how to make soboro

You may know this by now, but my boyfriend eats pretty much anything I put in his bento. But still, I usually try to put rice, veggie and meat or fish (protein) in his bento. I also try to save some time by cooking food that I can make a lot of and can be kept for a long time, and that’s why I use a lot of meatballs and hamburg. Soboro is a simple yet convenient meat recipe I often use. I didn’t really think soboro was anything special, but my boyfriend thought it was a very simple and useful food. As matter of a fact, I used soboro for “real rice cake” last night! It totally saved me.

Traditional soboro is made with ground chicken, but I usually use ground beef because I get left over ground beef when I make meatballs and hamburg. You can also make it with ground pork or even a can of tuna!

[How to make soboro]
– 1/2 lb of ground beef or pork or chicken, or *2 cans of tuna
– 2 tbs of soy sauce or *3 tbs if you’re using tuna
– 1 tbs of sugar or *2 tbs if you’re using tuna
– 1 tbs of cooking sake or white wine or *1 tbs of mayonnaise if you’re using tuna

Cooking sake, soy sauce and sugar

1. Cook meat. Break up big chunks while you cook.

2. When the meat is cooked, set the heat to low and put all three ingredients in.

3. Mix it well and cook it until all the fluid is gone.

That’s it!

In fact, it’s so easy that I wasn’t sure if I could call it a recipe, but you can use soboro for many dishes, including bento, so I thought I’d do a how-to anyway.

Soboro has sweet & salty flavor, and it might taste a little too sweet or salty by itself, but you can sprinkle some it on rice or use with other food.

The most common way to use soboro is “Sanshoku-don.” (three colored rice bowl) You put rice in a bowl, and put soboro, sliced thin omelet (or scrambled eggs) and some green vegetables (such as scallion, spinach, etc…) on rice. I made “real rice cake” with the same ingredients, but with a different presentation.

I also use soboro in left over potato salad to make croquettes. You can just put it in stir fried vegetables too. Since the meat is already seasoned, you don’t have to add too much spice to veggies. That way, while vegetable tastes like vegetables, the meat will have a flavor.

For bento, I use soboro to create “ground,” such as in Bento #22: Farm bento left, and Farm bento right, Bento #31: Totoro snowman bento, Bento #32: Where the Wild Things Are bento left side and right side, and Bento #35: Tingle bento.

Since the meat is already cooked, it’ll last for a couple of days in the fridge too. Also you can also freeze it.

There’s a vegetarian version of soboro which uses tofu, but I haven’t tried it yet. I’ll make it someday and if I think it’s good, I’ll put a recipe on my blog.

How to make soboro on my flickr

For more pictures of my bento, visit Bento! set and Bento details! set on my flickr page.
If you have any questions about any of my how-to’s, please feel free to leave a comment or email me!