My husband’s favorite pasta dish has got to be lasagna. Whenever we have guests, he makes this special request and I tell him that it gets to be boring. Well, I think lasagna is an all-time favorite for most pinoys.Lasagna involves three steps: The tomato meat sauce, boiling the pasta and the preparation of the bechamel sauce.

Let’s make the Bechamel sauce first:

Ingredients

3/4 cup butter
1/4 cup flour
2 cans evaporated milk (i can is equivalent to 225 ml or 1 cup)
1 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon pepper
1/4 teaspoon nutmeg

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Posted: November 10th, 2009 under Beef, Pasta, Recipes.
Comments: 18

Who says cooking has to be labor-intensive? Preparing filipino dishes can entail so much preparation and if you are feeling lazy, there are alternatives like easy to cook recipes that are just as delicious. I got invited to a Dona Elena Cuisenra Club cooking demo on “Easy to Cook Recipes” at the Podium last saturday with a presentation of 3 easy to cook recipes. Even your teenage kids or siblings can prepare this pasta dish. I have prepared a similar pasta in the past and my kids loved it. This attractive dish can also be great for parties or when you suddenly have surprise guests. You don’t need to call fastfood chains to deliver food to your home.

Ingredients

1/4 cup Dona Elena Pure Olive Oil
10 pieces Garlic cloves, peeled
1 Tablespoon Chili flakes (dried)- this is optional if you don’t like spicy dishes
20 pieces Dona Elena Anchovy Fillets (you can substitute with spanish sardines)
2 cups Cherry tomatoes, cut in half
1/4 cup Dona Elena Capers, drained.
To taste salt and pepper
250 grams Penne Pasta
for garnish, parsley chopped
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Posted: August 24th, 2009 under Pasta, Recipes.
Comments: 3

I never tasted Laing Pasta until I had it for a Goldilocks event last Friday. (You might want to read my winning entry of the You’re the 1, Goldilocks where Goldilocks judged me as first prize winner). I thought it was such a novel idea, similar to the pesto pasta that we often prepare at home. It is our own version of pinoy pasta. When I tasted it though, it wasn’t that delicious as I imagined it to be. I think the laing was too dry, lacked some meat and “keso”. I imagined eating laing with “kesong puti”. So here is what I prepared at home and made my own pata laing a bit moist and added “kesong puti”

You will need:

1. Laing- To prepare laing, read my laing recipe and skip steps 4 and 5. Reduce the laing until you have the right consistency for the pasta. I am sure you have an idea on the consistency of your pasta mix.

2. Boiled Pasta noodles.

3. As a twist, use shredded “kesong puti” or cottage cheese instead of the usual cheddar cheese or parmesan cheese.

4. When serving the Laing pasta, serve the laing and pasta separately so one can choose to decide the amount of the laing or pasta.

Posted: August 12th, 2009 under Coconut Milk, Pasta, Recipes.
Comments: 2

I started my herb garden when we moved to our new home. It’s a great feeling to pick freshly homegrown basil and add it to our pasta. This afternoon, I cooked Shrimp and Pasta with Pesto sauce to make up for the Lechon Manok that I was supposed to buy.

Here is the recipe that is even beginners can follow.

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Posted: June 30th, 2009 under Pasta, Recipes, Seafood.
Comments: 4

Before Jollibee or even Tropical Hut came out with the Filipino version of the Italian Spaghetti, there was Makati Supermarket’s spaghetti sold in their coffee shop in the early sixties. This is probably how the sweetish Filipino spaghetti evolved. A popular American blogger once commented that our Jollibee spaghetti tasted horrible. It must have seemed different from Italian spaghetti since the latter is sour. Filipino spaghetti has sweet sauce.

Filled with vienna sausage, ham strips, ground beef and grated cheese, the sauce of Makati Supermarket’ spaghetti is sweet with a tinge of spiciness. When I was in college during the mid-seventies, my dorm-mates and I would travel all the way from the UP campus to Makati Supermarket in Ayala. The supermarket does not exist anymore. These days you can eat their spaghetti at Cash and Carry Supermarket along , President Osmena Highway (South Superhighway) near Buendia Makati City and Makati Supermarket in Alabang.

A reader pointed out to me that some evidence of an even earlier birth of the “pinoy spaghetti” exists in the memoirs of Gen Douglas McArthur (yes the “I shall return guy”). I am not able to pull the line verbatim but it went mostly like this:

this sauce, so sweet on spaghetti, hardly seems like spaghetti sauce but it is good.

Through the years, I developed my own Filipino-Style Spaghetti Sauce. If you are in a hurry, you can always buy those ready-to-use Filipino Style Spaghetti sauce sold at the supermarket. But let me tell you, there is nothing more srcumptious than cooking spaghetti sauce in your own special touch. Here is my recipe which you can always innovate.

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Posted: May 24th, 2009 under Pasta, Recipes.
Comments: 10

During our dorm days at Sampaguita Residence Hall at UP Diliman, my aunt shared with me her fabulous Tuna Spaghetti. I remember preparing this dish one year for our annual Open House at “Sampa.” Check it out!

For every pack of Italian spaghetti (regular-sized box of 500 grams), use the following:

2 cans of tuna or tuna flakes or approximately 1 cup (in oil or water, your preference)
2 cans of tomato sauce or around 2 cups (I did not say tomato paste)
1 box of grated Kraft cheddar cheese or 1 cup (225 grams- the same size as a bar of butter)
2 cans of Campbell’s cream of mushroom soup
1/2 cup of mushrooms, sliced
pepper to taste
salt to taste
dash of Italian seasoning

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Posted: March 6th, 2009 under Pasta, Recipes.
Comments: 9

The origin of the “whore Spaghetti” was invented by one particular working girl. Another story is that it was the favorite recipe of the girls themselves. Yet another version of the putanesca recipe is that the name is only descriptive. Whatever the origin, the girls love flavors of Putanesca. I usually cook this pasta dish during birthdays or anniversary celebration. It’s so easy to cook.

8-12 cloves garlic
1 onion, chopped
8 tablespoons olive oil
1/2 cup capers
1/2 cup black olives
2 packs tomato paste (each pack is 150 grams)
1 cup water
6 whole tomatoes, stewed and chopped
Basil and Rosemary to taste

2 cans anchovies in olive oil (no capers) , served separately
Parmesan Cheese to sprinkle
Pasta noodles

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Posted: February 25th, 2009 under Pasta, Recipes.
Comments: 4

I normally cook Creamy Carbonara but here is a recipe for those that can’t stand creamy pasta sauce. Here is the traditional Spaghetti Carbonara recipe which tastes just as heavenly as creamy carbonara.

Spaghetti

500 grams spaghetti
6 quarts salted boiling water
1 tablespoons vegetable oil

1. Add spaghetti noodles to salted boiling water, bring water back to a boil.
2. Cook spaghetti until Al Dent (barely tender) about 6-8 minutes (Tasting is the only way to test doneness. Never overcook pasta)
3. Add oil during the last 2 minutes. To keep spaghetti from sticking together wen it is drained.
4. Drain but leave hot, ready to use.

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Posted: December 19th, 2008 under Pasta, Recipes.
Comments: 10

One of the dishes I prepared for our last Christmas day lunch in our old home in Makati in the year 2005 was Chicken Cannelloni. The young ones particularly raved the rich creamy Chicken Cannelloni. The recipe came from my sister, Lorna who modified it many times. I forgot to take a close-up photo of the Cannelloni dish but it’s the rectangular pyrex on the table. The great thing about Cannelloni is that I can prepare it a day before , freeze it and heat it on Christmas Day itself. It takes the stress away from cooking so many dishes in one day.

Cannelloni usually refers to rectangular pasta sheets that are rolled with a filling. However, sometimes the pasta dough is replaced with a cooked crepe, generally 3 to 4 inches in length and once rolled, one inch in diameter. After cooking the crepe (or boiling the pasta), it is typically filled with a savory stuffing which may include ricotta cheese, spinach, and various meats. It is then covered with a sauce, typically classic tomato or bechamel sauce, although many variations exist.

(wikipedia)

My Cannelloni version uses Bechamel sauce, chicken and ready made pasta as shown below:

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Posted: December 6th, 2008 under Noche Buena, Pasta, Recipes, chicken.
Comments: 8

The Real Carbonara Spaghetti is not really creamy. The noodles are coated in eggs and cheese. There is another way to cook Spaghetti Carbonara using processed foods at the grocery. This is really handy when you suddenly have guests that arrive. The canned goods comprise of canned mushroom soup, cream, ham, bacon and fetuccine noodles. You are also assured that the taste will come out a best seller. Try this next time when you have surprise guests. Here is the creamy carbonara recipe:

Ingredients

2 cans Creamed of Mushroom Soup (preferably Campbell)
250 ml All Purpose Cream (Nestle)
200 grams sweet ham, in small squares
200 grams bacon, shredded
Spinach Fettucine (400 grams noodles are green and I like the contrast of the white creamy carbonara sauce against the green noodles)
1 head garlic
a dash of nutmeg
a dash of pepper
Olive Oil
1/2 cup parmesan cheese for topping

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Posted: September 7th, 2008 under Pasta, Recipes.
Comments: 25