one filipino dish a week

If there is one fruit that I miss the most and is not available here where I live it’s lanzones (lansium domesticum or langsat in Malay). The sweet translucent meat is so good. Like most fruits the seed is very bitter. But if the fruit is small enough the seed will be soft and chewy and not bitter. So as a little kid I made a game of trying to find the right size where you can still eat the seeds and not have to spit it out but big enough that you have a lot of meat. I could eat several kilos of these. They’re so good and right about now i’m truly missing them. This is certainly one of my favorite fruits. I think it has an excellent flavor and texture. What fruit from your childhood that comes to mind right now?

Why can’t this be found here in NYC? is there some sort of ban? If anybody knows please let me know.

In the spirit of the holidays and holiday parties, I bring to you an easy party dessert that’s not going to stress you out and a guaranteed crowd pleaser This is something that The Girl and I randomly made one evening about a year ago and it turned out to be an excellent combination. We have since named it Golden Sunrise. I have made this from scratch and it was excellent. But in a pinch the prepared mango sorbet and lychee tastes great. The slight sourness from the mango sorbet and the sweetness of the preserved lychee is an excellent match. It’s a perfect palate cleanser. It’s very refereshing even on a cold day.

To make it:
Haagen Daz Mango Sorbet
1 can lychee (I like the Arroy-D brand)
mint for garnish

To assmble, take two scoops of mango sorbet, 2-3 lychees, pour the lychee syrup, garnish with mint. Serve.

Eat Filipino Food!

In a recent trip to the Asian store The Girl and I came across this  rather large melon. It looked like a huge elongated cantaloupe. It’s called a Hami melon. I was pretty excited to try it. Once I cut into it, it looked and smelled very much like a cantaloupe. It tasted very similar to a cantaloupe as well. There was only a slight difference in texture. It’s worth a try but there’s nothing too special about it.

Fried bananas the snack of champions! In my opinion, this is the ultimate Filipino snack. It’s hard to get the saba bananas here in NYC area (or maybe I just haven’t looked hard enough), however, the readily available plantain is a good substitute. It’s very simple to make and a very delicious snack. I have very vivid memories of eating fried bananas for snacks. If you’re in the Philippines this is just something that you eat, no questions asked. The Girl made a good point that the best bananas to use for this are the ones that are really ripe (almost overripe). The flavors are more pronounced and it doesn’t get lost when it gets cooked.

What’s in it?
3 Plantains, sliced to make a fan
1/3 cup flour
1/3 cup sugar
1/3 cup water

Dissolve the flour and sugar in the water and mix thoroughly.  Dip the banana in the flour to coat.

The more flour you use the thicker the coating will be on the banana. Adjust to your preference.

Fry until the sugar caramelizes and turns dark brown. Transfer to a service plate and dust with sugar. Simple!

Eat Filipino Food!

The Girl brought home one very nice surprise the other day. Mangosteens! It has been over a decade since I’ve had mangosteen. It has only been in 2007 when the FDA lifted its ban on the import of mangosteen. There has been a ban on import of mangosteen to the US because of the fruit flies they attract. The Asian fruit flies are feared to wreak havoc on the crops, especially without natural predators. The ban was lifted with the condition that the fruit is irradiated. Great! I wish I knew that before I ate some.

These mangosteens came from Thailand same as the large amount of mangosteens that you get in the Philippines. But from this CNN article it seems like we might soon be getting mangosteens from Puerto Rico.

These came from Thailand and bought in NYC’s Chinatown. That’s quite a ways and with today’s energy costs it was a pretty penny to buy this small bunch of mangosteens. These were $7/lb and this 2lb bunch only had 11 mangosteens. I savored every last bit of the luscious white meat.

What does it taste like? It’s sweet with a little bit of a sour tone. The white meat is creamy and smooth. It’s just heavenly. The thick outer skin however is very bitter and when you’re not looking and you accidntally bite into them… not a pleasant situation. So only eat the meat. Irradiated or not I devoured them. This was truly a little taste of luxury.

Eat Filipino Food!