Bola-Bola with Upo and Carrots

I remember my mother making bola-bola when I was young and thought, "Why isn't there more misua?!" Her version was soupy, flavorful, and had lots of vegetables swimming in the broth. However, for my 10 year old self, it just wasn't enough of those slippery noodles to eat with my rice! 

As I continued to eat this dish when I got older, I vowed that when I was making my own food, I'd add so much of those fine flour noodles that it would be a satisfying bite each time! Fast forward to now and when I firstbmade this, it was a disaster! I'd put so much of the noodles that it was just a glob of paste in the pan (especially after it sat and cooled). Disaster, I tell you!

I've tweaked my recipe bit by bit, removing excess noodles each time I made it. Now, the current version is perfect...super noodly but still has the looseness for the broth. Each little ladle perfectly how I want it!

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Bola-Bola with Upo and Carrots
(Serves 8 to 10 people)

For the meatballs: 

1 lb ground pok

1 lb ground beef

1/4 cup cornstarch 

3 to 4 scallions, minced

1 cup minced carrots

1 cup minced yellow onion

1 tbsp minced bottled garlic

2 tsp garlic powder

1 tsp salt

1 tsp black pepper

For the soup:

1 large tomato, chopped

1/2 cup shopped yellow onions

1 tbsp minced bottled garlic 

2 tbsp Lee Kum Kee chicken boullion

1/2 tsp black pepper

1/2 tsp garlic powder

1/2 tsp onion powder

1 to 2 tbsp patis

Water

1 1/2 to 2 bundles of misua (fine flour vermicelli)

3 cups large chunk carrots

3 cups large chunk upo

2 large scallions, large sliced

Combine all ingredients of the meatballs together. Fry a little pice to taste the seasoning and adjust as needed. Roll into 2 inch balls (about 12 to 16) and put aside.

In a large pot, add tomatoes, onion, and garlic. Cook down the tomatoes, then add enough water to fill 3/4 of the pot. Season with bouillon, garlic powder, onion powder, black pepper, and patis. Let simmer for 5 minutes.

Add carrots and the meatballs. Bring to a boil, then break the misua into pieces into the pot. Stir and cover. Let simmer another 5 minutes. 

Add the upo and the green on onions. Cover and turn the heat to medium. Let simmer until the upo is tender. Adjust taste as needed, then serve with rice.

Dad's Crab Torta

 

One of my favorite breakfast foods is a Filipino fritter called tortang talons (eggplant fritter). It's typically eaten with rice and a side of tomatoes a dollop of sweet (or spicy) banana ketchup on the side.

When I visited the parents last time, we had some steamed Dungeness crab the night prior and had some leftover. To my delight, Dad turned the leftover crab into a wonderful breakfast treat! Here's the recipe for my Dad's crab torta!

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Crab Torta with Potatoes and Onions

(Makes 4 to 5 fritters)

2 cup chopped Dungeness crab

1 cup potato, diced

1 cup onion, diced

2 green onion, chopped

4 eggs

3 tbsp tapioca starch

3 tbsp water

Salt and pepper, to taste

Fry potato until slightly  softened. Add onion, season with salt & pepper until potato is browned. Remove from heat and mix with crab. Add eggs and mix. 

In a separate bowl, combine water and tapioca starch. Add 3 tbsp of the tapioca mixture to the batter and mix. Add more to taste, if needed. Discard any unused tapioca mixture. Season with additional  salt and pepper, as needed.

Heat pan with oil. Scoop mixture to make 5 inch omelets. Cook each side until golden brown or until inside is no longer runny. Serve with banana ketchup and rice. 

Chicken and Pork Adobo with Sitaw

 

Sometimes I find it hard to eat a lot of Filipino food. Most dishes are meat-heavy and I constantly find myself finding ways to add lots of vegetables to my dishes, if I can. So typically, the Filipino dishes I make are slightly non-traditional that my Mom always finds weird, lol.

One such staple that we always have is adobo...warm, comforting, vinegary, and peppery. My favorite version of adobo is the sitaw or long bean while my sister's is the traditional pork and chicken.  In order to compromise, we decided to marry the two! Is it weird? Nah...I feel like this dish just makes sense. :)

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Chicken and Pork Adobo with Sitaw (Long Beans)

(Makes 8 to 10 servings)

3 to 4 lbs of chicken, pork or combination

2 tbsp minced bottled black garlic

1/4 tsp kosher salt

1 tsp fresh ground pepper

1 large onion, sliced

1/2 cup low sodium soy sauce

1/2 cup vinegar

1/2 cup water

2 tbsp packed brown sugar 

3 to 5 whole bay leaves

2 buches green or white sitaw (long beans), end trimmed and cut to 2-inches

2 tbsp vegetable oil

Optional: 1 pkg of coconut cream powder

Season and toss meat with 1 tbsp garlic, salt, and pepper. In a large hot pan, heat oil until very hot on high. Add meat to pan and sear. Add onions and cook until just softened. 

In a bowl, mix soy sauce, vinegar, water, sugar, and remaining garlic. Add coconut powder here, if adding. Stir well. Add to pan and reduce heat to medium. Cover and let vinegar cook off, about 15 to 20 minutes. 

Once mixture boils, add sitaw to pot. Submerge in liquid and cover. Let cook, covered for 45 minutes. Uncover and reduce liquid by 1/4 or until meat is tender.

fish with a face.

I remember the first time that I ever had a "faceless" fish. It was right after we got to America, back in the early '90's, and were were "fresh off the boat". My father wanted to treat us to a buffet and I had never seen so much food in my life! One thing that I found odd, though, was the fish they served. Sitting there, under the hot heat lamp of the buffet, were slivers of fish flesh floating in an oil-slick of "lemon butter" sauce.

Confused, all I could think to myself was "Where's the rest of the fish?".

Soon after, I learned that people on this side of the world didn't like to see the face of what they were eating. Scratch that, they didn't want to see discernible parts that told them what the animal was. No chicken feet, no pig's head, no fish heads.

Fast forward to the future. I remember the first time that my husband ever had fried fish at my parent's house. While he dutifully ate what was presented to him during dinner, it wasn't until when we got home that he remarked on the "faces" of the fish. He found it odd that we didn't simply fillet the fish then fried it separate from the bones. How different, he remarked.

How do I explain? Eating the entire fish was normal for me. If he wasn't there, I would've cracked the skull open, scooped up the stray bits of flesh and offal, and would of ate it with delicious relish over rice. I would've picked the fish clean until only it's bones were bare and no morsel were left. This was how I was raised . . . to eat everything, waste nothing. And the heads, oh, the heads were the best part. The essence of the fish were contained in those heads.

It was moments like these that reminded me of how truly different we were from each other: my husband, a white mid-western raised boy from a small town in North Dakota. Me, a Filipina with a mix of Philippine roots and big-city Southern California upbringing. Our worlds could not have been any more opposite.

But that's why we're together. He's the ying to my yang, the butter to my toast, the cherry on my sundae. I love the easy-going friendliness he brings to my busy hurried life. Who knew afternoon naps could be so refreshing? And to him, I bring fishes with a face.

My favorite fish would have to be the pompano. It's a relatively firm fish with a nice mild flavor. Wrapped in banana leaf and seasoned with lemon, ginger, garlic, and parsley, this fish turns divine! I served this with my father's daikon radish salad, a type of Filipino sawsawan. We typically have this sawsawn with fried fish, but I had a hankering for it today. It usually consists of grated daikon radish, chopped tomatoes and onion, fresh cilantro, a mix of white vinegar and fish sauce, then seasoned to perfection with salt and pepper.

And yes, I did pick this fish to its bare, bare bones.

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Baked Banana Leaf-Wrapped Whole Fish
(makes 2 servings)

1 whole pampano, scaled and cleaned
1 lemon, sliced
1/2-inch knob ginger, peeled and sliced
handful flat-leaf parsley
1 clove garlic, minced
salt and pepper
olive oil
1 large banana leaf, enough to wrap fish

 
Preheat oven to 375F degrees.

Score the fish diagonally, up to the bone, a few times on each side. Spread the minced garlic in the cavity of the fish. Stuff the cavity with parsley, lemon, and ginger. Drizzle fish generously with olive oil then season well with salt and pepper on each side. Rub oil and seasoning into the fish, making sure to get between the scored flesh.

Wrap the fish in the banana leaf and tie well with either leftover banana leaf or kitchen twine. Bake for 25 minutes of until flesh between the scored skin is opaque. Remove from oven then cut the banana leaf open to expose the fish. Increase oven heat to 450F degrees and continue cooking fish until skin is slightly bubbled and banana leaf has charred, about 2 to 5 minutes. To serve, peel skin from meat and then portion out fish.

recipe in pictures: crab pancit

Today I decided to do something Filipino: my mom's pancit. Pancit is a Filipino stir-fried noodle dish that's popular during celebrations and holidays (although that never stopped her from making it at least once a month). It's a relatively easy dish to do and sometimes my mom would change up the protiens. Normally, though, she would make it with pork, chicken, and shrimp. Since I had a package of imitation crab leftover from my previous recipe, I thought that I would treat myself to a crab version of her dish. I'm not posting a recipe for this since it's not really made properly. Note to self: get powdered annato next time. Picking through my pancit for annato seeds is not good eats. :/

mom-inspired tuna pasta.

My favorite breakfast that my mom makes is ginisang sardinas, which is basically sautéed mackerel sardines in tomato sauce that's served with a side of hot, steamy rice. Her version, though, is slightly different in that she adds additional tomatoes, adds one or two bay leaves, and is heavy on the onion. Finished with a few squeezes of calamansi, and you have a great hefty meal to start the day.

I didn't really fully appreciate her cooking until I got married and started living with my husband. To date, I've only made a handful of Filipino dishes that were either a hit or miss with the hubby. I miss her cooking and I guess that nostalgia (and the fact that the husband is iffy on Filipino food in general) makes me shy away from making Filipino dishes on my own.

Today I was feeling a little homesick. Eating at the table with my mom's generous cooking and having a conversation about the day's events were the norm during dinner time. This was family time and I was missing my family. So to ease that, I decided to make her sardines, but in a more "inspired" version and with an Italian twist.

I started with using an almost 2 to 1 ratio of tomatoes to onions. Adding a good amount of garlic and olive oil followed, then finished it with some lemon juice for acidity and lots of parsley for herbacious freshness. Since sardines in tomato sauce isn't something that we regularly keep in the house, I used chunk light tuna that's always a staple in our pantry. Toss that together with some hearty rigatoni, and dinner was served.

While it's a far cry from my mother's sardines, the flavors were there and the bite from the rigatoni added a pleasant counterpart to the fish. Fusion pasta . . . mmmmmm. As an added bonus, this made for a quick and tasty meal that was ready in less than half an hour. Mom, here's to you!
 

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Tangy Tuna Pasta
(makes about 4 servings)

2 cups dry rigatoni pasta
2 cans chunk light tuna, lightly drained
1 clamshell grape tomatoes, halved (or 2 large tomatoes, roughly chopped)
1 large onion (about 1 cup), thinly sliced
2 to 4 cloves garlic, minced
1 to 2 large dried bay leaves
1/2 cup chopped Italian parsley, divided
2 tbsp lemon juice
salt and pepper, to taste
olive oil

 
Prepare pasta as directed then reserve 1/2 cup of the cooking liquid. Set aside.

In a large skillet, heat 2 to 3 tbsp of olive oil. When the oil is hot, add tomatoes, onions, garlic, and bay leaves to the pan. Cook until the tomatoes have softened then add the tuna and a third of the parsley. Season with salt and pepper.

Sautée for 5 minutes, stirring lightly, then add the drained pasta. Cook for another few minutes. If the mixture is too dry, add some of the reserved pasta liquid as needed.

Remove pasta from heat, discard bay leaves, then stir in lemon juice. Toss in the remaining parsley then adjust seasoning with additional salt and pepper to taste. To serve, drizzle with extra virgin olive oil and additional parsley for garnish.

sharing food.

Now that I don't have instant access to my mom's cooking anymore, I found that I'm eating less Filipino food and more American food. Especially in the things that I cook nowadays for my husband. Being Caucasian, he's got a thing about textures and isn't overly fond of most Asian cuisines outside of Panda Express. In an effort to expose him to more Filipino food besides the usual adobo and pancit (and to help me reconnect to my heritage), I thought that I would make him one of my favorite Filipino dishes: my mother's kare kare.

Kare Kare is a traditional Filipino stew usually made with oxtails and veggies in a savory peanut sauce laced with annato and shrimp paste. It's another of my favorite dishes that my mom makes. In her version, she would use the less expensive beef chuck cuts for stew marbled with a little fat. Also, she adds cabbage to hers and usually blanches the vegetables in the beef broth. I remember that whenever my mom made this, I would eat a couple (sometimes three!) platefuls of it with a heaping dollop of spicy bagoong mixed in the rice. Those were some tasty goodness, right there!

While I might rant and rave about how good this dish is, I wasn't so sure if the hubby would have such a similar response. For one thing, it has eggplants...one vegetable that he's not so keen on. Also, another "weird" ingredient that he might be wary of was the peanut butter. I only had crunchy peanut butter so texture and taste was really something that I was worried about. But I went ahead and made it... hoping for the best. And to cut time, I skipped the blanching of the vegetables in the broth and hoped it would still taste the same...

I really shouldn't of worried. When the hubby walked in, the first thing he commented on was how good the house smelled. Yay! Then, after further investigation in the kitchen, he also remarked on how good the stew looked. Double yay! So when he finnaly took the first few bites, his only complaint was that he wished there were more bok choy (which was funny because I had left out the cabbbage for fear that he wouldn't like it). And you know what the best part of all this was? It tasted just like how mommy makes it! Fuck yeah!

So now, whenever I make this in the future, I won't be plagued by worry or doubt because I know that the hubby will eat it...but most importantly, *like* it as well. Huzzah for sharing cultures!!

P.S., you might notice that the directions don't match the pictures. The instructions below are for my mom's "real" kare kare...with cabbage and banana heart. :)

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Kare Kare
(Beef Stew with Vegetables in Peanut-Based Sauce)

2.5lbs beef chuck roast, cubed
6 to 8 cups water
1 medium-large banana heart, blossoms separated and heart chopped
1/4 cup vegetable oil
1 heaping tbsp annatto powder
4 cloves garlic, minced
1 large onion, chopped
1 tbsp shrimp paste (bagoong)
3/4 cup creamy peanut butter
1 cup rice water (first wash)
2 to 3 small eggplants, sliced into chunks
1 bundle Chinese long beans, cut into 3-inch length
1/4 of a cabbage
2 to 3 baby bok choy, halved
salt, pepper, and garlic powder to taste

In a large pot, add beef and enough water to cover the meat by about 1-2 inches. Season with salt and pepper and cook until the meat is tender, about 2 hours. Strain the meat out once tender, and keep the stock. Set aside.

Take prepared banana heart and blossoms and place in a large saucepan. Add enough stock to cover blossoms then boil until tender. Strain, discard stock, then set aside.

On medium-low, heat the oil in another large pot and stir in the annato powder. Let the annato infuse the oil for about 5 minutes then add the garlic and onions. Increase heat to medium and let cook for a couple of minutes until onion is slightly translucent. Stir in the shrimp paste (bagoong) then add the beef. Cook for another few minutes, stirring constantly.

After the meat just starts to brown, add the rice water and let simmer for five minutes. Stir in the peanut butter. If the mixture becomes too thick, add some reserved beef stock 1/4 cup at a time as needed.

Add the eggplant and banana heart and simmer for another 3-5 minutes. Then add the beans and cabbage, simmering for another 5-8 minutes. Check the consistency of the sauce and add stock as required. Season with salt, pepper, and garlic powder to taste. Lastly, add bok choy, and remove from heat. Cover and let sit for 5-10 minutes to finish steaming the bok choy. Serve with shrimp paste (bagoong) over hot plain rice.