Adobong Gulay

While I have made a spinach version before (there’s also adobong sitaw with Asian green beans), this was my first shot at this version of adobo. It was made for a potluck party attended by classmates old and new and a few of my professors…

…Proof positive that you can adobo just about anything! The below recipe is from Bobbiy at Sparkrecipies:

Adobong Gulay

Ingredients:

• 1 large raw onion
• 3 cloves garlic
• 1 tsp. peppercorn
• 2 bay leaves
• 3 Tbsp. vegetable oil
• ½ cup raw potato, diced
• 1 lb. Japanese Eggplant, cubed
• ¼ cup soy sauce
• ¼ cup palm or white vinegar
• dash of black pepper
• dash of granulated sugar

Instructions: In a pan, heat oil, and then add peppercorn and bay leaves. When the bay leaves start to turn brown, add the garlic. Saute until brown. Then add the onion and fry until translucent. Add the pepper and the sugar, stir briefly to mix, and then add the soy sauce and vinegar. Lower heat to medium, and then add the potatoes and eggplant. Stir briefly then simmer, covered, around 20 minutes for the potatoes and the eggplant. They should be soft but not mushy. Add water if liquid level drops too low. You don’t want to burn this dish. You just need enough liquid to cover the ingredients.

Serve over rice. Serves up to 8 people depending on how much you want to make.

---

Below are shots of the diced eggplant…Unfortunately, Giant didn’t have Japanese eggplant, but the big ol’ purple ones worked fine…

Probably my most common food shot, but… Hail to the Redskins!

I generally smash garlic against the blade of a big Japanese cleaver. Sure I can use a garlic press, but there’s something therapeutic about smashing things…

Garlic, bay leaves, and peppercorn smelled wonderful cooking in oil. Afterward, I added the onion, vinegar, and soy sauce…

While the dish might not have ended up as pretty as I would have liked, it tasted good…

I think next time, I should put the potato in before the eggplant, especially if I’m using redskins (despite what the recipe says). I also should cut the onion just a little bit larger and not process it any further.

Salt…What Salt?!

Pandesal literally means “salt bread”, but don’t let literal translations fool you: they aren’t even remotely salty. This yeast bread is often soft, slightly sweet, rolled in corn-flake crumbs and great for breakfast.

I featured some store-bought pandesal in an earlier post and naturally was waxing nostalgic about my mom’s version. While we were visiting my parents in May, mom and I actually made some:  mom mixed and proofed the dough, while we both formed and baked the rolls.

Below, some pandesal ready for the oven…

A closeup of one before going into the oven.

When baking, these rolls become a really pretty golden brown.

Once we get this off the pan, it’ll be ready to eat!

Again, no recipies on this one (at least until mom’s comfortable with me sharing her recipes online…). At least one has a glimpse of different versions of pandesal…

Hey… It’s How My Mom Rolls (Lumpia)…

I’m sure many people say this about their moms, but let me say it loud and proud:  my mom is an awesome cook…

While the Filipino and American culinary traditions are her base, she’s not afraid to tweak her tried-and-true recipes or experiment with new recipes… I’ll have more shots of some of her creations in future blog posts, but let me focus on one dish today.

Many Asian cuisines have their own variation of the Spring Roll. The Philippines is definitely no exception, making a version of the dish as Filipino as Adobo.  Lumpia can be prepared fried or fresh, and its thin wrapper is usually filled with meat (pork is most common) and/or vegetables (usually carrots, green beans, and/or cabbage….sometimes bean sprouts).  Sometimes seafood can make its appearance in the filling, and it even can be filled with banana and/or jackfruit (the latter version described is a snack/dessert called Turon).

While Dan, his parents, and I were visiting my parents at the end of May, mom made Lumpiang Gulay (Vegetable Lumpia).

The filling was a colorful array of carrots, cabbage, green beans and red peppers. Sometimes Mom puts jicama into her vegetable mixes for lumpia, but I forgot if it was in the mix or not since it’s been a couple of months.

Lumpia wrapper is ofter made out of cornstarch/flour, egg, and water.  If one doesn’t want to make it from scratch, pre-made wrappers can be found at many Asian stores (and even some supermarkets depending on where you live).

Filling… nice contrast to the wrapper…

In this picture, mom’s already folded opposing corners of wrapper (and I think the bottom as well) around the filling. She’ll put eggwash on the remaining part and roll the filled wrapper from bottom to top.

Rollin’… rollin’… rollin….

Below: fully rolled lumpia. A few more of these, and they’ll be ready to fry…

Some completely finished lumpia, piled high…

Nope… no burnt lumpia* here…

Dan’s playing with his food again? Ruh-roh…

Sorry… no recipe here this time. Mom tends to eyeball a lot of things nowadays, and…well… she was pretty surprised when I let the family banana bread recipe out of the bag (Not necessarily in a good way. Oops…).

-

*A shout-out to fellow food blogger Burnt Lumpia, who’s celebrating the birth of a Baby Lumpia. He’s the one who wrote the lumpia guest-blog I linked to in this entry.

East and Southeast…

A while ago, my brother and sister in law sent me some wonderful shots taken while they were visiting in Asia in April. The first group of shots were from a cooking class that the two of them took in Bali, where they made a number of dishes: banana fritters, steamed chicken in banana leaves, gado-gado, tofu and miso, and corn fritters.

My sister in law notes that Balinese cooking generally has a bit of a kick to it. Their secret ingredient… little red chilies! (as you’ll see see in some of the dishes in this set).

Pictured below is the dish least likely to contain those little red chilies :  Banana Fritters.

They were very sweet and the batter tasted almost like pancake batter,  according to my sister in-law. My brother noted that the bananas tasted like small plantains.  Next pictured, steamed chicken in banana leaves. You can definitely see the flecks of red in the dish.

Next pictured: Gado-gado. For those of you unfamiliar with the dish, Gado-gado consists of blanched vegetables mixed in peanut sauce.

Next pictured: Tofu with miso. The chilies are a little harder to see, but they’re there…

And last but not least (of the Bali group), corn fritters.

The final two shots were taken while my brother and sister in law were visiting Japan. First up,  some *real* ramen:

Not that über-salty, fried-noodle, plastic-wrapped stuff you find at your local grocer, for sure! OK, to be fair, that stuff was fine while I was a poor college student, but my tastes have grown up just a little.

Finally, some colorful bowls full of sashimi and rice. Looks like we might have some maguro…or maybe toro (tuna) and sake (salmon… not to be confused with the drink) topped by tamago (sweet egg)…

All in all:  niiiiice presentation!

I’ll end this post with a little programming note:  Resolving to post at least once a week…more if I have time. Hoping I’m able to keep up with that once the semester starts. Sorry for taking such a long hiatus, all.