a salad bowl with some lemon juice and sprinkled salt to taste. Also added some almonds to my salad to give some crunchiness. Picture shows what is left of the salad after we ate it while waiting for the stir fry to get ready.

Stir-fried Vegetables: Will add procedure soon. This included potatoes, zuccini, red peppers with cilantro seasoning at the end. Spices used were garlic, ginger, cumin seeds and asafoetida (optional).

Lentil-rice "pie": Not really a pie, but I just shaped the rice and lentils that I had cooked to softness in a pressure cooker (with 1 tbsp butter added) into the shape of a pie. You can also make this in a crock pot but start preparing the lentils first and then add the rice in about a 1/5th into your estimated total cooking time. So if you wanted to cook lentils for 60 mins in a slow cooker, then add rinsed rice and appropriate amount water about 12 mins into cooking cycle.

A different angle

Note: usually I add 2.25 cups water per cup of dry lentils and 2 cups water per cup of brown rice. these amounts may vary with your rice/lentil type.. add less and you can add more later if needed.

For other recipes using lentils, check out: http://spicetruck.blogspot.com/search/label/lentils