Asian Greens

This is a ridiculously easy "brown bag lunch".  Mark Bittmans article at the beginning of this school year is so accurate: most people avoid brown bag lunching it, simply because its too much fuss, and not very interesting once you open it up. This one? I love it. In fact, I look forward to lunch, knowing that this is a healthy lunch, ready when i am. Steam it in the microwave? I think so. Those greens are so good, slightly wilted.

This passion for rice, greens and some crazy spicy concoction and black sesame seeds started on my trip to Nagoya, summer of 2012. We arrived at the airport late at night, fried from a 30 hour journey (zipped into London on our flight out), so we stayed at the airport hotel, with our friends Heather and Blake. They invited us to experience Japan with them, and we said yes. Our first intro was breakfast at the hotel lobby in the morning. Western or japanese breakfast were the option. We had to try the japanese breakfast. I am sure there were other options, but i zeroed in on the steamed rice with various unfamiliar greens--ocean and land greens. So i watched what others were doing, and now this is my favorite go-to lunch...and if we were REALLY smart we'd recognize the smartitude of the Japanese and have a few bento boxes on hand for tidy meal carrying, and easy-on-mother-earth packaging!!! Stop using the brown bag/plastic bags/throw away packaging, an go green with their cute packaging.