See the recipe for Sassy Sarciado.

Whenever I see this grouping of vegetables, the first thing that comes to mind is another traditional Filipino dish called Pinakbet. This is what I call Pinakbet waiting to happen. When cornered into translating this dish for English speakers, I simply call it vegetable stew. Basically, that is what it is, a melange of vegetables stewed until their flavors meld.

I called this one Pinakbet Tagalog because that is what my Ilocano grandmother calls this sauteed with meat version. The Ilocano version uses no oil and uses Bagoong (fermented anchovies) instead of Alamang (shrimp paste).

Although this dish is traditionally cooked with pork, I have also cooked this as a side dish sans the meat and it is just as delicious. The combination of the vegetables is just classic. There have also been occasions when I didn't have bittermelon on hand, plus the girls arent' too crazy about the bitter gourd, so I have also been known to leave this particular vegetable out. There are many variations to this dish so don't be afraid to substitute or add other vegetables of your choosing. Another traditional ingredient to this dish that I didn't happen to have this time around is butter squash which I have also substituted with zucchini squash. No matter which vegetables you choose to "stew", the mandatory ones for me to be considered pinakbet are the eggplants and okra. Luckily, I have the holy trinity of Pinakbet in my garden and as the weather is starting to turn cool and I will soon be without these, I figured as a last hurrah to the summer I would cook Pinakbet one more time.

INGREDIENTS:
1/2 lb. Pork (with some fat on it - I used pork butt)
2 tablespoons Oil
1 Onion, sliced
4 cloves of Garlic, chopped
Thumb sized knob of Ginger, sliced into rounds
1 cup Tomatoes, chopped (I used cherry tomatoes)
2 Tablespoons of Shrimp Paste (Alamang)

Start by cooking the meat in about 1 cup of water until all the liquid evaporates and the meat starts to render some fat. Depending on how much fat is rendered, you may have to add another tablespoon or two of oil to saute' the rest of the ingredients in. When the pork is slightly browned on the edges, add the garlic and onions and cook until fragrant, about a minute or two. Add the ginger, tomatoes and shrimp paste and cook for another couple of minutes until the tomatoes have softened and flavors are starting to blend. Note: if you can't find shrimp paste or just don't want to add it, you can omit it. I have also been known to do this especially when I want my non-fish-eating daughter to eat some of it.

The vegetables you use depends on what you have on hand. This time around I added to this dish:
3 cups of Yard-long beans and regular Green Beans combined
a few florets of cauliflower (because that is all that is left in the garden and wanted to cook them up)
1 Bell Pepper, cut into squares
3 Japanese Eggplants, cut into serving size
10-15 pods of Okra, stem removed
1 medium sized Bittermelon, sliced diagonally
1 cup of water

Add the water to the sauteed onions and tomatoes, mix briefly then start layering the vegetables in the pot starting with the vegetable that takes the longest to cook up to the one the takes the least time to cook. The vegetables above are ordered in the way they were layered in the pot. Cover, and cook for about 7 to 10 minutes until the vegetables are tender but not overcooked. Stir just before serving to distribute the flavor of the aromatics at the bottom of the pot and to mix the vegetables. Serve over rice.

This post is my contribution to this week's Weekend Herb Blogging which was conceptualized by Kalyn's Kitchen to feature different herbs, vegetables, plants or flowers. This week, this event is being hosted by Sher at What Did You Eat?

Filipino Cookbooks

Adobo. There's tons of recipes for adobo to be had on the internet. Some of them probably a lot better than my version, but since the purpose of this blog is to have a repository of our family recipes for my girls to refer back to someday, I will post our easy version for adobo.
We have chicken adobo at least twice a month, sometimes more often, depending on our mood. Lately though, we have been having a love affair with potatoes, especially the yucon golds. They just have so much flavor! I don't know.

My mom says that my lola (grandmother) puts potatoes in her adobo as an extender, to make the dish feed more people. She is right. It used to amaze me how my grandmother would feed eight to ten people with one chicken! Well, we add potatoes to ours because we love the flavor, and adobo tastes even better the next day after the flavors have had a chance to blend further. This is one of our favorites.

INGREDIENTS:
1 whole chicken, cut up
10-12 cloves of garlic or 1 head, chopped coarsely
1 large or 2 medium onions, sliced
3 bay leaves
1 tsp. whole peppercorns
1/2 cup soy sauce
1/4 cup cider vinegar
1/2 cup water
4-5 yucon gold potatoes, quartered

Layer all the ingredients except potatoes in a pot and bring to a boil. Reduce the heat to a simmer and cook for 30 minutes. After 30 minutes of cooking, add the potatoes and cook for another 20 minutes or until sauce has reduced but not quite dried out yet. My family likes to have some sauce to pour over the rice so we tend to make our adobo on the saucy side. Some people make adobo on the dry side, even frying up the pieces after cooking in the sauce.



Filipino Cookbooks

Pork apritada is a Filipino pork stew, better described by the Radical Chef, in relation to other tomato based stews common in the Philippines. I used her recipe and a simpler version from my one of only two Filipino cookbook, Let's Cook with Nora by Nora Daza, to come up with this version. I usually cook chicken apritada, but this time I thought I'd try it with pork.

Continue to the Pork Apritada Recipe.

I saw this recipe on Sassy's Blog and thought it may be a good thing to try. Cooking chicken as often as we do, the same recipes over and over again get tiresome, so it's always great to discover a new way of treating the same meat.



I had to make minor adjustments to the recipe though, since I didn't have liquid seasoning and didn't have time to go out to the grocery store.

1 whole chicken
1/4 cup Worcestershire Sauce
1/4 cup soy sauce
1 head of garlic, chopped
1 large onion, sliced
3 cups tomatoes (I used frozen quartered tomatoes from my summer garden)
1 20-oz can of pineapple chunks (a little more than what's called for in Sassy's recipe, but I didn't want to bother about putting the other half of pineapples in the refrigerator. Knowing us, it will still be there growing something in a month or so, so better to use it now)
1 tablespoon of rice vinegar
4 tablespoons of sugar
Red pepper flakes
4 tablespoons of butter
Salt to taste

I followed Sassy's instructions and marinated the chicken in half the garlic, 1/4 cup of Worcestershire sauce, and 1/4 cup of soy. Then put the mixture over medium high heat while I prepared the rest of the ingredients.

In a separate pan, I sauteed the garlic, onions and tomatoes in butter. I then added the sauteed vegetables and the rest of the ingredients to the chicken and simmered them until the chicken is tender, about 40 minutes. Adjust the seasonings and serve.

It was delicious! I couldn't get The Clone to try it though, she thought I was serving her the pig's feet I cooked last night :) She didn't trust me even when I swore it was chicken, so she just ate rice and nothing else. Actually, I think she was saving room for dessert.

I have been tracking Manang's posts on the unwanted parts of pork, and she got me hankering for something sinful, and I have been eyeing these pig's feet at the grocery store for some time but I wasn't sure how to cook them. So I too referred to Sassy's recipe for paksiw na pata.



I used dried lily buds like Manang since I don't have bulaklak ng saging as Sassy's recipe called for. As usual, I was the only one who ate this. Hubby tasted the sauce and liked it, but he said the rest of the stuff was too fatty. He put the sauce over his rice. Asi tasted it and liked it too. Jade and the Clone won't even taste it. Oh well, more for me. I had to put half in of it in the freezer though, so I won't overdo it. Still gotta watch the fats, you know :).