one filipino dish a week

Stir fry to me is the ultimate quick weeknight dinner. It’s the go-to dish when it’s been a long day at work and I’m starving when I come home. There’s not too much fuss about stir frying. Mix veggies together (and some meat if you like) add a little bit of some kind of sauce serve over rice and you’re golden. It’s all about just putting things together that you like. This time around T and I made bok choy and snap peas stir fry over white rice.

The Asian store in Jersey City carries vegetables that you normally don’t see at the standard box grocery store. You’ll find bok choy at the grocery store every now and then but not most times. So we go to the Asian store for them. I’m actually quite conflicted with buying vegetables at the Asian store. As a food blogger I’m quite aware of the different movements for better food out there: local, organic, and sustainable to name a few. But when I’m buying at the Asian store I know that none of those are really taken into account. It’s just price. Quality is even second to price. Looking at these vegetables they don’t look like they’re the best. So I’m always conflicted because I understand that I probably should be doing more to save the planet and my health but I’m also on a tight budget. Am I being a bad food promoter? Am I letting the factory farms and big business win? I’d like to hear your thoughts on this topic if you have any comments.

Now that I’ve aired my thoughts out there it’s on to the cooking. For this evening’s stir fry it’s just bok choy, snap peas, shallots minced, garlic minced, ginger finely chopped, soy sauce, spicy chili sesame oil, vegetable stock, salt and pepper to taste, and oil for frying. This is really what was in the fridge that night but it’s really anything you like. You can put carrots, green beans, mushrooms, baby corn, green/red peppers, etc.

Put about 2 tablespoons of the frying oil in your wok or pan on high heat. Once the oil is nice and hot (right before it starts smoking) saute the garlic and shallots for a couple of minutes. Add the snap peas, ginger, and bok choy and fry until the vegetables are soft but still firm. Touch it, feel it, smell it. That’s the fun part about cooking. Then add vegetable stock and soy sauce probably about a 1/4 cup total. Whatever looks right for your amount of vegetables (it shouldn’t be like soup but it shouldn’t be completely dry). Salt and pepper and give it a try and add until it tastes good. Turn the heat off and add about 1 teaspoon of the sesame oil and mix. Serve over white rice. Eat right away! Clean up later.

What’s your go to weeknight dish?

Pizza!!! I’m always excited for pizza. I was extra excited for this Friday night dinner with T because I was going to make pizza from scratch. For me pizza is one of those things that I’ve never really thought about making from scratch. I’ve always associated it with something you order. I’ve never really made pizza dough so I did the google-ing and the recipe book researching for pizza dough and found that it isn’t really as intimidating as I thought it would be. Probably the most intimidating part as crazy as it sounds was buying yeast. It’s like when you have to try something that you’ve never used before and you have that anxiety if it works or not.

Making the dough was a little bit of a challenge and I think I just need to do it a couple more times to get it to that right elasticity and consistency. I used portabellas, white button, and enoki mushrooms along with the white part of the leek. For the cheese, I used gruyere and pecorino romano. Even though I had a challenge with the dough this came out spectacularly and was an excellent Friday night dinner along with some red wine. Wine and pizza that’s how adults spend Friday nights. Especially with the soil smelling mushrooms this pizza was really good with red wine. Perfect combination. This may be one of those things that will be added to the regular rotation.

Being Catholic this is a season of self reflection and self sacrifice also known as Lent. The tradition is to give up something as a sacrifice and in return the practitioner will be more self aware and be able to better themselves. So what did I give up for Lent? Meat. In the next 40 days T and I will eat as vegetarians. Nothing that moos, nothing that flies, nothing that swims, and *gasp* nothing that oinks! What’s a Filipino to do with our pork? Actually, I’m looking forward to these next few weeks. This will be an opportunity to open up my cooking skills to new dishes and techniques and possibly change my outlook on how to cook. It’s like when people lose one of their senses they quickly adapt by compensating with the remaining ones. I’m hoping that this journey will not only fulfill me spiritually but also culinary-ly. My goal is to document the adventures of cooking outside my comfort zone.

It’s been a while since I’ve posted. I’ve been back in the kitchen and have been cooking weeknight dinners but have not been able to take pictures. Tonight I made sure to take pictures. This is tonight’s dinner (which I didn’t cook haha). The Girl cooked this wonderful stuffed eggplant. Eggplants are one of our favorite vegetables in this house. Tortang Talong is a very weeknight dinner. It’s easy to make and quite stuffing. I’m so full right now as I’m writing this post.

Amounts serves 2-4 people (depending how hungry you are)

Ingredients:
2 Asian eggplants
1/2 medium white onion diced
1 medium tomato diced
1 stalk scallion
2 eggs
salt and pepper to taste
oil for frying

1. Broil the eggplants until the skin is crispy. To make it easier to peel the skin. This takes about 5-6 minutes.
2. Let the eggplant cool down before peeling.
3. Peel. Take a fork to flatten and spread the eggplant.
4. Place the diced tomatoes, onions, and scallions on top.

5. Beat the egg in a bowl (use 1 egg per eggplant). Pour the egg over the eggplant.
6. Heat the oil medium-high and slide in the eggplant from the plate into the pan. The Girl’s tip: Sliding the eggplant from the plate prevents oil splashing.

7. Cook until the eggs are set and it looks golden brown (or a little darker if you want a little bit more crispier).

Thanks for cooking dinner tonight babe!

Eat Filipino Food!

I’ve been in London the last couple of weeks for work and once again been pretty busy and not much time to cook. I have been eating and exploring the food in London so I’d like to share that with you. These aren’t the highest quality pics because these were all taken from my blackberry.

One of the exciting things here that I found are the markets. The last couple of weekends I’ve gone to two markets and had lunch. The first one is Borough Market which has been around since the 13th century and is frequented by the local chefs, foodies and practically everyone.

It’s winter so most of the goods that the farmer’s had were root veggies and these huge lettuce

When I saw this I knew this was what I was going to have for lunch. It looked ridiculously good Cheeeeese!

Here’s the raclette: melted cheese over potatoes and pickled baby cucumber and pearl onions. Yum!

Everything here is extremely fresh….which one do you want? Pheasant, duck, rabbit, hare or the deer? I can still almost see the heart beating in these animals haha. I think you can adobo and sinigang anyone of these Adobo Pheasant now that would be something I need to make.

It was raining all day yesterday and I didn’t feel like going out in the rain too much. However, today was really nice so I went to the Mayfair Farmer’s Market which is close to where I’m staying.

They had quite a variety of honeys, fresh meats, and vegetables. I got a bottle of apple and black currant juice. Haven’t tasted it yet but I will open it very soon and post an update here.

One of the meat vendors was selling a lamb sandwich which looked ridiculously good so I had to try it. It was lamb, spinach, chili sauce, apricot chutney and pineapple chutney on a ciabatta bread. It was a fantastic lunch!

It’s been great to explore the markets here in London. If anyone has info on where to get good Filipino food in London let me know. I’m here for a few more days.