milenyo

storm milenyo devastated the metropolis bringing in strong winds and tons of rain.

this is the worst flood we had experienced. water nearly went in the house. knee deep flood is just in front of our place.

no electricy. no water. good thing water pressure from the local district supplier reached our home. it was a slow trickle but it filled all our containers. i also had the chance to squeeze in a quick shower in the dark.

we're back in office now. the family's fine and healthy. i just hope that the electricity will be back tonight when we go home.

milenyo

storm milenyo devastated the metropolis bringing in strong winds and tons of rain.

this is the worst flood we had experienced. water nearly went in the house. knee deep flood is just in front of our place.

no electricy. no water. good thing water pressure from the local district supplier reached our home. it was a slow trickle but it filled all our containers. i also had the chance to squeeze in a quick shower in the dark.

we're back in office now. the family's fine and healthy. i just hope that the electricity will be back tonight when we go home.

milenyo

storm milenyo devastated the metropolis bringing in strong winds and tons of rain.

this is the worst flood we had experienced. water nearly went in the house. knee deep flood is just in front of our place.

no electricy. no water. good thing water pressure from the local district supplier reached our home. it was a slow trickle but it filled all our containers. i also had the chance to squeeze in a quick shower in the dark.

we're back in office now. the family's fine and healthy. i just hope that the electricity will be back tonight when we go home.

galunggong is still cheap

prices are now jacking up. but, generally, price of galunggong is still cheap.

we had galunggong for dinner. it was only about 75 pesos for 10 pieces. the fish was enough for the three of us plus an additional lunch pack for my hunny. this makes the 75 peso meal good for 4 servings. that's about 18 pesos per serving and the serving is good.

fried galunggong

10 pieces galunggong
oil for frying
salt
little wine

clean the fresh fish. remove the gills and the intestines. wash with running water.
sprinkle generously with salt. add about 1/2 cup of wine. marinate for about 10 minutes.

put oil in hot pan. place enough oil in the pan so that it can cover half the body of the fish.

fry the first side of the fish for about 15 minutes in medium heat. we fry the fish crispy brown so that i can eat the whole head. do not move the fish until it is well done on one side. moving it before it is done will destroy the flesh of the fish.

flip over the fish to cook the other side. fry for another 10 minutes.

serve with boiled tomatoes with bagoong.

fortuner ride

we rode the new car of our friend juday. she got a good toyota fortuner. that was a very nice car.

i further got in love with the car when i learned that going to baguio and back to manila needs only 1,900.00 pesos worth of gasoline.

even better than the honda civic of my dad.

i hope to get one fortuner as well.

birthday of ima

we went to san luis last weekend for a surprise visit to ima's birthday. we didn't announce our arrival to surprise them.

we brought a nice big cake for ima and she's very much surprised. the cake was so good that it was consummed in just a few minutes.

chocolate trimmings were pulled out first from the cake leaving a messy dessert which shows all the children (young and old) had good fun.

i hope that the fun would continue forever.

corned beef shangrila

we haven't gone to the supermarket so i dropped by a grocery store just to get something simple for dinner. i had a reliable can of corned beed and some veggies. these veggies are available anytime and when assembled, you'll be surprised on how it looks. tastes good too!

corned beef shangrila

1 300 gram canned corned beef
1 medium onion, sliced in thick rings
1 tablespoon of chopped garlic
1/2 cup leeks, chopped in 1 inch slices
2 baby carrots, sliced in thin rounds
salt and pepper

in a hot pan, add little oil and fry the garlic till golden. add the onions till soft. add the canned corned beef. add little water to prevent from drying. add the carrots. heat through for about 3 minutes. add the leeks. adjust the salt and pepper to taste.

surviving no food from nowhere: egg stew

my hunny made an interesting stew last night. we rummaged again through our ref and our food cab and had made this egg stew. the eggs we used came from organic free range chickens. sounds so nice and cool but acutually they are just eggs from a homeless local chicken running around our rural home.

egg stew

6 eggs
1 medium onion, chopped
1 cup tomato sauce
salt and pepper

boil the eggs till well done. remove the shells.

on a pan, saute the onion till soft. add the tomato sauce. simmer for about 5 minutes. add the eggs. stir. add salt and pepper to taste.


A variation is available. Going through our food cab, we saw dried vermicelli available.

Vermicelli Egg Soup

Do the Egg Stew as stated above, add 3 cups of water. then add ample amount of cut vermicelli into the stock. if you want a soupy stock, lessen the vermicelli. once the vermicelli is added, expect the stock to lessen as it will be absorbed by the noodles. adjust the salt and pepper afterwards.

dried preserved fruits

when we were in china, we went to a neighborhood grocery and got dried fruits.

the chinese have a very simple technology of preserving fruits in abundance.

we got a small seeminly berry-like fruit. it's now brown and don't know what it is like when it was still fresh.

taste is sweet, with a hint of cloves, and a touch of spicyness. similar to the spicy tamarind from thailand.

2 to 4 seeds are usually found in the fruit. be careful not to bite the fruit immediately as the seeds are titanium-like hardness.

i never really liked these preserved fruits before... but now, i kinda like them. i'm on my second bag of preserved fruits. i usually take them when i'm in the kitchen, washing the dishes....

classic cheese and butter sandwich

i prepared this morning a simple sandwich that enhances the flavor of the bread.

you will enjoy the flavor as the sandwich is humble and good.

i am using the good bread from shang and a good butter i got from the sup.

classic cheese and butter sandwich

2 thick slices of all-grain brown nut bread
cheese slices
butter

on one side of each bread slice, spread generous amount of butter. this prevents the bread from drying as i would eat the sandwich by lunchtime.

place the cheese slices evenly on the bread.

top the sandwich with the other slice of loaf.

seal properly to prevent drying. my office does not have an oven to toast the bread. but if you have one, it will be better if you toast the sandwich till light golden brown having a texture of thin crunchiness on the face of the loaf but still very soft in the inside.

good bread at half the cost

last friday, we walked around the lobby of makati shangri-la hotel and visited the circles event cafe.

we checked their good buffet food and stuff. new offerings are now available. very different is the addition of chocolates in cosmetic inspired packaging. i wonder if you can bring them home. i see colored chocolates in lipstick form, lollipops in compact powder packs, and other girly stuff deserts.

we also visited their bread section. we found out that they changed their discount hours from 9pm to a very early 6pm! wow! that's is a perfect time for me to go there and get good bread at half the cost! just in time after my office hours of 8 to 5!

now, i'll have good bread everyday in all my lunches at office.

china and macau

we went to macau and china.

my first time to be out of town together with my hunny.

this is quite an experience as we go there with a language barrier to hurdle.

tons of good food and good shopping.

i learned a trick on how to communicate when shopping....

1. remember "do shau". this means: "how much?"

2. then on pricing, all shops have their calculators. communicate by keying in your haggling price on the calculator.... then they will respond with no or yes. ...or they will key in their own price ... and work it from there.

3. try charades.... it will be totally fun and very fulfilling if you successfully send your message through.

blessed mother's day

Today is the birthday of Blessed Mama Mary. She started the life of Jesus and brought him up perfectly to be a very wonderful person.

If all mothers are like Mama Mary, all of us here are like Jesus.

Mama Mary, pray for us. Let our prayers reach Jesus through your intercession.

easy gelato

ice creams here are a bit expensive especially if you know how to make good ones. in our spice cabinet, we have different artificial flavorings available locally. you can use and experiment with them to produce a unique flavor. Sometimes it is very simple that you'll realize that the commercial ice cream manufacturers are making money out of a simple and affordable ingredients.

one discovery i found is just to use butter flavoring. it enhances the flavor of the home made ice cream making it seems richer and improves the taste. below is a sample ice cream that you can make any time.

butter corn gelato

4 tablespoons powdered milk
4 tablespoons sugar
1/8 teaspoon artificial butter flavoring
2 tablespoons fresh corn kernels
1 1/2 cup cold water

in a heavy glass bowl or jar or just plain heavy drinking glass, add water, milk and sugar. mix well till everything is dissolved and mixture is smooth. add the butter flavoring and corn. stir a bit till the flavor is mixed with the milk mixture.

freeze overnight. the next morning, remove the frozen mixture from the freezer. leave it at room temperature for about 5 to 10 minutes or until it is easy to crush. using a spoon, crush and mix the frozen mixture until frothy and slushy.

if desired, place it back into the freezer for another 8 hours. this way, the ice cream will be softer and finer. but if you can't resist it, you can just eat it immediately....

i can do the long process of double freezing since it is more adaptable to the schedule of my office. i make the mixture at night. after i wake up in the morning, i do the crushing to make a slush and place it back into the freezer. and as i arrive back from the office, the slush is ready to be served!

bagoong

i can write a very lengthy subject about this condiment as it touches the culinary roots of the filipinos. you'll find this very aromatic food all over the country. but on this article, i will just show you how to make good bagoong the easy way. the secret here is generosity when using garlic.

the pork fat and skin leftovers i used here are the fat portion of our porkchop leftover.

bagoong

2 cups salted shrimp fry
1 large full head garlic, chopped
1 large white onion, chopped
1 1/2 cup oil
1 teaspoon anato powder
pork fat and skin leftovers

in a pan, heat the oil. add the garlic stiring constantly till evenly golden brown. add the chopped onion. stir till limp. add the salted shrimp fry and the pork fat left overs.

if you want the bagoong less salty, rinse the salted shrimp fry under running water till the saltiness is reduced. the longer you wash, the blander it gets. Following my taste, i did not wash the shrimp fry.

stir until the shrimp fry is well cooked or for about 10 minutes. if a bit dry, add more oil. add the anato powder to improve the color. simmer for 2 minutes more.

bagoong can be served with green mango, singkamas, boiled eggplants, sitaw, ampalaya or pechay. may be used with dips when mixed with vinegar, calamansi, kamias, or tamarind broth. may be used as flavor for saute meals, fried rice, or mixed with mayo.

the use of bagoong listed here is only the tip of the iceberg. you'll enjoy it anywhere possible.

binagoongan ispesyal

it has been a long time since my hunny is requesting for this native delicacy. i believe that there is no other similar meal comes close to this original filipino dish. the secret here is to adobo the pork then fry them before going into the regular binagoongan procedures. When serving, drizzle the dish with calamansi to balance the saltiness of the shrimp fry.

binagoongan ispesyal

STEP 1: ADOBO
4 tablespoons chopped garlic
4 tablespoons cane vinegar
1 tablespoon soy sauce
1 leaf laurel
10 whole pepper corns
1 kilo pork belly chopped in serving sizes

wash and clean the pork belly. in a pan (with the flame still not open) mix the vinegar, soy sauce, chopped garlic. add the laurel leaf and pepper corns. add the pork and mix till the pork is coated.

light now the flame. simmer the pork WITHOUT MIXING. simmer until the pork is tender adding ample amount of water to prevent drying.


STEP 2: FRYING

remove the pork from the reduced adobo broth. set the adobo broth aside. in a separate pan, add about 1 cup of oil. fry the pork till the sides are brown. remove pork from oil and return the pork into the reduced adobo broth. set aside the used oil after frying.


STEP 3: BINAGOONGAN
1 cup red salted shrimp fry
1 whole head chopped onion
1 large onion, finely chopped
1 teaspoon powdered annato seeds (atsuete)

using the used oil you used when browning the pork adobo, add the chopped garlic. stir the garlic till golden brown. add the finely chopped onions. mix till the onions are translucent. add the shrimp fry and simmer for about 15 minutes for the shrimp fry to be well done. add the powdered annato seeds. stir to evenly spread the color.

add the pork adobo together with the reduced adobo broth into the shrimp fry mix. mix and stir through until the flavors work together.

serve with hot rice. it is suggested to serve this dish with grilled eggplants.

blessings!

tita eleng is here and i asked if i can change my peso to her dollars. she said ok.

i went to their place bringing along with my peso savings. when i received the equivalent, it's twice as what i have expected!!!!

wow... tita eleng is so good.

when we are stable in canada, i'll do the same as what is tita eleng is doing.

onion tuna

i again made a simple pack lunch for my hunny. this can be done in a jiffy with ingredients readily available.

onion tuna

1 can packed tuna in oil
1 medium onion
butter

slice onion in thick rounds. add 2 tablespoons of butter in pan. add onion to pan till slightly caramelized.

add the tuna. stir a bit to loosen the meat into chunks. simmer for about 2 minutes. add salt to taste.

pack the onion tuna together with 2 pcs of calamansi if preferred. squeeze the calamansi on to the tuna before serving to add some zing.