Failure To Lunch

Fish Be With You 3 - Cream Dory in Garlic Tomato Salsa

2011-05-20T21:02:00.003+08:00

Cream dory (Pangasius) has quickly become a favorite ingredient of mine - I first discovered it a few years ago in the now-defunct Makro, and it has since lent itself well to a variety of recipes, from fish and chips to Hap Chan-style steamed fish in garlic sauce. I whip this quick dish up when I have a hankering for something kinamatisan: season cream dory fillets with salt and pepper; steam until cooked (10 minutes or less). In a frying pan, saute garlic, onions, and lots of tomatoes. Season well, and spoon over the steamed fillets.

Fish Be With You 2 - Tagalog istek (isdang steak)

2011-05-20T20:59:00.002+08:00

Anything beef can do, fish can do better. Well, not really. But this is a fishy alternative to Tagalog bistek, and prepared in almost exactly the same manner. Marinate some blue marlin steaks in soy sauce, kalamansi, and freshly ground pepper. Slice up some onion rings, fry in oil and set aside. Heat up some butter in the same pan, introduce the fish steaks sans the marinade, and cook until done. Remove the steaks from the fire, and return the marinade into the pan, cooking until slightly thickened. Pour the resulting sauce over the fish, and top with the onion rings. Move over bistek, istek has arrived.

Fish be with you - Bangus steak

2011-05-20T20:54:00.003+08:00

When I was in the third grade many moons ago, we learned that fish and rice is to Filipinos as bread and butter is to Americans. The modern day translation (mutation?) of these traditional diets would be spaghetti and fried chicken (PHL)/burgers and fries (US) - and if I had more than but a small voice, I would let there be fish, frosferity, and love for all mankind.

Our fine finned friends are not only good for us, but are available in such variety beyond the wildest imagination of any pig, cow, or fowl. One of the more familiar species in the Philippines is Chanos chanos, otherwise known as the milkfish or bangus. While I love bangus in all its many shapes and manners of preparation, this particular recipe lends a little bit of class to the humble fish that Filipinos know and love the most.

Chop up a head of garlic and fry in oil until golden and crispy - drain off oil (I use a sieve) and let dry on paper towels. Deep fry a deboned daing na bangus (milkfish marinated in vinegar, garlic, and pepper - readily available in the supermarket, but you can always make it from scratch). You may also use bangus bellies as in photo). When done, set aside and prepare the gravy: melt some butter, whisk in some flour (1:1 ratio). After a minute, add in a couple of cups of broth (in a pinch, water and bouillon cubes), Worcestershire sauce and seasoning to taste; cook until slightly thickened.

Spoon the gravy over the fish, top with garlic chips, and voila - a healthy steak alternative! Let there be fish on earth...

Failure to Blog

2011-05-20T20:00:00.000+08:00

I can't believe that it's been more than a year since the last entry - guess I let stuff get in the way! But I've built up quite a stock of photos and food adventures over the last several months, which should make up for lost time.

Vamos a comer!

Abra Home Cooking: Dinaldalem and Kinamatisan

2009-04-24T21:25:00.005+08:00

Monday, a Firm "eating" with my partners, Japanese-til-you're-stuffed. Tuesday, Burgoo appetizers with clients, a Japanese-Filipino fusion late lunch/early dinner, loads of pizza and pansit palabok by the poolside near midnight. Wednesday, Chinese take-out for lunch, and a Chinese home-cooked dinner with the Board. Thursday, modern Filipino at Mesa. Today, Friday, yet another Firm lunch at Zong.

There really can be too much of a good thing. It's times like these when I long for my grandmother's home cooking; for the fond and familiar comforts of my childhood - the real simple stuff that only my Lola can seem to whip up. Unfortunately, my grandmother's kitchen is almost 500 kilometers away at the moment, and I have to rely on memory and trial-and-error to approximate her cooking.

After an unsuccessful call for assistance to my cousin (grandma was probably still asleep) and a little research on the net, I made a quick trip to Farmer's for some liver and kidneys (luckily available even in the late afternoon) and attempted to duplicate Lola's dinaldalem. While I was at it, I remembered I had some lean pork defrosting in the fridge, and which I'd intended to make into kinamatisan (Web research failed to turn up any information on the particular dish I wanted to recreate). And the results turned out to be pretty good, well worth the choice of turning back in Friday traffic instead of the originally intended night-out.

Abra Dinaldalem

Also known as igado to non-Ilocanos, this dish generally calls for peas, green and red peppers, and a thick gravy-like sauce. We did not grow up on this version - our dinaldalem is dry and unadorned, well-suited for long-term storage, with the meats cut in much smaller pieces than the common igado. My attempt, while not quite approximating the oily yumminess of my grandmother's version, turned out well - I wager it'll even be better after a day or so in the fridge (good luck to that, assuming it survives my brother's late night binge). Here goes:

1/4 kilo (approximately 1 cup) lean pork, cut in small, bite-size pieces
1/4 kilo pig's kidneys, cut the same
1/4 kilo pig's liver, ditto
(I missed getting pig's heart, and if I'd gotten that, it'd go the same way)
2 swirls Ilocos (dark) vinegar; red wine vinegar apparently is a good substitute
1/4 cup soy sauce
freshly ground black pepper
3 cloves crushed garlic
2 swirls cooking oil

Marinate the lean pork, kidneys, and heart in soy sauce and black pepper for 45 minutes to an hour; in a separate container, marinate the liver in the vinegar for half an hour.

Heat up the oil in a frying pan, toss in the garlic - when golden brown, throw in the pork and kidney mixture. Allow to cook for approximately 10 minutes, then add in the liver. Just let it sit there until the sauce is reduced and the oil starts to separate. Remove from heat when fairly dry. Best, like any Filipino dish, with rice!

Kinamatisan

This turned out to be even better than the dinaldalem. Nothing quite like the sweetness of sauteed tomatoes and onions - pretty much a sofrito - to complement tender cuts of pork. Too bad I didn't make a bigger batch.

1/4 kilo lean pork, cut in bite-sized cubes and boiled until cooked in 1 cup water, some salt and a few black peppercorns
2 medium tomatoes, sliced
1 small white onion, sliced
3 cloves garlic, crushed
2 swirls cooking oil
fish sauce (otherwise known as patis, nuoc mam, or nam pla) to taste
sprinkle of sugar (best substitute for MSG), optional
freshly ground pepper

Saute the garlic, onions, and tomatoes in the cooking oil. Drain the pork and add into the sofrito; allow to cook for 5 minutes. Season with fish sauce and sprinkle sparingly with sugar (or a dash of msg if you dare) and freshly ground black pepper. Serve hot with lots of steamed white rice.

So that's what was for dinner tonight - my Lola would be proud!

Oysterrific

2008-09-04T05:23:00.001+08:00

One of the pleasures my law partners and I have shared since we first started the Firm together is eating - more particularly, eating out and eating well.

While the different schedules we keep have had us meet over the dinner or lunch table infrequently, Macky proposed a new Firm policy: a partners' meeting every week to discuss caseloads, clients' concerns, and the culinary offerings of whatever new restaurant we may be meeting at. Resolution passed, unanimously :-)

Macky has extremely good taste in food, so we invariably end up dining at restaurants of his choice (Kenneth, whom I meet up with at the office once or twice a week, is happy with whatever might be prepared by the staff - and for the most part, so am I). So last Monday, after a client call, Macky suggested Mr. Rockefeller (Steaks, Ribs, Spanking Good Oysters) in Greenbelt 3.

The well-appointed space is quiet enough for conversation, and the service is beyond reproach. Patrons that evening ranged from a big family celebrating a birthday in the segregated dining area, to office executives enjoying a beer and a smoke al fresco. Mr. Rockefeller, with its predominantly American menu, also seems to be favored by the expatriate and Western tourist crowd - at one point there were as many foreign diners (curiously, all men - but hey, it's a steak place after all) as there were locals.

To start off our meal, we had a platter of Original Buffalo Wings served with a side of Mr. Rockefeller's version of blue cheese dressing (I'm pretty sure it wasn't blue cheese but instead some milder, less pungent alternative), and, since Kenneth hadn't yet arrived, a half-dozen order each of Buddha's Heaven (fried battered oysters with Thai chili dressing) and Boursin Oysters (named after the peppery sour Normandy cheese they slather on the steamed mollusks).

The wings were deep-fried to perfection, with just a hint of spicy Tabasco-based sauce drizzled over them - none of that floury batter or heavy ketchup sauce concoctions that has you go into a state of surfeit after one bite. I would have happily been content with the wings alone to accompany our icy glasses of San Mig Light, but with the piece de resistance still to be presented in different manifestations, I grazed through the entire evening.

The service was impeccable, and extremely considerate. I'd only just suggested to Macky that he line his empty stomach with some amount of food before proceeding to the oysters, when the server presented us with two demitasse servings of French onion soup, precisely for that purpose. The oysters themselves were delish, though I wouldn't binge on either Buddha's Heaven or the Boursin due to the extreme complexities of the flavors. But between the two of us, a couple of each was enough to satisfy our curiousity.

Since Kenneth had arrived, another round of oysters was in order - this time, in a simpler variation: the classic Oysters Rockefeller (to "honor" the name of the restaurant, according to Macky), and the Fresh Oysters on the Half Shell (you could actually order Fresh Oysters, unshucked - but who has the time or the patience to do that?). But by that time, I'd had my fair share of the slippery morsels.

Apparently my two growing partners (both are almost six foot, with appetites as big as their physiques) had only just started their meal, so they went on to plates of Batangas Tenderloin steak served with sides of buttered corn off the cob and baked beans. The bovine pride of Southern Luzon was buttery, well flavored, and tender as a steak should always be. My grazing was getting the better of me, so I just ate off Macky's plate for a bit before ordering the Grilled Kielbasa with a side of cole slaw and fries (I only got through a quarter of my meal before I had it bagged for later).

In all, the meal and the restaurant left us extremely satisfied. At only about PhP1,000 (US$24) per person, including several rounds of beer and other drinks, it was pretty much - pardon me - a good bang for our buck. I regret that I didn't take any photos, but that's pretty much all we ate. :-)

Mr. Rockefeller is at the 2nd Level, Greenbelt 3, Ayala Center, Makati City.
Phone Number - (632) 757-4802.

Off With Its Head!

2008-07-15T13:26:00.005+08:00

One of my favorite places to lunch is a small, non-descript eatery called Ulo-Ulo sa Veteran's (Project 6, in an alley behind the Veteran's Memorial Hospital). The specialty of the house: sinigang na ulo-ulo ng maya-maya (red snapper heads in tamarind-soured broth), which is served, steaming hot, in humongous proportions to droves of diners from all walks of life who pack the place to the rafters by the time noon comes around. To avoid the midday rush, I've always made it a point to either order carry-out (as early as 10:30 a.m.) or actually eat there way after the lunchtime crowd has dissipated (2:00 pm onwards), so it's really not a place to have a (comfortable) noontime meal on a whim.

Today, I decided to take a shot at making my own version of this comfort food favorite, especially conducive on this nice rainy day. I picked up a salmon head and some salmon bellies (I'll deal with them later this week) for a steal at Makro last weekend, figuring that they'd make a great sinigang - and I wasn't disappointed.

I have no photos as of yet (don't worry, I had the whole head chopped nicely such that I didn't have to stare back at a decapitated fish in my soup), but the whole experiment turned out pretty well. I like my sinigang slightly spicy, so aside from the green siling mahaba, I sauteed some chopped siling labuyo (bird's eye chilis) with tomatoes, onions, and ginger (which is not traditional in Tagalog sinigang, but works so well to add flavor and eliminate the lansa or "fishyness" of the salmon). Sinigang na ulo-ulo, with a side of bagoong na isda with more crushed labuyo and a mound of freshly steamed rice...a relatively healthy meal that's just super saraaap to the (fish) bones.

Sinigang na Ulo-Ulo ng Salmon recipe here.

Puttanesca and Chicken Cordon Bleu

2008-07-13T21:52:00.007+08:00

Last Saturday afternoon, I put in some assisting hours at Landmark Education Manila's workspace. Since I'd be working through the day and heading off to an Introduction to the Landmark Forum afterwards, I brought some lunch - not just for myself, but, upon special request, for some of the other assistants as well. The meal turned out nicely: puttanesca and chicken cordon bleu (one of my new culinary challenges is to feed my friend and fellow Landmark graduate Chill, who doesn't eat red meat, on a weekly basis).

I learned to make puttanesca many years ago from my best friend Miles - it's a simple enough dish to whip one when company comes over (I remember her having a full-blown conversation with me while she was chopping and cooking away).

On the other hand, chicken cordon bleu is something I'd never tried making before (link below goes to Tyler Florence's recipe, which I adjusted to what I had on hand), but I used to order it all the time at Full House, one of our old college haunts on Katipunan Avenue. However, their version had pure butter in it, instead of the traditional ham and cheese, so when you cut into it, a river of yellow creaminess would inundate your lunch plate. Gooood stuff.

Puttanesca and Chicken Cordon Bleu recipes here and here.

Heaven on a Stick

2008-07-13T18:23:00.004+08:00

I stepped outside a climbing gym's party last night for a few minutes, and espied a fond and familiar sight: a fishball vendor!

I have loved those little deep-fried pieces of piscine-flavored batter (cornstarch and flaked fish according to a recipe) since I was knee-high and strictly forbidden to buy the stuff off the streets. Then again, I've never been one to listen to the "You can't" command, which I guess explains my predilection for fried fishballs and reckless stunts. At any rate, the parental injunction was not without sound basis: it wasn't the fishballs per se that were the problem, it was the sauce. Those three magical and mysterious jars of sweet, sour, and spicy condiments of varying degrees of heat were potential breeding grounds of nasty transmittable diseases, such as hepatitis or cholera. In fact, a friend of mine from law school came down with a bad case of hepatitis A just as the Bar exams were underway - fishball sauce being the culprit. Wait, that's an unjust accusation; it's not the actual sauce that's to blame, it's the abonimable phenomenon of the *shudder*... double dip!

And thus it was with some trepidation that I approached the unfamiliar vendor - I only usually get my hit on the UP campus where sauce sanitation is zealously guarded by vendors armed with slotted spoons. But the temptation was too much to resist, even if I did find out much later (after single-dipping and ingesting two and half sticks' worth) that Manong Fishball also peddled his goodies on campus and observed the requisite sanitary standards.

So anyway, I had a fine time conversing with the toothless vendor about the economy of scale, the rising prices of gas and fishballs (50 centavos each!), and the peculiar physique of rockclimbers. By the time I left the party, and as I'd foretold, he'd gone home, his stock and sauces sold out.

I think will never make fishballs from scratch because, though the recipe seems fairly simple, you can get a big bag to stuff yourself with for a little more than PhP50 (US$1.20) at the nearest Filipino supermarket or Asian grocery store. I like the good old fishballs - those slightly squashed grayish discs - as opposed to the modern pristine-white squid or cuttlefish balls, or, good grief, those nasty chicken balls. And I personally enjoy the balls fried to a crisp, dipped once in sweet-spicy dip and a second time in the vinegar-chili-onion jar. The only thing that used to suck about eating fishballs at home was that I couldn't quite replicate the sauce (maybe I couldn't quite get the right proportion of bacteria or virii? Heh heh), but today I hit paydirt after just one try. No need for two sauces with this one; it came out exactly the way I like it, just as if I had it off the street. Even the household help, who I fried up a whole batch for, couldn't stop saying "yumm."

Fishball sauce, street-style, here.

Fidel

2008-07-09T20:53:00.006+08:00

I recently saw the documentary 638 Ways To Kill Castro, and I found the man fascinating. Not that I agree with the way he runs his country, or with his ideology, but boy, you gotta admire the guy for his cojones. The dictionary should have a picture of him under the entry "underdog."

Anyway, I will not go into the state of US-Cuba relations or engage in a diatribe on American foreign policy. I will instead, in the spirit of magnanimity and world peace, bring the nations to the dining table with my take on a familiar recipe attributed to Castro's beloved island state.

Arroz a la Cubana was one of the first things I learned to cook, especially since it's one dish I really enjoyed eating as a child. I still love how the combination of all its elements - the fried saba, a spoonful of egg, the meat-raisin-potatoes-peas mixture - results, with a mouthful of steamed white rice, in one perfect bite. There is simplicity in its complexity, if you catch my drift.

Today I took the old recipe out and gave it a little spin. For all the ingredients involved, it's nevertheless an extremely affordable dish to prepare - I used to serve it up to the streetkids at the mission (anything with sauce to go with mounds of rice always stretches the budget). One of the little innovations I made under those constraints was replacing the sunny-side up egg with slices of hardboiled eggs instead (it's much prettier to look at too).

For this particular version, I used a pack of those frozen vegetable mixes that had corn niblets as well as peas and carrots. And, since I was going for a little twist, I diced up the saba bananas instead of the traditional lengthwise slices and deep fried them to lend a little more crunch into each lovely bite (plus it saves you the hassle of cutting up the banana with each spoonful). The result was scrumptious - the photo a lot less so. I'm learning, I'm learning!

So, ladies and gentlemen, I give you Arroz a la Cubana version 20.08, which I have lovingly christened...Fidel!

Recipe for Fidel here.

Munggo a la Cebu

2008-07-09T19:41:00.004+08:00

Just flew in from a weekend in Cebu, and I now I have to deal with the "excess cargo" of that brief adventure. As always, our meals were abundant and extremely satisfying - to the point that I had to frequently order a hot cup of water or tea to digest everything properly (i.e., matunawan). I was there less than 72 hours, but I think I ate enough to last me 'til Christmas!

Anyway, one of our favorite things to eat in Cebu is the outrageously delicious munggo soup at Chika-an on Salinas Drive - a divine symphony of lentils and vegetables simmered in a hint of coconut cream. Totally TDF.

Today, I had another failure to lunch - or to breakfast, for that matter, so I decided to whip up a nice dinner of munggo guisado, adopting some of Chika-an's flavors and doing a little experimentation of my own. In honor of the Queen City of the South, I threw in a tribute to the famous Tabo-an dried fish market: sauteeing onions, garlic, and tomatoes with dried dulong instead of the traditional hibe (dried shrimp) and topping off the whole thing with pan fried dried and shredded squid. Eat with a "main course" of tocinong pusit and a smidgeon of rice...busog gyud! Pass the hot water, please.

Munggo guisado a la Cebu recipe here.

(Can you tell I was playing with Photoshop? Because it's raining outside - perfect munggo weather - the indoor lighting conditions were crummy...and so too the photographer's skills :-) )

Ispaghetting Pataas...

2008-07-09T02:27:00.004+08:00

I was once asked: if I were to eat only one food every day for the rest of my life, what would it be?

There was not the slightest hesitation as I answered, "spaghetti!"

Ah, the naïveté of an eleven year old. I have since learned that variety is the spice of life, and my self-diagnosed suspicions of ADHD would probably have me sick of the stuff within a week, but I do love a good plate of spaghetti.

I will have it alla vongole, or alla carbonara, or aglio oglio, even baked like lasagna in cheese and sauce...and I would eat it in a boat. And I would eat it with a goat...and I will eat it in the rain. And in the dark. And on a train. And in a car. And in a tree. It is so good, so good, you see!(with apologies to the late great Dr. Seuss)

But my favorite pasta pleasure is embarassingly plebeian: more often than not, I hanker for the children's party variety of spaghetti - that of the sweet, slightly spicy sauce with hotdogs, goo-ey processed cheese food, and (heavens to Betsy!) banana ketchup. The Italians would probably have a conniption at this strange admixture, so thank goodness I'm not one of them (in fact, the only plate of pasta I ever had on that side of the world was, unfortunately, too horrid for words...can you say "tourist trap?"). Jollibee spaghetti used to be my favorite movie snack (don't you just love Philippine theaters!), and I remember telling my friend Larry, during one trip down to Sorsogon, how wonderful it would be to have that kind of spaghetti both of us loved - you know, the carinderia spaghetti that's all ketchup, Eden cheese, and hotdogs - for breakfast. Lo and behold, guess what that morning's breakfast was? The angels and the universe had smiled upon us!

Anyway, I could go on and on about my predilection for pasta - sophisticated and otherwise - but all I really wanted to share are a couple of "secret" ingredients to approximate that Jollibee flavor. One is actually non-Jollibee in origin, but instead was dissected from the spaghetti "Bolognese" of the Valle Verde Country Club, which I adore: my sister's boyfriend took one taste and declared, "liver spread!" The other is the slightest hint of condensed milk, creamy enough to thicken the sauce and have it adhere to the noodles, but not have it too cloyingly sweet. And of course, the reglementary dose of UFC tamis-anghang banana ketchup to seal the deal.

Hmmm...breakfast isn't too many hours away...

Recipe (approximation thereof, I don't really do measurements) here.

Korean BBQ Beef

2008-07-09T01:55:00.005+08:00

My sister, the US-based doctor, could give Rachael Ray a run for her money when it comes to preparing quick, satisfying meals (ten minutes or less, instead of 30). Granted, she has a pantry full of Lucky Me instant pansit canton and Purefoods Carne Norte at her disposal (courtesy of relatives like myself and my parents who fill our suitcases with half the shelf stock of Hi-Top and Landmark Trinoma each time we visit. Try explaining that to curious customs officials!). But she does have her moments.

Take, for instance, this lovely recipe of Korean-style BBQ beef, that takes no time at all to prepare. Just marinate thin sirloin slices (breakfast steak or sukiyaki cut beef would work as well)in a good amount of store-bought Lee Kum Kee Korean BBQ Marinade, sear on a hot pan sprayed with oil, and voila! A meal fit for a Korean telenovela emperor. As RR would say, "yummm-o!"

Warning: This Post May Be Hazardous To Your Health

2008-07-09T00:31:00.004+08:00

(I posted this originally on my other blog sometime last year, and thought it would be more appropriate to give it a new home here.)

Weekends in my family's house have been mostly lazy days for me, especially in the kitchen. But this last weekend had me busy in front of the stove due to popular demand: my Mom wanted pork pata humba and my brother wanted binagoongan, but only if I cooked it myself.

Thus I obliged.

If I may say so myself, my bagoong is to die for (and to die from, if your kidneys are averse to salt overload). It's the coup de grace of my kare-kare, which in turn is one of the most popular features of our C+C catering menu (my sister, right before I left Chicago for Manila last July, begged me to make some kare-kare, which wasn't quite the same as we had to make do with the ready-made bottled stuff so as not to stink up the condo kitchen and wreak havoc with the neighbors). Anyway, I'm not much for proportion, but my timpla involves a lot of white cane vinegar and a massive amount of brown sugar which, when reduced over a slow boil with Pangasinan alamang, is a sweet-salty-sour taste of heaven.

This weekend, I took on making Crispy Binagoongan, which I hadn't made for quite some time. Take about a kilo and a half of pork (pigue or kasim, the less fat the better for your health, the more fat the better for the taste) and cut it up for adobo (or, as our Man Friday did for this particular preparation, for menudo). Boil the pork in enough water with some peppercorns and a little bit of salt and garlic for about half an hour, then drain well. Heat up some oil in a frying pan and saute some garlic and onion (my Dad requested no onions in this dish as they lead to early spoilage and he wanted it to keep...duh, not very many leftovers for this one), take the ginisa out of the pan and fry the pork in batches until slightly crispy. Add back all the pork, the sauteed onions and garlic, and about 1/4 cup of the bagoong (just enough to coat the meat sufficiently). Voila! One heart attack to heaven, coming right up. Eat moderately.

Next dish, yet another doozy of a pork entree: humba made with pork pata (you can also use fatty cuts but you can just as well shoot yourself in the head, heh heh). My Mom likes her stewed ham hocks falling off the bone, so I had the chopped pork leg boiled in garlic and peppercorns to the desired effect. Take the pieces out of the broth, then saute a couple of tablespoons of tausi or salted black beans in a Dutch oven, add in the pork pieces with approximately 1/4 cup soy sauce, 1 cup vinegar, 1 1/2 cups of the broth, 3/4 cup of brown sugar (or to taste; I personally like it sweet), a bay leaf, and a handful of dried banana blossoms. Reduce on a slow boil until the sauce is slightly thick. Serve with very hot rice and a Norvasc.

The good thing about all this is that I don't really eat very much of what I cook (familiarity breeds contempt: I already spent so much time with the food I'm cooking that afterwards I can't find the appetite for it). So I'm going back to my stewed tofu now, thank you very much.

A Turkey Tale

2008-07-08T22:54:00.005+08:00

This last New Year's found me all alone in a downtown Chicago apartment in subzero weather. My sister had gone down to the warmer climes of the West Coast to ring in 2008, and I had the good excuse of too much studying still to be done. This was the first time I celebrated New Year's with only myself to toast to, but it was still a good enough reason to have a mini-feast. After all, I wasn't about to break the time-honored tradition of slaving away in front of a hot stove on the one of the most festive evenings of the year.

And since it was also my first time to spend the holidays in the good ol' USA, what better way to herald the incoming year than with the culinary centerpiece of American festivities - (insert dramatic pause a la Chairman Kaga) turkey!

While I have roasted a number of chickens in my lifetime, I had no idea whatsoever how to tackle the granddaddy of all fine feathered fowl. My Uncle John had previously dished up one of those big boys for Christmas dinner, and I thought I'd parallel his attempt, even if I knew at the back of my mind that I'd be eating leftovers until spring. The challenge was just all too tempting.

So I went off to Jewel, got me the smallest turkey breast I could find (which was still the equivalent of two large chickens), picked up some traditional sidings, and a nice bottle of Reisling. And happily went to work on the big bird.

I won't be sharing with you the recipe as I don't remember which websites I nicked it from (I mixed and matched from a few but didn't write the results down), but I do remember it was a nice Asian style turkey with a soy and honey glaze. The bird came out perfectly, even though I'd stupidly pulled out the plastic indicator thingy that came with it (it supposedly pops out when the ideal internal temperature is reached, so much for reading directions) and had to poke it every so often to test for done-ness.

My point is, that is probably the last turkey I will ever cook or eat for a very, very long time. The leftovers could feed a whole barangay for lunch, or, in my case, an unfortunate Bar examinee for several weeks. I tried to dress it up and create variety every meal time, but alas, with turkey, there is only so much one can do.

(Photo up top is of one of the first few turkey meals I actually still enjoyed - leftover Asian style turkey with fried rice and a nice salad. The second one is a later reincarnation of the same turkey - in a mixed greens salad with Asian dressing. Still, it didn't fool me.)

Failure To Lunch

2008-07-08T22:37:00.001+08:00

So I'm finally getting my act together and putting up a real food blog I can take care of and maintain on a daily basis. The previous one fell through the cracks after suffering many months of neglect, but this one is going to be for keeps, dammit. I've got a ton of photos I've always meant to upload and a wealth of gastronomic insights I've always intended to write down, but intentions have counted for nothing so far. Back to the keyboard, baby.