This week, Weekend Herb Blogging is being hosted by Christa of Calendula & Concrete.

Thanks to Kalyn, this event has been a constant source for me to find new recipes to try with the produce from our garden. This week, I'd like to feature a vegetable we call "sitaw" in the Philippines. This vegetable goes by many names and many faces as Karen's post on it would tell you. Here in the U.S., it is simply called yard-long beans because its pods can grow up to a yard long. I had posted a recipe for yard long beans last year when I had an abundance, and as I look to my archives, I am surprised I didn't post more recipes for it since I had so many! So here goes another one.

The title, gising-gising, in Pilipino means "wake-up wake-up" literally. I suppose it could be translated as a waker-upper for it would certainly awaken your palate if it isn't already. This dish can be made using the common green beans found in most supermarkets, or if you're lucky enough like I was and happen to have these yardlong beans in your garden, then we're in business to wake up our palates.

I had an abundance of these beans last year and they were so wonderful that I wanted more this year. Imagine my disappointment when I couldn't find the seeds anywhere this year. Last year, I found a packet in our local Home Depot. After my futile search for seeds this year, and I didn't want to resort to ordering them online, I had resigned myself to doing without them this season. I must have been a very good girl though, for the garden gods or my resident composter/gardener/husband had blessed my garden and three of these bean plants sprouted up to surprise me. I have been harvesting a handful of these yardlong beans just about every other day, to my delight.

With these beans on hand I finally get a chance to try out this waker upper recipe that has been touted by blogger friends. Mec finally posted her recipe for this, and although I don't have all the ingredients she used, this dish turned out wonderfully. Even with the spiciness, which is optional but of which I don't think this dish would be the same without, the girls actually liked it!

Mec's Gising-Gising

2 Tbsp. Cooking Oil
3 cloves of Garlic, chopped
1 medium onion, chopped
4 cups chopped Yard-long beans (about a pound and a half)
1 Tbsp. Maggi Seasoning
1 Tbsp. Patis or Fish Sauce or to your taste
1 can Coconut milk (about 1 1/2 cups)
2 fresh chili peppers, minced (I used serrano chilis from the garden) - optional if you don't want it spicy.

Heat the oil and saute' garlic and onions until they are fragrant but not browned. Stir in the beans and the rest of the seasonings and bring to a simmer. Don't let it come to boil so the coconut milk will not separate. Let it cook just until the beans are tender but not overcooked.





Filipino Cookbooks

Just because this is an HERBY dish, I decided to make this my entry for this week's Weekend Herb Blogging, which is back home in Kalyn's Kitchen this week.


Are you going to Scarborough Faire.... Know that song? That is what this dish is named after. Why? Because it has parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme, of course! All these herbs we have in our garden so I thought why not make a recipe out of the song and at the same time use these individually packaged chicken thighs that Costco, our favorite store, have started carrying. They contain 5 thighs in each pack which is perfect for our family, there's five of us!

Chicken is cheap and baking is easy so a baked chicken dish of one sort or another is pretty common in our kitchen. This dish is something we came up with just to have something different for a change.



10 Chicken Thighs
3 Tablespoons Butter
Parsley, Sage, Rosemary & Thyme (probaby about a tablespoon each, chopped)
1 teaspoon garlic powder
2 cups Flour
1 can Evaporated Milk
Salt & Pepper to taste

Place the butter in a baking dish in the oven, heated to 375 degrees, to melt. In the meantime, season chicken thighs with salt, pepper, and garlic powder. Coat each chicken piece with flour and lay on the baking dish skin side up. Pour the milk and about half a can of water in the dish, sprinkle with the herbs, and bake for 375 degrees for 45 minutes to an hour until the chicken is tender and the liquid has thickened to form a gravy.

This time served with Beet Greens with Garlic and as always, steamed rice.

This week, Weekend Herb Blogging is being hosted by Cooking Adventures of Chef Paz, since that busy lady Kalyn is attending the Blogher conference in California.

Although the title is weekend HERB blogging, the rules just requires that the post be about an herb, plant or flower. I thought this would be a great way to show off these beautiful swiss chard. I just wish there was a way for me to preserve the colorful stalks. With the abundance of swiss chard from our garden, I have been on the lookout for different ways to cook chard. The girls tend to favor them plainly sauteed with just a bit of butter, but I like to try new recipes, and they gamely indulge me sometimes. This is one of those times.

While bloghopping not too long ago I ran across a post about chard on the Scent of Green Bananas. This is where I got this idea of spicing up chard, but I used pinenuts rather than peanuts as Santos did.

INGREDIENTS:
2 Tbsp. Butter
2 Tbsp. Olive Oil
3 cloves of Garlic, minced fine
1 small Onion, chopped
1/2 cup Tomatoes, chopped
1/2 tsp. each of: Coriander seeds, dried red chili peppers, turmeric, curry powder
Salt & Pepper to taste
Toasted Pinenuts
Swiss Chard - use as much as you like or whatever you have on hand

Heat butter and olive oil and saute' the garlic and onion until fragrant. Add the tomatoes and cook until onions are translucent and tomatoes start to render their juices. Add the spices and cook another minute stirring occasionaly. Add the swiss chard which have been washed and cut into one inch lengths. Season with kosher salt and fresh cracked black pepper. Cook just until chard wilts and sprinkle with toasted pinenuts just before serving.

Thank you, Chef Paz for hosting this week's WHB.

I finally got around to posting something for Weekend Herb Blogging which was started by Kalyn's Kitchen! The garden has been doing really well especially the herbs, so I thought this event would be the perfect way to feature these goodies from our backyard.

From one pack of beets seed, we've had a bumper crop of beets this season. I haven't motivated myself yet to start canning anything so we've been eating a lot of greens and beets. So far our favorite way of fixing beets is this fresh pickled recipe which I put together from several sites on the web. The addition of fresh dill is a must. The dill heightens the natural sweetness of the beets perfectly. We have also tried it without the dill, and the flavors were a bit flat without that extra kick from the dill so if you can, don't leave it out.

To cook the beets, first cut the tops off, leaving an inch on the roots, and reserve for another dish. Don't be tempted to peel them first as I was because this will cause a lot of the pretty red coloring to bleed out, and bleeding out is not a good thing even for vegetables. That means don't cut the root tendrils off either just wash the roots throughly and boil the beet roots unpeeled until tender, about 20 to 30 minutes. You can cook them longer if you prefer them to be more tender. 30 minutes, I found, is the perfect cooking time for me as at this point they are thoroughly cooked but still have a bit of a 'bite' to them. Rinse them under cool running water, cool, peel and slice into rounds or quarters.

In a small bowl combine:
1/4 cup apple cider vinegar
1 tablespoon sugar
1 tablespoon olive oil
1/4 teaspoon each of salt & black pepper
about 1 tablespoon of fresh dill, chopped (add more if you prefer I was being a bit cautious this time around)

Pour the dressing over the prepared beets and let marinate at room temperature for at least 30 minutes before serving.