afritadang manok

Filipino cuisine (or the cuisine of islands of the Philippines) has evolved from its Malay roots to a predominant Hispanic-based cuisine because of the dishes brought during Spanish rule. American, Arab and Chinese cultures have also influenced it. Filipinos have their own unique way of adapting to these environmental influences. Surprisingly, despite such influences traditional Filipino food recipes have still survived.

Filipino food recipes are distinguished by their bold combination of sour, sweet and salty flavors. Generally most authentic Filipino food recipes are not heavily spiced. Filipino dishes showcase a sudden influx of flavor and are usually delivered in a single presentation. This gives the eater a simultaneous visual feast, a gustatory glee and an aromatic bouquet. An important feature of Filipino food is contrastic. For instance, pairing sweet with salty; like salted sun dried fish being paired with sweet cocoa rice porridge. Delicious and inventive!

A staple Filipino food is rice that is served in all meals with different ingredients and seasonings; like it is served with fried eggs at breakfast. Fruits like coconuts, tomatoes, bananas and vegetables like potatoes, purple yam, and carrots are popular ingredients. Filipino food recipes are rich in seafood because of its geographical location – the Philippines is made up of all islands after all! Catfish, shrimp, mackerel, crabs prawns, oysters and other seafood and fish are very popular in the Filipino food dishes.

Filipino Food recipes range from a simple meal of fried fish and rice to rich paellas and cocidos. Popular Filipino food recipes include Philippine sausage-longganisa, beef jerky, omelette, goat in tomato stew-kaldereta, mechado (meat in tomato sauce), banana and tomato sauced beef- pochero, kare-kare (vegetables and oxtail made in peanut sauce), pancit or stir-fried noodles, crispy pata or deep-fried pig’s leg, hamonado (pineapple sauced sweetened pork), sinigang (fish, pork or shrimp in tamarind) and lumpia (fresh or fried spring rolls). The most well liked desserts include leche flan and buko pandan (slivers of young coconut with cream and pandan flavor).

Champorado is a perfect meal on a rainy day

 
For Filipinos, the champorado or chocolate porridge is one of the best snacks to eat especially on a rainy day. To make the meal even more special, it is matched with other native delicacies, such as tuyo or dried fish.

Preparing champorado is just like cooking rice. The only difference is that it uses malagkit or glutinous rice. It is cooked slowly until the right consistency is achieved. Roasted cacao nibs called tablea give the champorado its dark chocolate flavor that no processed cereals could ever have.

Rsmacaalay of the blog Ang Sarap wrote that although champorado has long been part of Filipino dining, it is merely an adaptation of a Mexican drink called 'champurrado.' The adding of malagkit came in only after the post-Spanish era and from then on, champorado was made a Filipino merienda staple.

Man Armel of Manila Metblogs on the other hand, wrote that there is another version of the champorado's origins based on a Batibot episode which he saw when he was a kid. He wrote that because of Jose Rizal's curious nature, it was believed that it was he who invented the champorado.

Many Filipinos love to eat hot champorado for breakfast, but for most, it is a snack perfect on a lazy and rainy afternoon. This snack is also enjoyed with a number of "side dishes" to complement its sweet flavor.

Marvin of Burnt Lumpia likes to add beef tapa to the champorado. He also suggests drizzling over good old evaporated or condensed milk instead of fresh milk atop this delicious porridge. Ms. Porkchop of Plurk.com likes pairing champorado with daing na pusit or dried squid. Girl Retard of A Retard's Blurbs takes it to the next level by adding fried bananas and dilis to her champorado bowl .

Tuyo or fried fish and champorado is still the perfect tandem for a nice morning meal for Ibyang Sanchez of A Wife's Charmed Life. She sees the dish as very reminiscent of the days when she was in the Philippines.
Whatever the choice of what to pair it with or what time of the day to eat it, the champorado will remain a special treat that's close to the hearts of Filipinos.

VEGETABLE, RICE AND NOODLES RECIPE

Much of the flavor of Philippine cooking is due to the wide variety of vegetables that are featured in almost every meal. As a tropical and luxuriant country, the Philippines is blessed with lush vegetation and many plants have been domesticated and found not only edible but delicious as well. The native dishes derived from Malaysia and Indonesia take full advantage of vegetables. However, it is in Chinese cuisine that vegetables find their fulfillment as gourmet delights.

Many Filipino dishes use meat, fish or poultry just to provide the flavor and the protein needed to balance their diets. The bulk of the dishes, however, are made up of vegetables, which are often mixed together chop suey style. Leaves, buds, stalks, pods and tender parts of plants and trees are used to full advantage. Usually blanched and never overcooked, vegetables provide the Filipino with sufficient vitamins and minerals. Beans and legumes supply most of the protein in his diet.

The staple of Filipino diet is rice although the strong Chinese influence on Filipino cooking is also seen in the wide use of noodles. Rice was grown in Southeast Asia and the Philippines long before the coming of Westerners. The preferred varieties for daily meals are white, long grained and aromatic. Glutinous or sticky rice, of either the white or brownish varieties. are used for rice cakes and other native sweets. For normal use, rice is simply boiled with just enough water to cook it until it is dry and fluffy; nothing else is added, not even salt

The practice of using rice in a main dish is borrowed from Spain — as in arroz a la Valenciana or arroz con caldo. Fried rice in the Chinese manner has also introduced endless combinations. The traditional Filipino way of frying rice, however, is simply to brown a crushed clove of garlic in hot lard, add a little salt, and stir-fry the rice in this. Fried rice is a favorite breakfast fare as the practical Filipinos usually use leftover rice and it is a good way to warm it up and add some flavor to it. Chinese noodles are of many varieties but the main Filipino favorites are bihon (rice sticks) and sotanghon (transparent noodles from soy beans). They can be boiled in soup or sauteed with meat and vegetables.

Filipino Chicken Macaroni Salad Recipe

 

Chicken Macaroni Salad Ingredients:

• 1/5 kilo macaroni noodles
• 2 to 3 pieces, medium sized carrots
• 1 big chicken breast
• 500 ml of mayonnaise
• 1 can (836 g) pineapple chunks or tidbits
• 1 big white onion, finely chopped
• 1/2 cup sweet pickle relish
• 3 hardboiled eggs, diced
• 1 cup diced cheddar cheese
• 1/2 cup raisins
• salt and pepper to taste

Macaroni Salad Cooking Instructions:

• Cook macaroni noodles according to package cooking instructions.
• In a pot, boil carrots in water for 15 to 20 minutes or until cooked.
• Drain carrots and let cool. Peal skin then dice.
• Boil chicken breast in water with salt. Drain chicken breast, then shred in 1 inch lengths
• Drain pineapple chunks or tidbits.
• Combine all ingredients while adding salt and pepper, to taste.
• Refrigerate, then serve.

Pancit Palabok Recipe

Pansit Palabok Ingredients:

Palabok Noodles / Sauce

• 1/2 kilo miki noodles
• 1/2 kilo small crabs
• 5 cloves of garlic, minced
• 1 onion, chopped
• 2 tablespoons of atchuete seeds or oil
• 2 tablespoons of patis (fish sauce)
• 4 tablespoons of cornstarch, dissolved in water
• 1 teaspoon of monosodium glutamate (MSG)
• 1 1/2 cups of water

Palabok Toppings

• Tinapa flakes (smoked fish)
• Cooked shrimps, shelled
• Squid adobo, sliced into rings
• Pork chicharon, grounded
• Spring onions, chopped
• Hard boiled eggs, shelled, sliced
• Fried garlic, minced
• Fresh calamansi (lemon), sliced

Pansit Palabok Cooking Instructions:

• Extract fat and meat from clean crabs, set aside.
• Pound crab and extract juice on 1 1/2 cups of water
• On a pan, sauté garlic and onions until golden brown then add crab fat, crab meat, 1 1/2 cups of crab wash, patis and MSG. Bring to a boil and simmer for 10 minutes.
• Add corn starch and continue to simmer while constantly stirring until thick.
• Put miki noodles in a strainer and dip in boiling water for 5 minutes or until cooked.
• Lay drained noodles on a platter and pour the palabok sauce. Garnish with toppings and serve.

Chayote Guisado / Sayote Guisado (Sautéed Chayote)

Chayote Guisado or Sayote Guisado (Sautéed Chayote) is one of the Filipino recipes found in the recipe database that my family and me loves to eat.

Here in Canada, you can find chayote in most Asian stores and sometimes to known grocery stores like No Frills and Price Choppers. At first, I thought I couldn't find this chayote in our local community and getting one of it, take me an hour drive to have it.

I was surprise to see chayote in the shelf of our local grocery. The funny thing was, when I’m about to pay this chayote, the cashier didn’t know its name and take us long time to figure out where to get its price. And after a long search, the chayote was under squash-vegetable category and its name was chayote squash.

Anyway, I’m happy that this chayote vegetable is just near by…

Ingredients :

• 2 to 4 pieces chayote squash, pared, seeded and sliced
• 1 tbsp. vegetable oil
• 1/2 lb. pork, sliced
• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• 1 onion, chopped
• 2 tomatoes, chopped
• 1 tbsp. patis (fish sauce)
• salt and pepper, to taste
• water

(Cooking Conversion Chart)

Cooking Procedures :

1. In a pan, heat oil over medium heat. Cook pork until it turns slightly brown.
2. Add garlic, onions and tomatoes. Sauté for a few minutes until tomatoes wilted.
3. Add chayote slices. Season with patis, salt and pepper. Stir-fry for few minutes until well blended.
4. Pour in water and bring to boil. Cover, lower the heat and let it simmer until chayote is tender.
5. Correct the seasonings according to your style and liking.
6. Remove from heat. Transfer to a serving dish. Serve hot.

Pancit Canton

Pancit Canton or Lo Mein is a dish of Chinese origin that becomes one of the traditional Philippine noodle dish that is mostly made of egg noodles, vegetables, chicken, pork and shrimp.

Ingredients :

• 1/2 lb. shrimps
• 1 eggwhite
• 2 tbsp. cornstarch
• 2 chicken breast, deboned
• 3 tbsp. oil
• 3 cloves garlic, crushed
• 1 onion, chopped
• 2 pcs. chicken liver, cooked and sliced (optional)
• patis (fish sauce), salt, pepper and soy sauce, to taste
• 1-1/2 cups chicken broth
• 1 head cauliflower, cut into floweretes
• 1/4 cup snow peas
• 1/3 cup leeks
• 1 small carrot, cut into rounds
• 2 tbsp. cornstarch, dispersed in
• 1/4 cup water
• 1 package canton noodles

(Cooking Conversion Chart)

Cooking Procedures :

1. Peel shrimps leaving the tails intact.  Coat with a mixture of eggwhite and cornstarch.  Slice chicken breast into strips and coat with cornstarch.  Set aside.
2. In a wok (or large frying pan), heat oiland sauté garlic and onions.  Add in chicken meat, liver and shrimps.  Season to taste.  Stir-fry for a few minutes.
3. Pour in broth and bring to a boil.  Lower heat and let it simmer for 2 minutes.  Add in all the vegetables.  Cook until tender but still crisp.  Thicken with dispersed cornstarch.
4. Stir in canton noodles and cook until tender.
5. Makes 4-6 servings.