Finished Watchmen Lunch

It seems a lot of people liked my Watchmen lunch, and kiddo wanted one for school tomorrow, so I put together a quick picture tutorial of how to put one together. I realized after I looked at the pictures that the orange background is horrendous, but I’m too lazy to start all over.

First of all, you’ll need to gather your ingredients. You will need:

• 3 tostadas
• refried beans
• chicken (optional)
• black olives (optional)
• tomatoes
• shredded cheese
• nori (for the face)

Step 1:  Using a fork, spread refried beans across the tostada and place it in your lunch container

Step 1

Step 2:  Kiddo wanted chicken on his, but I put black olives on mine.

Step 2

Step 3:  Sprinkled with shredded cheese.  This will help hold it all together when melted.

Step 3

Step 4:  Top with another tostada that has been spread with refried beans.  This is a good place to get rid of broken tostadas, since it won’t show once you get it all put together.

Step 4

Step 5:  Add more chicken (or olives, or whatever you’d like)

Step 5

Step 6:  Add tomatoes.  I used sliced grape tomatoes, but you could use normal diced tomatoes or even salsa.  Chiles would be good here too.

Step 6

Step 7:  Add more cheese.  Again, this will glue it together when melted, but it also protects the crispy tostada a bit from the wet tomatoes.

Step 7

Step 8: Top with another tostada.  Pick a good one, this is the one that will be the face.

Step 8

Step 9: Cut the eyes and mouth from nori.  For the eyes, it’s easiest to get them the same size if you cut two layers at once.  For the mouth, I cut the nori in 3 pieces.  For the main part of the smile, I cut around a corner of the nori sheet to help me cut it symmetrically.  Then I cut the corners of the mouth, again with two layers of nori so that they were the same size and shape.

Step 9

Step 10: “Glue” the nori into place by putting a little bit of refried beans on the back of each piece.

Step 10

Step 11:  Cut the red splotch out of tomato skin.  I do this by sort of cutting the tomato with a steak knife the way you’d carve a jack-o-lantern. Be careful, I did cut myself the first time I did this.  If you think this is too tricky, you could probably use pimento slices or roasted red pepper.  You could probably even use some kind of sauce like sriracha or ketchup, but it might soak into the tostada.   Glue it on with refried beans the same way you did the eyes and mouth.  When it’s time to eat, nuke in the microwave for about a minute.  Now you have a yummy lunch that will make your friends jealous

Step 11

Chocolate Mochi Ice Cream with Lumonde Cookie

Kiddo’s staying with a friend tonight, lucky me, because now I get the goodies I bought at United Noodles all to myself.

I’ve heard a lot about mochi. Asians seem to love it, and Americans seem to think it has sort of a weird texture. I wanted to try it, but I figured trying the mochi ice cream might be the best move for a mochi beginner. Mochi is glutinous rice that has been pounded into a paste and then formed into shapes, sometimes little cakes that are sometimes filled with red bean paste or fruit.

The mochi ice cream is basically ice cream wrapped with mochi.  The mochi does have a strange texture to my American palate, but it’s not adversive.  It’s kind of gummy and chewy and sticky, and then the chocolate ice cream inside is so cold and creamy and it has little chunks of chocolate in it, it’s delicious.  Combined with the Bourbon Lumonde cookie, which is kind of a roll of papery thin pastry covered with a sweet frosting glaze, this was a really fun treat.  Chewy, gummy, creamy, cold, sweet, smooth, crispy all together.  In CHOCOLATE.