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Home ► Recipes ► Japanese (Traditional)

Ginger Chicken Bento

Updated: 05.22.25 | Marc Matsumoto | 9 Comments

5 from 2 votes
This colorful Ginger Chicken bento box comes together from just twelve simple ingredients that cost about $1.80 per box. With tender chicken coated in a fragrant ginger glaze, Tamagoyaki, and a fresh medley of vegetables and fruit, this bento lunch is a frugal yet flavorful meal that you can take on the go.
Recipe Video
This Ginger Chicken Bento includes just $1.80 worth of ingredients, and yet's it's balanced, satisfying and delicious.

What is a Bento?

Bento (弁当) is a Japanese word that refers to both a portable meal, as well as the container it's carried in. With a history stretching back nearly 700 years, it was originally a utilitarian meal meant to be carried to work. The fancy lacquered boxes came later when bento would be eaten for special events such as hanami, or Noh performances. These days bento can be found almost anywhere in Japan, from train stations to convenience stores, and they've even started spreading around the world.

Jump to:
  • What is a Bento?
  • Packing a Bento
  • How to Make Ginger Chicken Bento
  • $3 Bento Challenge
  • Cost Analysis for Ginger Chicken Bento
  • Other Bento Recipes
  • 📖 Recipe
  • Comments

Packing a Bento

These days, there are so many styles of bento that there aren't any hard and fast rules. That being said, here are three guidelines I like to follow to ensure my bentos are practical, balanced, and beautiful:

  1. Use a small container - While you can get a fancy bento box to pack your bento in, it's not unnecessary. A small shallow plastic or glass food container will work just as well. The only important thing is that it shouldn't be too large. This controls the portions you can include, but more importantly it allows you to pack your bento in tight so that the food doesn't shift around while you're on the go.
  2. Use edible partitions - I see a lot of people using disposable paper or plastic partitions or cups in their bentos, and they are almost always unnecessary. By using leafy greens such as lettuce, kale, or cabbage, you can keep your food from mingling, while cramming in more vegetables.
  3. Make it colorful - For me, a great bento includes most of the colors of the rainbow. This not only makes the lunchbox visually appealing, but it also ensures that you're getting a good balance of vitamins, minerals, and antioxidants.
How to make and pack a traditional Japanese bento box lunch with tamagoyaki, ginger chicken, vegetables, and rice.

How to Make Ginger Chicken Bento

Proteins

I try and limit the protein to about a quarter of the bento, and for this one, I've added some Ginger Chicken and Tamagoyaki.

  • Ginger Chicken - With tender, juicy chicken glazed in a sweet and savory sauce that's redolent of ginger, making this easy bento entree is as simple as pan-frying some chicken, and then glazing it with sake, soy sauce, sugar, and ginger.
  • Tamagoyaki - Tamagoyaki is a Japanese omelette made by rolling thin sheets of seasoned egg and then slicing the resulting log, exposing the layers of egg. It's a staple of Japanese breakfasts, and the leftovers are perfect for adding a splash of color and protein to this Ginger Chicken Bento.

Carbs

In a traditional Japanese bento, up to half of the bento is rice, but I like to cut that back to about a quarter of the bento. For my Ginger Chicken Bento, I'm using partially milled rice, which is a perfect middle ground between unmilled brown rice and white rice, which has had the most nutritious parts milled away. You could also swap out the rice for Japanese Potato Salad, which includes a colorful array of vegetables.

Vegetables and Fruits

  • Frill Lettuce - Frill lettuce or curly lettuce works great in bento's because they can not only partition your container, they also make for good padding.
  • Broccoli - Broccoli is a fantastic addition to bentos because the fluffy florets are perfect for padding your bento so that the food inside doesn't shift around in transit. I usually blanch mine in salt water and use most of it in a salad for dinner the night before, but I'll set aside a few florets to include in a bento the next day.
  • Carrots - Carrots add color and texture to this bento. You can use them raw, but I like to lightly blanch them, which makes their color even more vibrant. Cutting the carrot slices into flowers is optional, but it's a fun way to bring some life to your bento. You can get flower-shaped cutters on Amazon.
  • Strawberries - I almost always like to round out my bentos with either strawberries or cherry tomatoes. Either way, you get a burst of sweetness and a vibrant red color. The strawberries really compliment the spicy sweetness of this Ginger Chicken Bento.
Recipe for a Japanese bento box lunch with Ginger Chicken, Tamagoyaki and a fresh medley of fruit and vegetables.

$3 Bento Challenge

Some of you may know me as the host of Bento Expo, and one thing I've learned while doing the show is that bringing a bento lunch from home is perhaps one of the best ways to save money while eating healthier. Unfortunately, Japanese food is often considered expensive or unapproachable, so I want to try and change this perception.

Cost Analysis for Ginger Chicken Bento

IngredientCost
chicken thighs$0.61
soy sauce$0.04
sake$0.06
sugar$0.01
ginger$0.03
egg$0.16
saltless than a cent
cooked rice$0.24
frill lettuce$0.06
broccoli$0.13
strawberries$0.41
carrots$0.04
TOTAL$1.80

Other Bento Recipes

  • Chicken Teriyaki Bento
  • Chicken Soboro Bento
  • Vegan Tamagoyaki Bento
  • Demon Slayer Bento (gyunabe bento)
  • Maple Miso Chicken Bento

📖 Recipe

This frugal bento costs just $1.80 to make, and is loaded with fresh vegetables and fruit, along with Ginger Chicken and Rice.

Ginger Chicken Bento

5 from 2 votes
Print Pin
Prep Time 10 minutes mins
Cook Time 10 minutes mins
Total Time 20 minutes mins
Yield 2 bento boxes
YouTube video

Units

Ingredients 

For ginger chicken

  • 285 grams boneless skin-on chicken thighs
  • 1 tablespoon soy sauce
  • 1 tablespoon sake
  • 1 tablespoon evaporated cane sugar
  • 1 teaspoon grated ginger

For packing bento

  • ½ batch tamagoyaki
  • 220 grams cooked rice
  • 16 grams frill lettuce
  • 60 grams broccoli (blanched)
  • 2 strawberries
  • 24 grams carrots (sliced, blanched, and cut into flowers)

Instructions

  • To make the sauce for the ginger chicken, combine the soy sauce, sake, sugar and grated ginger in a small bowl and stir together until the sugar has dissolved.
    Mixing the sauce for ginger chicken together.
  • Heat a frying pan over medium heat along with a splash of oil, and add the chicken in a single layer. Fry until it's browned on one side (about 2-3 minutes)
    Pan-frying chicken for making ginger chicken.
  • Flip the chicken over and continue cooking until for another minute.
    Pan-fried chicken thighs for ginger chicken bento.
  • Use a paper towel to soak up any excess oil in the pan.
    Wiping the fat out of a pan with paper towels.
  • Add the sauce and caramelize it around the chicken until there's almost no liquid left. Let the chicken cool before packing it into a bento.
    Pan-fried chicken with a ginger soy glaze.
  • To assemble the bento, add your rice to your bento box first. This provides a base to arrange all your other ingredients.
    Packing a bento starts with rice.
  • Arrange the chicken next to the rice.
    Ginger chicken gets added next to the rice.
  • Add some frill lettuce to separate the chicken from the vegetables, and if you have a deeper bento box, you may want to pad the bottom of the box with some lettuce too.
    Frill lettuce is used to partition the bento box.
  • Add the slices of tamagoyaki using the broccoli to fill the spaces around them.
    Tamagoyaki and broccoli are added to the Ginger Chicken Bento.
  • Fill the remaining space with the strawberry and slice it in half if necessary.
    A strawberry is added to the Ginger Chicken Bento.
  • Decorate the bento with the flower-shaped carrots.
    Flowers cut from carrots are added to the Bento.
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Nutrition Facts

Calories • 514kcalCarbohydrates • 42gProtein • 28gFat • 24gSaturated Fat • 6gCholesterol • 139mgSodium • 633mgPotassium • 501mgFiber • 1gSugar • 8gVitamin A • 2345IUVitamin C • 34.6mgCalcium • 37mgIron • 1.6mg

Comments

    5 from 2 votes (2 ratings without comment)

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    Recipe Rating




  1. Rie says

    February 28, 2019 at 6:08 pm

    Hi Marc-san!
    I prepare 4 Bento-lunch boxes for my sons and me. In my case, paper cups are very useful. I make large amount of Okazu such as Gomaae and Kinpira, and portion them out into paper cups, then stock them in the freezer. I just put them in Bento boxes in the morning and they melt slowly by lunch time. Tamago-Yaki is also suitable for frozen stock. In this way, it is really easy to make Bentos on a busy morning. How is my idea?
    No Recipes was introduced by my English teacher. Your techniques are wanderful every time, recipes are very helpful for my every day meal and videos are good for studying English. Thank you so much!

    Reply
    • Marc Matsumoto says

      March 01, 2019 at 8:53 am

      Hi Rie-san, that's a great tip that makes bento preparation on busy weekday mornings easier. Thanks for sharing! I'm so glad to hear you've found my site helpful for everyday meal prep, and I hadn't really planned for my videos to be a resource for learning English, but I'm glad to hear they've been useful for you. Please thank your English teacher for me!

      Reply
      • Rie says

        March 02, 2019 at 8:59 pm

        Wow! Thank you so much for your comment! I’m really happy to get your reply. Bento is a wounderful idea for health and saving money, so I hope many people try it and continue.

        Reply
  2. PekoPeko says

    February 26, 2019 at 3:57 pm

    If my calculations are correct that's $4.28 per kilo of chicken and $0.16 per egg. At those prices, I'm more than concerned about the welfare of the chicken (the one in the bento and the one that laid the egg).

    Reply
    • Marc Matsumoto says

      February 26, 2019 at 9:21 pm

      Hi PekoPeko, yes the chicken was a bargain. I bought it in bulk, on sale at a local grocery store, but the meat was imported from Brazil. To be honest I usually prefer using Japanese products, but it just would not have fit within the budget if I'd used Japanese chicken. As for the eggs, they're free range from a local farm (I buy it from the farm directly, and they don't even come in a carton) which is why they are so inexpensive. Obviously if you can afford it I would recommend using higher quality chicken, but the point of this exercise is to show that bringing lunches from home is a great way to save money over buying something at a fast food restaurant.

      Reply
      • PekoPeko says

        February 26, 2019 at 9:46 pm

        Thanks for the reply! Glad to hear the eggs are free range, I wish I could get such good quality eggs at that price. As for the chicken, I'm of the opinion that it's better to eat less meat than to eat cheap meat, but I know it's my own choice and I can't force it on everyone. I'm not sure Japanese chicken would always be better just because it's Japanese, unless you know it's been raised in decent conditions. From what I gather animal welfare is not a big topic in Japan? I've heard of 地鶏 but even then, the bar seems pretty low (my Japanese is not that great but if I understand the wikipedia article correctly, they don't even need to be outdoors and there can be up to 10 chicken per square meter?) In France more and more people are concerned about animal welfare, and it's very easy to buy free-range or organic chicken where they are required to have 2 or 4 square meters of outdoor space per chicken respectively. But of course, it's a lot more expensive that 4 euros a kilo. In any case, I appreciate the discussion.

        Reply
        • Marc Matsumoto says

          February 26, 2019 at 10:08 pm

          Agreed, I'm sure the regular broilers are raised in factory style farms, but when I say "Japanese Chicken" I mean Jidori. One of my favorite types is Hinai Jidori from Akita prefecture and I've visited the farms and processing plants and they are world class. Because these are a cross breed of Rhode Island Red and Hinai birds, they are delicate birds that have a tendency to scare and stampede, which is why they have to be kept in large open enclosures with only a limited number of birds per enclosure. I don't actually eat very much meat at home and totally agree that I'd rather have a smaller amount of something higher quality than a lot of something cheap.

          Reply
      • Val says

        March 17, 2019 at 10:00 pm

        And much healthier than fast food!

        Reply
        • Marc Matsumoto says

          March 18, 2019 at 7:22 pm

          For sure!

          Reply
Marc Matsumoto

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