Laing in Can?

Taro leaves cooked in coconut milk, coconut cream, pork, shrimp, chilli, ginger, onion, garlic, jalapeno pepper, salt and other special ingredients is called "Laing" in the Philippines. Other regions in the Philippines have their own way of cooking this. Whatever style it is, Laing is one of my favourite Filipino dishes.

Here at the Central Coast, NSW (Australia) where I live taro leaves is not available in the market, supermarket or even in the Asian store near us. I may have seen a frozen taro leaves for “laing” stored in the freezer in the Filipino store here but I guess I prefer the fresh leaves.

I missed “laing” that when I saw this in can I decided to try it. Well, as soon as I open the can I right away smell the preservatives. What am I thinking? Of course it has to have loads of preservatives! I didn’t enjoy it. Oh well, at least I’ve tried it.

Lamb Shank cooked in a Slow Cooker

My husband asked me to cook lamb shank and I did. If you are more into sweet sauce just add honey or sugar. You may also want to cook 2 shanks for each person as 1 is not enough unless you are not into lamb. Please feel free to add anything from this recipe. We all have different taste and it is most enjoyable if you adjust the taste according to your liking.

I had:

3 Lamb shanks
olive oil
2 cloves garlic
1 medium size onion
410 g crushed tomatoes in can
1 tbsp tomato paste
1 vegetable stock in cube
1 big carrot
1 stalk celery
1 small parnips
a handful of fresh parsley
1 tsp Worcestershire sauce
1 cup water

What I did:

1. Brown lamb in a hot pan without oil. Set aside once brown.
2. Saute garlic and onion in olive oil. Add crushed tomato, worcestershire sauce, tomato sauce, let it boil and add the stock and water.
3. Add the rest of the ingredients and adjust taste according to your desired taste.
4. Transfer everything in a slow cooker and leave it cooking in a low heat until the meat just falls off the bone. My lamb was cooking from 10am to 3pm and it was heaven!

Eskabetche

Eskabetche is one of my favorite dish when it comes to fish. I have always been wanting to cook this but I didn't know how. So when my Mum and Dad came to visit us 5 months ago, I asked Dad to show me how to cook it.

You will need:

Fish
Canola oil
2 cloves of garlic
2 big onions
1 tomato
ginger
vinegar
soy sauce
sugar

How to cook it:

Mix the sauce - vinegar, soy sauce and sugar in a measuring cup. I had like 3 tablespoon of vinegar, 2 tablespoon of soy sauce and 2 teaspoon of sugar. Mix the sauce well and add more sugar according to taste. Sprinkle a little bit of salt on the fish and fry in a hot canola oil. Set aside when it's cooked. Saute garlic, onions, tomato and ginger and add the sauce. Let it boil and add the fried fish. Serve with rice, enjoy!

Ginisang Chayote with Prawn

Filipino food often comes to mind when my husband can't join us for dinner. I missed chayote or sayote in the Philippines so that's what I had for dinner the other night with "chicken adobo". To cook this dish all you need are:

olive oil
1 sayote
1 carrot
1 clove of minced garlic
1 small size chopped onion
1 medium size tomato
peeled prawn
minced pork
fish sauce (patis)
1/4 of the vegetable stock cube

Saute garlic, onion and tomato. Add pork. When the pork is cooked add the prawn. Add carrots and sayote. Add a little bit of water then throw in the vegetable stock. Let is boil and add the fish sauce to taste. Simple yet delicious!

If you are interested to find out how to cook a spot on chicken adobo please visit Home Cooking Rocks  http://pinoycook.net/myras-chicken-adobo/  for the recipe. I have been doing the same thing without the potato.

Saving Dried Fish For A Year

When I was pregnant with my second child I was craving for Filipino food. Dried fish is one of them. When I went to the Filipino store to get them, they came in bulk. One packet of dried fish has like 30 to 50 pieces in it. I was a bit hesitant to buy but then I really like to eat dried fish that time. One of my favorites is called "parutput" in Waray Waray dialect or "kiampi" in Bisaya dialect. So there, I bought one packet but then my problem is how am I going to save all of them? I will not be eating all in one go and I will certainly not eat them everyday as it is salty and can be rather unhealthy as well. Cooking them everyday also mean my house is going to stink and that it will take me weeks if not months to get rid of the smell. I am the only one in the family who enjoys this food so imagine the distorted faces of my husband and daughter every time I fry them?

So here's what I did and you may want to do as well if you want to save your dried fish.

1. Fry all dried fish in olive oil. You may want to use whatever oil you have in the pantry.
2. Once brown and cooked, place them in a tight container with a kitchen towel at the bottom to drain the excess oil. I used 2 take away containers for this.
3. Once it's cool down, remove the kitchen paper.
4. Put the lid on and place the container inside a zip lock bag. I find it useful to use a ziplock bag because I still see a bit of oil coming out from the container and it also help me get rid of the smell totally.
5. Put the bag in the freezer and there, you can save it for a year or more!

How to reheat? Do any of these...

1. You can either defrost it half an hour or an hour before you eat them or
2. Heat the fish in the microwave or
3. Fry them again.

I have been doing #1 , this way I can save 1 bottle of air freshener to get rid of the smell hehe... Once defrosted, all I have to do is pour vinegar on it and yummmmmmmmmmm!

Below are the only fish left after a year!

Wholemeal Banana Chocolate Muffin

My daughter brings either muffin, cookies or a finger bun for morning tea at school. I would normally buy them at  the supermarket but this time around I decided to bake them. Thanks to http://www.joyofbaking.com for a great recipe! Most of the ingredients below are the same except for the flour, I used wholemeal instead of white flour and I added 3/4 cup of brown sugar instead of 1 cup white sugar. This looks really good with the frosting but I didn't add any as I didn't like to use butter this time.

You need:

1 cup wholemeal flour

3/4 cup brown sugar

1/3 cup unsweetened cocoa powder

3/4 teaspoon baking powder

3/4 teaspoon of baking soda

1/4 teaspoon salt

1 large egg

1/2 cup mashed ripe bananas

1/2 cup warm water

1/4 cup skim milk

1/4 cup canola oil

3/4 teaspoon vanilla

1. Combine all the dry ingredients in a bowl.

2. Combine all the wet ingredients in a bowl.

3. Combine dry and wet ingredients together, stir just enough to combine everything. Do not stir too much.

4. Pour batter in the muffin cups. This makes for 12 muffins.

5. Bake in a preheated oven for 15 to 20 minutes in 180 degrees.

6. Do not overcook. Enjoy!

French Toast with Wholemeal Bread

A French toast for breakfast came to mind this morning when my daughter asked what we are going to have for brekky. She would normally eat Coco Pops every weekend but I wanted to cook her something nice. I unfortunately don't measure what I put in my food anymore. However I will try to give you the estimate of the ingredients.

I put the following together in the bowl. Please note that the cream and milk are both an estimate, I wasn't sure of the exact measurements. Just add more or less of it.

2 Eggs 

1/4 cup light cream

1/4 cup skim milk

a dash of cinnamon and nutmeg

honey 

6 slices of wholemeal bread

butter

Beat 2 eggs in the bowl then stir in cream, milk, cinnamon, nutmeg and honey. You may want to taste it to make sure you put in enough honey.

Heat pan and add butter. Dip one bread at a time in the mixture making sure bread is well coated. Please do not dip the bread into the mixture too long as it will be too soggy. Cook until brown and serve with your desired fruit, caster sugar and honey. You can also use maple syrup instead of honey. Hubby didn't have honey on his toast so it is up to you. Enjoy!

My 2011 Birthday!!!

I didn't realise we are going to celebrate my birthday for 5 days! Here's what happened...

Day 1 (25th of June) - Family and friends came over to celebrate. We had to do it on the weekend so everyone can come. I was greeted a happy birthday.

Day 2 (26th of June) - We invited some family members to help us eat the left-overs. I was greeted a happy birthday.

Day 3 (27th of June) - We had a pizza night. I was greeted a happy birthday.

Day 4 (my birthday, 28th of June) - We invited family members to have a birthday dinner with us. My hubby wants to do a barbeque but since he was busy the whole day I decided to cook a lamb shank cooked in red wine vinegar with some herbs served with steamed broccoli., carrots and asparagus. We had a really nice "Tangy Lemon Cheesecake" for dessert. I was greeted a happy birthday.

Day 5 (29th of June) - That is today, hubby invited me for lunch because he wasn't able to spend most of the day with me yesterday. I was greeted a happy birthday.

It was an amazing 5 days and I think I will starve starting tomorrow, I eat too much and I should last for 5 months without any food hahaha...

P.S. 

I just realised it is still the 28th of June in Blogspot. Oh well, we are definitely the future then as today is the 29th over here lol.

Biko

There are different versions of Biko. A friend of mine cooks Biko without coconut milk while I grew up with coconut milk and cream in it. When my parents were here a few months ago, I was craving for the biko that I used to eat when I was young so I asked Mum to cook it for me. While watching her cook, I found out it was actually pretty simple. 

"Mum puts anise seeds around 1/4 tsp in the heated pan. Once you can smell the aroma of the seeds add coconut milk (I can't remember how much) and let it boil. Add brown sugar until you get the sweetness you want and stir until the sugar dissolves. Add the cooked glutinous rice (we cooked it an hour ago). Keep stirring until the rice absorbs the liquid and it becomes very sticky."

Mum and Dad's visit

My parents came over from the Philippines to witness the birth of my second child. Everyone were busy including Mum who helped me with the household chores and Dad in cooking the food that I have missed back in the Philippines. When Dad finished cooking all I could think of is to try the food he cooked. He doesn't use a lot of ingredients but boy it is so delicious... he sure is one amazing cook! I wasn't able to take photo of all the food he cooked because I was in a hurry to eat them hehehe... Fortunately, I was able to stop myself from dishing up and instead got my camera so I can keep some souveniers.

This is called "Sarciadong Manok" cooked with chicken, green peas, carrots, potato etc...

Above is a fish dish called " Eskabetche ".

The dish above is "Adobong Manok, Bistek style". It is cooked in vinegar, pepper, bay leaf, onion and a little bit of soy sauce.

A few hours before Mum and Dad left to catch their flight going back to the Philippines, my Dad promised to cook something for me. He got up early morning so he can cook me a fried rice with some burger patty. It was heaven! I miss his cooking and hopefully Mum and Dad can come back soon because I miss them both.