what's in the box: thai basil pork bento

A newer apartment, bigger kitchen and (slightly) more expensive rent has meant I've become a bit more inspired than last year to take my own lunch to work here in Japan. As much as I enjoy the convenience of just ordering a bento like most other people at work, there's only so much grilled salted fish, miso soup, and cold vegetables I can tolerate every Wednesday.

So, with that in mind, I decided to suck it up and invest in my own bento box for lunches. And while I do enjoy cooking probably a bit more than the adequate amount, I don't think I'm quite ready to plunge of waking up early to prepare an array of side dishes every morning, let alone doing something like this.    As a compromise though, I figured I'd start with one-dish lunches, or just about anything that'll find in my fancy new double-tired bento box.

Not wanting to stray too far from the rice-lunch staple I've gotten used too here in Japan, I figured I'd start with tonight's leftovers to make a Thai-inspired Basil pork bento. 

ga prow gai thai basil chicken

In hindsight, one of the benefits of working at the family restaurant when I was younger was the free meals that came with every shift. Request anything on the menu (and sometimes off the menu), and the cook would whip it up on the spot. Of course, being raised on Thai food my whole life meant I never really appreciated it, and just thought of it as 'food'. It was only when the restaurant closed down and my mum returned to Thailand did I then start to miss Thai food, and also realise that some of the other local Thai restaurants didn't really cut it for me.

It's been almost nine years since the restaurant closed, but I still remember the look the cook would give me every time I requested my meal: Khao Ga Prow Gai, hold the basil. With my limited Thai, I didn't realise what I was saying, and only on a recent trip to Thailand and talking to my mum, did it finally click.  I was asking for 'Basil chicken and rice' without the basil.

Those strange, judgemental looks I received finally make sense.

curry puff pie

"You know, you should really open your own restaurant!"

It's probably a compliment that is thrown around quite frequently. And while it's only some of the time that people are being sincere and genuinely think that the complimentee (that's a word, right?) would in fact be successful as a restauranteur, even fewer complimentees would actually follow up on that.

My mum was that minority, and while I thought her food was alright, I think it was probably just due to the fact that Thai food wasn't as prevalent in Melbourne when she decided to open up her restaurant, and it was still an exotic, lesser-known food to many. Her food wasn't that unique or fancy; it was just traditional food you'd see regular people eat at home in Thailand.


But if there was one food that garnered the most compliments, it was definitely her curry puffs. These may have single-handedly been the reason why she got the got those "open your restaurants" compliments in the first place, which the made her consider doing the restaurant thing for a few years. Actually, scratch that. They are the sole reason my mum had a restaurant. My mum will never read this blog to deny it, so I'm just going make that statement and say that it's fact.