bento box

noun

Etymology: From bento + box. Bento is borrowed from Japanese 弁(べん)当(とう) (bentō, “food to be eaten on the go; takeaway lunch served in a box”).

1. A partitioned, traditionally lacquered, lunchbox in which a bento (“Japanese takeaway lunch”) is served.

   “My heart was filled with covetousness as I saw the fine old lacquer bento boxes which they produced after carefully removing many silk wrappings.”

   “At every important station, boys walk along the platform carrying large trays and shouting "Bento," (prolong the o). The hungry traveler opens the window and buys a neat parcel, consisting of two wooden boxes and a long narrow envelope [containing chopsticks]. […] One of the wooden boxes is full of cold boiled rice. The other contains an assortment of things, usually including fish and pickles. To name the contents of a bento''' box and tell what each thing is made of requires an extensive knowledge of Japanese cookery.”

2. Synonym of bento (“a Japanese takeaway lunch served in a box”).

   “[M]arvelous vegetable sushi—slivers of cucumber and carrot and threads of ginger rolled in cooked rice, then in leaves of seaweed and dusted with roasted white sesame seeds—which I ate one evening at Anzu, a restaurant that serves, to Dallas's satisfaction, its bento''' boxes with a Texas twang.”

   “NAGANO […] Bento boxes are a great value, and there is a full sushi bar as well.”