Pancit Bihon!

     The thing I realize about cooking is, it's hard to cook for two people after cooking for 15. The thought that you might end up with too little food always makes me think we need more than we end up really even wanting. And that means left-overs! We're bad about left overs. It always breaks my heart throwing food knowing that there are a lot of people all over the world who are starving. It's been a challenge for me for about 2 1/2 years now on how we can lessen the throwing but instead creating something from it. Having a husband that never really considers left-over food unless its from Frost-Doughnut (Yeah! left-over donuts! Nummy!) makes it hard. So as much as I can, I am trying to make it a point to cook different dishes using left-overs.

      So here is a great recipe from my left-over pan fried pork shoulder blade we had last night. You can also use fresh meat instead of left-overs with other ingredients such as chicken breast, pork, shrimp, and beef. For example in this recipe you could use 1 lb of freshly cooked meat instead.

Ingredients:

1 10.4 oz pack of Vermicelli noodles

Mise en place

1 large shallot (chopped)

3 cloves garlic (thinly sliced)

5 oz. Portuguese sausage (sliced)

1 red bell pepper (chopped)

1 large carrot (thinly sliced)

1/4 whole cabbage (cut in 1/4 inch strips)

1 cup sliced green beans

1 1/2 cups left-over meat

2 cups water

3 Tbsp Soy sauce

3 Tbsp Olive oil

Scallions for garnish (optional)

Key lime (optional)

Salt and Pepper to taste!

Procedure:

Soak Vermicelli noddles in a cold water for 20 minutes. (You can do this procedure while preparing your Mise en place) .

1. In a big fry pan heat olive oil over high heat and sauté shallots once oil  is hot enough, for about 2 minutes.
2. When the shallots are translucent, add in garlic and sauté for another 2 minutes.
3. Add left-over meat and Portuguese sausage, mixing in for 5 minutes. (When using raw meat, brown the meat before adding the sausage).
4. Mix bell pepper, carrots, green beans and soy sauce over meat mixture for 5 minutes.
5. Pour water in and let simmer for 10 minutes with the lid on, lowering the heat to medium high.
6. Once the water boils, add cabbage and simmer for another 3 minutes.
7. Mix in Vermicelli noodles, making sure to incorporate with the other ingredients, turn heat off! Garnish with scallions and a freshly squeeze key lime to your liking!
8. Enjoy!

-Love-

Crispy Red Snapper with Aoili Dip!

     Ever since our last trip to the Philippines in May-June 2011, where we had a dinner at one of the best seafood Restaurants in Dumaguete City called Lab-as ("Fresh" in English terminology), we have been in love with Red Snapper, and how good it can be even when just grilling it. So every time we do our seafood shopping at our local Asian Market, we make sure to grab at least 3-4 pieces of whole Red Snapper. The thing I love about going to an Asian Market is the vast selection of seafood they always have, from fresh anchovy, to baby octopus, and the sometimes 30 lbs catfish to the 3 lbs parrot fish. And even better is how you can take that fresh seafood to the counter and ask them to clean the fish, head or tail off, fillet, cut into sections or even deep-fried to go.

     Personally I like to have my fish left whole and just cleaned. I love to fillet my fish not just because it helps me improve my skills and techniques but at the same time I get to keep the fish heads for making soup the next day. In the Philippines we never let anything go to waste we love oxtail and the ox tongue, we use the pork ears, and snout, and even the pigs blood. Some more of my favorites back home are chicken feet and chicken intestine (when grilled on a skewer with super spicy vinegar-garlic dip). The same even goes for fish from head to its guts we love it all. Lots of Filipinos let fish innards ferment in an empty bottle of rum, with generous amounts of sea salt for several days before serving it as a side with freshly squeezed key lime juice, minced shallots and lots of Thai chili for extra kick (this is Papc Bert's favorite especially when paired with day-old rice! Yum!). I know sounds disgusting, but hey, come on give a little credit to our creativity and technique ;). I can just imagine the faces of many of you readers now(LOL!) Are you getting the same "voluntary" allergy my husband does, the "eeww-yuck" kinda face? OK, well before I gross you all out to the highest level, here is my Crispy fillet of Red Snapper that we think goes really good with Aoili Dip.

Ingredients:

2 Snapper fillets

¼ cup cornmeal

3 Tbsp flour

1 tsp Kosher salt

1 tsp lemon-pepper seasoning

¼ Olive oil

Aoili Dip:

1 cup mayonnaise

1 tsp lemon zest

1 tsp lemon juice

1 clove garlic (minced)

Pinch of cayenne pepper

Salt and Pepper to taste

Mix all the ingredients and set aside in the refrigerator until ready to serve!

Procedure:

1. In a bowl mix cornmeal, flour, kosher salt, and lemon-pepper seasoning.
2. Wash fish fillets and pat dry with paper towel.
3. Heat olive oil in a pan fry over medium high.
4. Dredge fillet on the cornmeal mixture, shaking it off removing the excess mixture.
5. Pan fry fillet 4 minutes on each side.
6. Serve with Aoili dip!

-Love-

Baked Salmon!

     One of the things that I would love to thank on this day is for my wonderful family here, and in the Philippines as well. I am also thankful for having such a wonderful man who listens and deals with my drama, for his on going good health, and for Salmon that helps a lot on our venture to achieving great health. Having a family that loves you and cares for you other than your own family is such a blessing, and so is my extended family.

     And so on Thanksgiving I would like to post one of my new favorites and an old favorite for many of you, a wonderful orange-redish looking kinda fish called Salmon! I had heard of this fish back in the Philippines but I never had the chance to try it, because it was so freaking expensive. Salmon is one of my husband's favorite fish, believe it or not, we now eat salmon 3 times a week, and sometimes I kinda feel like I'm starting to have scales (LOL!) because of it. So before I turned into a fish with gills, try this simple, and easy to follow recipe, and a really delicious dish!



1 ½ lbs Coho Salmon (Wild)
½ of fresh lemon
Kosher salt
Pepper
Olive oil

Preheat Oven to 450 degrees F.

1. Wash salmon and pat dry with paper towel.
2. Squeeze the lemon juice over the salmon fillet evenly.
3. Sprinkle a generous amount of kosher salt and pepper.
4. Drizzle with olive oil.
5. Place salmon on the cooking sheet with non-stick foil, skin down.
6. Bake for 16-20 minutes. 
7. Enjoy!


-Love-

Bicol Express!

     Bicol Express is a very popular dish from the Philippines; it consist mainly of pork, chili, coconut milk and shrimp paste. The way that this dish is cooked depends heavily on the person cooking its preferences. And since my husband has an "allergy" of shrimp paste, which makes him always get this "eeww-yuck" face, I choose to omit it. Also if you don't have a high tolerance for spicy dishes you can lessen the chili and discard the rib and seeds; my recipe is a little spicy.

     Over the years there has been a bit of a confusion regarding this dish, it's a common misconception that the dish comes from the Bicol region of the Philippines; specially because Bicol is a place that is known to have an abundance of coconut and is famous for its spicy cuisine. With a little research I came to know that the dish was named after a passenger train from Manila to the Bicol region and it was created by Cely Kalaw, a native of Laguna who owns a restaurant located in Malate, Manila. She was known for her hot and very spicy dishes! In the 60's Cely Kalaw's restaurant became famous for her Laing (taro) dish, but then started to receive complaints from the customer about how overwhelming the spicy was . So on the same day she invented a new dish that would best compliment the Taro but still needs to be spicy. It was almost lunch time and Cely was about to open the restaurant but she still didn't have an idea as to what the dish should be called. When a train chugged by the restaurant bearing the name, “Bicol Express”, tadaaa! that was the birthday of the dish called Bicol Express!

So here is my own version of Bicol Express! Choo-Choo!

Ingredients:

• 4 lbs pork shoulder (cubed)
• 1 knob ginger (minced)
• 15 pcs Thai chili pepper (chopped)
• 1 large red onion (chopped)
• 6 cloves of garlic (chopped)
• 2 cans coconut milk
• 5 Tbsp olive oil
• Salt and Pepper to taste

Procedure:

In a large pot heat olive oil over high.

1. Saute onions until translucent should take about 5 minutes.
2. Add ginger and garlic for another 3 minutes.
3. Place pork and mix it with the spices. Lower heat to medium and simmer the pork for 35 minutes with the lid on.
4. Mix Thai chilies and coconut milk for another 15 minutes. Turn off heat.
5. Serve and Enjoy!

-Love-

Kare-Kare!

    

  Kare-kare is a traditional Filipino dish, it is created using different kinds of meat, either tripe, goat meat, pork's leg or oxtail that is then mixed with a peanut butter sauce as a base with vegetables. This dish is very well-known in Northern part of the Philippines. The Visayan region, where I come from is in the central part of the Philippines, so we didn't usually have this as a meal when I was growing up. But when I moved here in the States, I came to realize that I also need to introduce my husband to a wide variety of Filipino dishes, and that would mean creating food outside my comfort level (which is not a problem). I believe that all Filipino cooks takes extra pride in their cooking. The food that we put on our plate shows so much love and so much soul. Every meal is a blessing to a Filipino.

      Now my advice is to start setting up your karaoke machine for some serious singing as this will take a good 3 hours to cook (lol) and make sure to have fun cooking and singing!

Ingredients:

3 lbs oxtail

1 large Chinese eggplant (sliced)

1 bunch string beans (cut into 2 inches)

1 bundle of bok choy

1 large onion (quartered)

½ cup freshly ground peanut butter or crunchy peanut butter

¼ cup creamy peanut butter

1 Tbsp Annatto powder (can be found in your local asian market)

Kosher salt and Pepper

Procedure:

      In a big pot place oxtail and cover with water over high heat. Add in onion and generous amount of kosher salt and pepper. Let the oxtail simmer for 2:45 hours or until it is tender. Keep your eye on the simmering oxtail, checking it once in a while and making sure that the oxtail is not sticking in the pot and feel free to add water if necessary to prevent it from reducing to much.

1. When the oxtail is tender enough, take it out of the pot and set aside.
2. Adjust the heat to medium high, using the same pot, add string beans and eggplant in the broth and simmer for 3-5 minutes. Avoid over cooking the veggies. After simmering set aside!
3. After the veggies, add the bok choy to the same pot and let it simmer for an additional 2 minutes. Set aside!
4. Put in Annatto powder, stirring occasionally until it is completely dissolved in the broth.
5. Add freshly ground peanut butter and creamy peanut butter in the Annatto mixture.
6. Place the the oxtail and vegetables back into the large pot and let it simmer for 2 more minutes over low heat. Salt and pepper to taste!
7. Serve over steamed rice!
8. Enjoy

-Love-

Halloween in both worlds!

     What comes to your mind when you hear the word “Halloween”? 

     Chocolates? Trick or Treat? Costumes? Halloween party's? Jack-o-lantern carving? Ghost stories? Horror movies? Or Candy Apples? These are just a few things that I associate with American homes on Halloween.

    This is my third year celebrating Halloween in the States. My first year in 2009, I remember asking my husband “When are we going to the cemetery?”, and what did I get? A blank, confused J Bird with a what-the-hell-are-you-talking-about look on his face. It was such a awkward moment, one that opened my eyes, that maybe, just maybe, they don’t do the same thing we do back home. So that night he gave me an overview as to how they celebrate Halloween here. Kids would show up knocking on your door and you hand them bags of candies. He also told me to look for a costume that I would like to wear for a friends Halloween party. But Damn! My ass that time, it was just freezing cold, and I couldn't force myself to go. I feel asleep on the couch waiting for trick or treaters to show up, but duh who would dare climb up our 18 stairs to the front door for some bag of candies? Probably some desperate, and tough kids with a sugar problem (lol). So to make my funny story short I had my first Halloween party last year. Being a Criminology graduate, I wore a policewoman costume with J Bird as my prisoner. And this year I was a Dark Angel and J Bird was a Vampire. I just love the thought of living a dream for a day.

     Anyhow, this article is really special to me since this tells a lot of where I came from, the tradition and our culture. Coming from a very religious country where the population is at least 80% Catholic, Halloween is also one big annual celebration, but in the Philippines we treat it more like a family reunion. Members of the family who work away from home usually return to spend this time of the year with the rest of the family; both the living and the dead.(Yes you read that right! Specially the DEAD!). From a Catholics point of view November 1^st and 2^nd in the Philippines is specially dedicated to commemorate our loved ones who have passed away. We go to the cemeteries to clean the graves of our departed family members, repainting their tombstones, pulling out weeds and sweeping the family plot. I remember back before I moved, the cemetery was always packed! Hundreds of police men would be deployed to the local cemeteries to keep the peace and order of the place.

     Some of the things we Filipinos do during this time of the year is to offer candles, prayers and flowers to our loved ones grave. We also bring a variety of native delicacies such as suman, biko, puto, and a lot more. Mostly grandmas and moms are in charge of the food, from planning the menu, to grocery shopping and cooking. Some people set up a tent for overnight vigil at the cemetery. This is the perfect night where grandchildren gather around their grandma's rocking chair listening to her ghost stories; and only grandma knew if they were real or made-up. But hey, whatever it was, who cares we had fun (LOL!) . On a lighter note, playing cards and other board games works perfect for kids too, while mahjong is for adults. I remember before the law was amended, in the early 90's, the cemeteries had carnivals and some even put barricades around the basketball court for late night Dancing! We used to pay 10 pesos ( which is about $.25) as entrance fee. The Halloween party would usually last til 4 in the morning. It would oftentimes be sunrise when we would leave the cemetery. After a whole night of dancing, together with a group of friends and cousins we start walking a long ways back home. I can still smell the aroma of hot cocoa around the neighborhood. The smoke coming from each house, which signifies that the moms are awake and cooking breakfast. I think that is one of the most unforgettable moments that I will cherish forever. Only in the Philippines!

-Love-