Chayote Tops and Salted Eggs Salad

I found this recipe in Food Magazine (April Issue last year) and I made a twist, since I don't like vinegar in my salad. Instead of blanching, I steamed the chayote tops.
Here's the recipe:
1 bundle chayote (sayote) tops
2 salted eggs
olive oil
balsamic vinegar (optional)
1 big tomato

Cut off the tough lower half of the chayote tops. Steam for few minutes. Set aside.
In a bowl, combine salted eggs and tomato with 1 tablespoon olive oil.
Place a small amount of the chayote tops . Pour the mix salted eggs and tomato on top.

 Right post for Lenten Season(specially Friday)

Happy Friday!

Food Trip Friday

Food Friday

Purple Sweet Potato Chips

First glance at this photo without looking the title, my friends thought it's not purple sweet potato. I had this sweet potato for a long time and I don't know what to do with it. For a change, I made it into chips. Well, not bad although the color is not that appetizing.

1 large sweet potato, peeled and cut into very thin slices
2 cups iced water
oil for deep frying
sugar for dusting

Soaked the sliced sweet potato in iced water for at least 30 minutes.
Drain and allow to dry on paper towels.
Heat the oil in the frying pan. Deep fry sweet potato until crisp.
Drain on paper towels. Sprinkle with sugar before serving.

Potluck Friday

Fat Camp Friday

Luscious Saturday

Sweets for Saturday

Yummy Sunday

Chicken Sopas (Soup)

An ordinary soup but taste great. After eating almost all the meat from roasted chicken, I boiled the left-over, removed all the chicken meat, and used the boiled water as the chicken stock in this soup. In the same pan, cooked a cup of noodles.  In another pan, sauteed garlic, onion, chicken meat, and carrots. Seasoned with salt and pepper, placed in the soup stock, added fresh milk, and a pinched of brown sugar. Added shredded cabbage and celery.

Another meal from left-over chicken.

Seasonal Sunday

Tuesdays at the Table

Tempt My Tummy Tuesdays

Delectable Tuesday

Tasty Tuesdays

Frugal Thursday

Rice Cake

A Filipino favorite rice cake (bibingka), usually with fresh grated coconut and cook in a banana leaf-lined clay mold. This is just  ready mix  in a 250g box, and I baked it in an oven toaster.

250g rice cake mix
3 eggs
50g melted butter
1 cup water
1/2 cup sugar

Heat oven at 190*C. In a bowl, beat eggs. Combine rice cake mix, water, sugar, and melted butter. Mix until well blended. Pour the batter on prepared pans. Bake for 15 minuts or until done. Brush the surface with butter. Sprinkle wit grated coconut. Serve hot.

My Meatless Monday

MM Meatless Monday

Yellow Mellow Monday

Filipino Beef Stew (Caldereta) 2

Another way to cook Filipino Beef Stew, a lot different from my first post Filipino Beef Stew 1. The recipe is from the June Edition of Filipino Food Magazine. In this recipe, almost all the ingredients are fresh.

1/2  kilo beef chunks

2 tablespoons olive oil

4 cloves garlic, minced

1 large onion, minced

1 red bell pepper, diced (omitted)

1 red green pepper, diced

1 hot chili pepper, minced (optional)

2 large fresh tomatoes, diced

1 cup chicken liver, poached and mashed

1/2 cup water (or beef stock)

some grated cheese
some green olives

In a pan, brown the beef pieces in hot olive oil. Remove the beef from the pan and set aside. In the same pan, saute the garlic and onion until soft. Add red and green pepper, tomatoes, and chili pepper. Saute for few minutes. Put the beef back, add mashed liver and stock or water. Simmer for at least 1 hour or until the beef is tender. Add cheese and olives. Continue to simmer until the sauce thickens.

Served on top of steamed rice. I served it with blanched broccoli.

Green Mango Shake

My favorite shake!
It's very refreshing specially this summer!

1 cup green mango, cubed
1 cup water
some crushed ice
1 tablespoon honey

In a blender, combine green mango and water.
Process until smooth.
Pour in honey.
Add crushed ice.
Blend again until smooth.

Chill further before serving.

Sugar syrup can be used instead of honey.
To make sugar syrup, just boil brown sugar in water.
Set aside and cool.

Filipino Beef Steak

Another famous dish in the Philippines is called "Bistek", meaning Beef Steak. As usual different region has different ways to prepare it. The common ingredients are beef, calamsi juice, onion, and soy sauce. Since I only have lime, I used lime instead of calamsi. Here it is:

1/2 kilo beef

1 white onion, sliced into rings

2 tablespoon lime juice

1/2 cup water

soy sauce

bay leaf

Cut beef across the grain into 2-inch portions.

Put water, soy sauce and bay leaf in a saucepan.

Cook beef in this mixture over medium heat.

When the meat is slightly tender, pour in lime juice. Simmer.

Add onion rings before removing from heat.

Since I don't have any vegetables that day,

I got  fresh tomato for side dish.

OK, here it is! Let's eat!

My hubby cooked this one, he marinated the beef

with soy sauce and calamansi juice over night.

Dip: Fermented Salted Fish with Liver Spread

In the Philippines, if there's fried fish in a meal there will be a common side dish either salted eggs with tomato or green mango with fermented fish/shrimp paste dip. But I never thought liver spread can be added to fermented salted fish (bagoong). My friend Eva gave me this recipe and for me it really taste good. It's not salty at all!

3 tablespoon fermented fish
1 small can liver spread
3 cloves garlic, minced
1/2 small onion, chopped
1 teaspoon vinegar (I used lemon)
dash of sugar
water (if too dry)

In a pan, heat 1 teaspoon oil and saute garlic and onion.

Add liver spread and fermented fish. Add vinegar, water and sugar. Mix well.  Serve with green mango.

Here's a sample of how we eat mango with fermented fish dip with meal. My husband cooked this in Las Vegas and sent it to me the day I was making the fermented fish dip.

Kain na! (Let's eat!)

Submitted to:

Bitter Gourd with Salted Eggs

White bitter gourd is common here in Taiwan. I saw some fruit shake stands selling bitter gourd shake and I never tried them yet. I'm afraid, I'm not gonna like it! But given the chance, I would like to try it! ;). This recipe is taken from my cookbook All About Eggs. I added tuna flakes instead of dried shrimps.

Ingredients:
1 bitter gourd, sliced
2 cooked salted eggs, cubed
1/2 tablespoon dried shrimps (tuna flakes)
2 cloves garlic, chopped
1 red chili pepper, sliced
salt and pepper
some sugar

In a pan, heat 2 tablespoon oil and saute garlic, dried shrimps until fragrant. Stir in salted eggs and fry until foamy (If the salted egg is too salty, don't add 1 egg white). Add bitter gourd and combine well. Add some water and seasonings. Stir well and scatter over the chili. Serve.

Note: If the bitter gourd is too bitter, blanch in boiling water with salt.

Chicken and Papaya Soup

One of the famous dish soup in the Philippines is called Tinola or Chicken Soup with Papaya. Actually, I made this without recipe, I just prepared 1 chicken breast fillet, 1/2 green papaya, some ginger, salt and pepper, drop of fish sauce, and dash of chili powder. First, I sauteed the chicken and ginger, then added water to boil. Add the green papaya, and seasoned. In the original recipe, chili leaves are included. Mostly, the chicken added should have bones and skin. This time I used breast fillet and its not that tastier than I tasted before. Still, it's very healthy!

Fresh Bamboo Shoots Spring Roll

For the filling
500g bamboo shoots (ubod), cut into thin strips
200g shrimps, shelled, chopped
1 small onion, chopped
2 cloves garlic, minced
1/2 cup stock (water)
2 stalks spring onion, chopped
salt and pepper; oil for sauteing

For the sauce
1 cup broth (bamboo shoots broth)
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 tablespoon soy sauce
1/4 cup brown sugar (or any)
1 tablespoon cornstarch
2 cloves garlic, minced

For the wrapper
1 cup all purpose flour
1/3 cup tapioca starch
1 egg
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 to 2 1/2 cup water


For the filling
Saute garlic and onion.
Add shrimps, stirring until done or shrimps turn pink.
Pour water. Cover pan and let it boil.
Add bamboo shoots. Stir and simmer for 3-5 minutes.
Season with salt and pepper according to taste.
Transfer to a separate dish, allow to cool.
Drain excess broth and set aside.

For the Sauce
Combine broth, sugar, soy sauce, and salt.
Allow to boil.
To thicken, pour in cornstarch dissolved in water.
Add minced garlic.
Remove from heat and set aside.



For the wrapper
Combine the flour, starch, egg, salt, and water.
Mix well and strain the mixture.
Place Teflon pan over low heat,
pour a small amount mixture just enough to cover the pan.




let's make our Fresh Bamboo Shoot Spring Roll

Place a wrapper on a flat surface, add a spoonful of mixture.
Fold one side of the wrapper just to cover the mixture.


Then fold left and right sides, and roll forward to wrap the mixture.

Serve with sauce on top, sprinkle some onions and peanuts.

There are two ways how to eat spring roll: serve the sauce separately,
use hand to eat the spring roll and just dip it in a sauce.


By using fork, pour the sauce on top of the spring roll, cut and mix well.


Here in Taiwan, we have so much bamboo shoots available all year long. Mostly, Taiwanese add bamboo shoots to their soup, sauteed vegetables, boil and dip it in a mayonnaise, or make it into a fermented bamboo shoots In my hometown (Angeles City), we have this favorite restaurant (Perfect Loaf) offering fresh bamboo shoots lumpia and I never tired eating it. I always wonder how they make the wrapper, here it is my first try!
This recipe once again is adapted from Christie Lee's Pagkaing Pinoy  cookbook. Originally, it has pork added into the mixture. How to make wrapper is not included in the book, I found it a Chinese cookbook and just made a twist.

Fresh Bamboo Shoots Spring Rolls

Filipino's Beef Stew (Kaldereta)

Beef Caldereta or Beef Stew (Filipino Style)
1 kilo beef, cubed
6 hot dogs, sliced diagonally
2 heads garlic, minced
1 small pack tomato sauce
6 potatoes, quartered (I used 4)
1 medium carrot, sliced
1 red pepper, sliced and pitted
2 tablespoon liver spread (I used 1 small can)
salt and pepper to taste
small pack of kaldereta mix (optional)
1/4 cup grated cheese
1 cup sweet peas
oil fr frying

Marinate beef overnight in a mixture of 1 tablespoon salt,

1/4 teaspoon black pepper, and 1 head of garlic.

In a saucepan, heat oil and fry meat until slightly brown.

Set aside, saute chopped onion and 1 head of garlic.

(You can also remove the beef first) Pour in tomato sauce.

Mix beef and add hot dogs. Add enough water to cover the meat.

Simmer until the meat is tender.

Add potatoes, carrots, and red pepper. Stir. Add liver spread,

instant kalderta mix (optional), sweet peas, grated cheese, salt and

pepper to taste. Cook until the sauce is thicken.

In the Philippines, we called it "Kaldereta" or Caldereta", comes from the Spanish name "Caldera" (cooking pot). In other words stewing meat in a totally immersed liquid in a pot. There are different ways how to make Caldereta and I never been cook this dish for others, so this time I'm adapting Christie Lee's Pagkaing Pinoy for our Mother's Day potluck get together in St. Francis Church (Xizhi, Taipei County). I followed the recipe except for kaldereta mix and the liver spread. I added one small can instead of 2 tablespoon of liver spead. I'm just thinking if I will not add all of the liver spread, no one will eat it!

Here's a glimpse of the Filipino Food @ our small gathering:

Beef Stew

Lumpiang Shanghai (Pork Handrolls)

Macaroni Salad

Spaghetti

The rest... cake ordered from Costco, and fresh watermelon!

Happy Mother's Day!!!

****

I'm not a mother yet, and it's so touching to received message like this:

"tita lani,, HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY! you may not have your own "yet" pero since i was little,, you've always treated me like a daughter.. from washing my ehem.ehem. when i made poo poo to watching me graduate,, you were there,, so happy to call you a mom and any child would be proud to call you mom!!! i love you! happy mother's day!!! :))"