Bambinos (Pan de sal Pizza) is such a simple and unoriginal concoction. It’s not even cooking. It’s just that this afternoon I felt nostalgic about my childhood. Sometimes a food memory can be a comfort. So I remembered my mom ( she died when I was 19). We owned a bakeshop when I was growing up in Cebu (the defunct Sally’s Home Bake Shop). Not only did we serve bread, cakes or pastries, but snacks as well for the hungry customers who would drop by our “tea house”. Mom called her pan de sal pizzas , “Bambinos“. I don’t know if she coined it herself or she got the idea from a recipe book. In fact, I never referred to it as mini pizzas. In the early seventies, commercial pizzas were unheard of.

I looked around for our pan de sal and was surprised that one bread had molds in the bottom. No worries. I scraped them off. I toasted the sliced pan de sal in order to make it tougher like a pizza crust. The heat will kill off the molds too.

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Posted: January 30th, 2009 under Recipes.
Comments: 2

There are probably 500 ways to cook adobo but the one that is most familiar to the children is the adobo with vinegar and soy sauce. I call it my classic adobo recipe because I also cook white adobo.

Here is my usual adobo recipe.

Ingredients

1 kilo pork shoulder or loin cut in 1/2 inch cubes (variation: use half chicken and half pork)
1/3 cup vinegar
2 Tablespoon soy sauce
1 teaspoon salt
4 cloves crushed garlic
1 small bay leaf
1 tablespoon sugar
1/2 cup water
2 Tablespoon cooking oil

direction

1. Combine all ingredients except cooking oil and let stand for at least 30 minutes. The longer the marination, the more flavorful.

2. Simmer covered for 1 hour or until meat is tender. Stir occasionally and make sure meat does stick to the pan. Liquid will reduce and thicken. Drain and keep sauce to the side.

3. Heat cooking oil in a pot. Brown the meat on all sides. Transfer to a serving dish.

4. Pour off the remaining oil from the the pot. Add the sauce in number 2 and cook for two more minutes while scraping off some of the meat that adhered to the pot.

5. Pour sauce over meat. Serve hot.

Taste Variation

1. Use all the ingredients except the Soy sauce.

2. Add more garlic, salt and vinegar instead. This is what we call the white adobo.

3. Add 1 more tablespoon of sugar if you desire a sweeter taste.

4. Add more vinegar if you want your adobo to keep longer.

5. Adobo tastes better a day after it is cooked because all the ingredients and flavorings have seeped in.

You might also want to check my other recipe, Adobong Puti

Next entry, I will feature techniques and tips on how to cook adobo.

Posted: January 25th, 2009 under Pork, Recipes.
Comments: 5

I want to dedicate this Lumpia Shanghai to Ness who emailed me requesting for a lumpia recipe. I cook lumpia all the time but I never bother to take photos. Ness told me that her American boyfriend rwants to appreciate Filipino cuisine. I find it really sweet that she wants to find time to cook for her boyfriend. Here is my recipe, Ness. Hope your boyfriend will love lumpia shanghai.

There are many lumpia versions but I feel this is the easiest to cook. You will need to buy lumpia wrapper at the supermarket.

Ingredients for Filling

1/2 kilo small shrimps, chopped
1/2 kilo ground pork
1/4 cup chopped dried Chinese mushrooms
1/4 cup chopped spring green onion leaves
1/4 cup chopped singkamas
2 eggs
2 Tablespoon soy sauace
1 teaspoon Sesame oil
Dash of salt
Dash of Pepper

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Posted: January 21st, 2009 under Pork, Recipes.
Comments: 3

Another guest post from my sister Lorna is a recipe that made it to the finals during the RFM Corporation’s 25th Anniversary in 1983 is Chit Kiam Siopao. I am copying the recipe “as is” so substitute the ingredients accordingly. If you prefer, Asado Siopao, you can also follow this Asado Siopao Recipe.

Dough:

2 tsps active dry yeast

1-1/2 cup lukewarm water

3/4 cup sugar

4 to 5 cups White King All-Purpose Flour (subsitute with your favorite brand)

3 teaspoons Snow White Baking Powder (subsitute with your favorite brand)

1 tablespoon vegetable oil

Procedure:

1. Soften yeast in lukewarm water with 2 tbsps sugar. Set aside in a mixing bowl for about 5 minutes.
2. Mix together remaining sugar, White King All-Purpose Flour, and baking powder.
3. Add flour mixture to dissolved yeast. Add vegetable oil and knead until the dough is smooth and elastic, for about 20 minutes.
4. Form dough into a ball, place in a slightly-greased bowl and cover with a damp cloth. Let rise for 1 hour or until double in bulk.
5. Punch down dough and form into a rod. Divide dough into 24 pieces.
6. Let rise for 30 minutes.
7. With the cut side up, flatten each piece of dough and put a tbsp of filling, a tbsp of sauce, and a piece of quail egg. Seal well.
8. Put a piece of paper underneath each siopao.
9. Let rise for another 30 minutes.
10. Steam for 20-25 minutes or until done.

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Posted: January 19th, 2009 under Pork, Recipes.
Comments: none

During a rare moment of domesticity, I offered to make kani (crab stick) salad for dinner today. I was inspired by a rather expensive kani salad I had at a Japanese restaurant at Eastwood whose name escapes me now. The kani salad I ordered was incredibly disappointing – not only was there hardly any kani; 70% of the salad was made up of cucumbers. I really, really hate cucumbers.

The kani salad I made tonight was something I just kind of put together by myself. Except for a little help from Google on “Japanese mayo”, I pretty much came up with the recipe all on my own. Here’s what I remember of it:

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Posted: January 12th, 2009 under Recipes, Salad.
Comments: 1

Oatmeal cookies are the all time favorite cookies of my kids. There are many ways to bake Oatmeal Cookies. I have tried all sorts of Oatmeal cookies’ recipe but the best recipe is one that Lauren discovered in the internet called “Wyomings Best Oatmeal Cookies”. I made a little variation to the original recipe by adding nuts. Other than that, the recipe is easy to prepare, bake and is very tasty. Quite healthy too with the natural fiber of oatmeal.

Here is my recipe.

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Posted: January 12th, 2009 under Baking Recipes.
Comments: 10

My friend from the USA sent me this recipe on how she makes cassava cake. When I saw that she used frozen cassava, I was surprised. It’s been awhile since I’ve gone to a Filipino grocery in the states. I am sure a lot of Filipinos can still come up with our native delicacies as long as the Filipino stores carry these ingredients. So here is her recipe:

2 packs frozen cassava

2 packs frozen buko

2 eggs

2 cups sugar 2 cans (16 0z) coconut milk

1 tablespoon vanilla

1/4 cup melted butter

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Posted: January 6th, 2009 under Recipes, kakanin, kakanin, suman, native rice cakes.
Comments: 4

This is the buko pandan that I ate at my cousin’s birthday party. The taste of Buko pandan dessert never fails to tempt me. The green and white colors lures you to take a bite. Here is a buko pandan recipe .

Buko Pandan Salad

Ingredients
8 leaves of Pandan – cleaned well
5 Buko (Coconut)not too hard, not too soft- Grated to strips
Water from 5 Buko (approx. 10 cups)
3 small cans of Nestle Cream
1 medium can of Condensed Milk
2 bars of Green Gulaman
1 3/4 Cups Sugar (more if you want it sweeter)
1 cup Kaong (optional)

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Technorati Tags: Buko pandan

Posted: January 2nd, 2009 under Filipino Delicacies.
Comments: 12