Ham and Cheese Waffle ‘Sandwich’

Lifted from the recipe pages of FOODIE magazine, I literally dished out three exciting  food treats from leftovers during the taping of Studio 23’s “US Girls”.

Ahh, how I embraced the challenge of having to revv up an otherwise dull, unappetizing, ex-yummy-now-eecky leftover dish! My magic wand/sandok just had me do some quick but yummy dishes.

Okay, the first dish was the ham and cheese waffle sandwich. The leftover ingredient was the waffle (waffle recipe courtesy of FOODIE magazine). The challenge for me was how to tweak the waffle and transform it into a mega breakfast. And so, I did this:

Nice? Nothing easier than this, really. I just put a piece of salami and cheese in between two waffles and toasted them using a lightly greased pan, a minute on each side. There. Shockingly easy! I cut them into bite sizes and placed a dipping bowl of maple syrup. Dipping your waffle bites into it should be a great idea.

I thought allowing the citrus fruits to join my waffle ensemble was a good idea, too. There. Shockingly easy.

The next two leftover ‘wonders’ on my next blog, stay tuned!

Cooking On TV 3 (US Girls, Studio 23)

I left ABS-CBN today feeling totally awesome. Taping went great and was very excited cooking before the cameras again. Angel Aquino was the nicest and most grounded celebrity I’ve met recently.

Here goes some snippets of the taping to be aired sometime this week on Studio 23.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Tapenade On Sliced Burger

I love flavors. Don’t like it when the same taste (spanning weeks)  dominate the flavors of our home food. Variety is key. Ahh, how I enjoy a  see-saw of  sweet and sour, of spicy and zingy… my palate is insanely adventurous.

Today,  I decided to do a tapenade-grilled beef tandem. Tapenade is an extremely popular dish in France. It is used as spread on breads or fillng in fillets or paninis.

The original recipe calls for olives, capers and anchovy fillets, mixed together and finely chopped. Now my version, coarsely chopped. LOveet!

Biting into these roughly chopped olives and capers excite my palate. The play of salty and sour in these two great ingredients take me to some great gastronomic trip.

The meat that went with it was actually some sliced beef burger that I earlier cooked.

The tapenade would be the meat topping, wrapped in some warm pita bread.

(Meats are always kept moist when cooked whole then sliced after it’s cooked as opposed to meat that were cut before they were cooked.)

 

So, here goes how it’s done:

The tapenade will call for 20 pcs black pitted olives, 2 tbsps capers, 3 tbsps lemon juice, 1 tbsp mashed anchovy fillet (optional) and 3 tbsps olive oil. Coarsely chop the olives and capers, mix in anchovies, lemon juice and olive oil. Set aside. Tapenade can keep well in the ref for upto 2 weeks.

Meantime, to prepare the burger meat, season 1/2 kilo of ground meat with salt and pepper. Add 1 beaten egg, 3 cloves of chopped garlc, 1 minced onion and 3 tbsps flour. Mix all ingredients together. Form patties and grill. Let rest for 3 minutes. Slice into 1 inch width or your desired size.

Meantime, warm some pita bread (available in most supermarkets). Place some sliced burger on the center, top with tapenade and fold pita with the meat-tapenade fillng inside.

German Franks In Spicy Tomato Sauce

A German Wurstchen or a frankfurter sausage is, traditionally, made from veal and lean pork meat. The flavor, usually powered by some fresh seasonings like fresh onions and other great tasting spices, just makes it one of the best-tasting sausages around.

Interestingly, the mixture is encapsuled in some  natural sheep casing and cooked through a special smoking process. The cooking method definitely yields the aromatic factor that makes this sausage extra addictive.

It was said that during the 13th century, a butcher from Frankfurt created this dish in Vienna and later on made this dish world-famous. Now that’s interesting, a German creating the frankfurter in Vienna!!

Anyway, Jake got me some German franks from his trip to Germany. He brought home several kinds of sausages, but the one I picked to cook first were the franks. So, what did I do? I did some mean spicy frankfurter bites in spicy tomato sauce. It looked something like this:

 

The juiciness of these sausages was well accompanied by the rich taste of the spicy tomato sauce. Imagine Regine Velasquez in a concert backed up by the Philippine Philarmonic Orchestra! Yeah, something of that magnitude…

Anyway, to do this you will need:

2 German frankfurter sausages, sliced diagonally

1/2 cup tomato paste

4 cloves of garlic, minced

1 onion, minced

1 bell pepper, julienned

1/2 tsp cayenne pepper

1 tsp fresh rosemary, chopped (optional)

salt and pepper to taste

oil

 

 Saute garlic, onion, bell pepper and sausages. Stir in tomato paste. Slowly add in water to thin the sauce until desired consistency is achieved. Season with cayenne pepper, regular ground pepper and salt. Add chopped rosemary. Serve hot.

 

 

 

Paksiw Na Pata

 

Food doesn’t have to be complicated to be big in taste. In fact, most dishes that, to me, are drool-stimulating  are those that are simple, common and very easy to make. The secret to making it extra rich and scrumptious is actually in the way that it is cooked.

Let’s take the case of my all-time favorite, paksiw na pata. I am bothered by the fact that quite a number of restaurants serve these pork knuckles half-cooked and still gummy. If this is their way of saving up on gas, time and effort, then I suggest that they better just ditch this dish for dishes that are less labor-intensive. Serving them matigas and makunat kinda bastardizes the real thing.

Paksiw na pata is best eaten when it’s tender, falling off the bones and immeresed in a sauce that has the balance of sweet and sour.

Ahh, my dad loved having this dish while he watched his fave tv programs. He liked this with matching ginisang munggo with dahon ng sili or pritong bangus (na ‘posta’ and hiwa..).

I’m reminded of how my dad introduced me to simple but delish home-cooked meals that included halaan soup with dahon ng sili, inihaw na liyempo in just salt and pepper, batchoy (that was made super tasty courtesy of the kinchay), laing, inadobong atay ng manok, pancit molo, etc.

And this, paksiw na pata. Another great flagship food of my happy childhood.

So easy to make, here’s how to do it:

You will need..

1 pork pata (front, it’s meatier!), chopped

1 cup vinegar

1/2 cup soy sauce

4 cloves of garlic, chopped

1 onion, chopped

1/2 cup banana blossoms (bulaklak ng saging)

3 pcs saba (banana plantain), cut diagonally

1/2 cup brown sugar (adjust according to taste)

1 tsp pamintang buo

1 laurel leaf

salt and pepper to tase

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1. Season pata with salt and pepper. Put pata in a casserole with the garlic, onion, paminta, vinegar and soy sauce. Cover with water and bring to a simmer. It is best slow-cooked (about two hours).

2. Continue adding water until meat is tender and sauce is reduced to half. Add saba, laurel leaf , sugar  and banana blossoms about 2o minutes before turning off the fire.  Serve hot.

 

 

 

Farfalle in Pesto And Sun-Dried Tomato Sauce

“Mommy, you’re the pasta queen!”, I couldn’t be more flattered when Sam referred to me as that. She delightedly finished her plate of ribbon pasta in pesto and sundried tomatoes in a jiffy. Quite a surprise there,  considering Sam’s preference for unflavored pasta and all.

But hey, before somebody raises a howl, it was just Sam labeling me as the ‘queen’, okay? Chill! In her eyes, I am. So be it! Haha!

Healthy, tasty, meatless and fanciful, this pasta has the x-factor kids would love to eat. The very pretty ribbon pasta (farfalle) should be the main attraction here to get kids into eating it. Then you load the pasta with all the healthy flavors that taste just as great.

Okay, for this dish you will need:

1/4 kilo ribbon pasta (farfalle)

1/2 cup pesto

3/4 cup sundried tomatoes

4 pcs shitake mushrooms, sliced

1/4 cup kesong puti, diced

1/2 cup parmesan cheese

1 tbsp dried rosemary

3 cloves garlic, minced

1 onion, minced

1/2 cup black olives, sliced (optional)

salt and pepper to taste

olive oil

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1. In a skillet, saute onion garlic, olives  and mushrooms. Add cooked pasta. Mix in pesto and sundried tomatoes. Season with salt and pepper. Add dried rosemary. Serve.

2. Top with parmesan cheese and kesong puti. Serve with your favorite toast.

A Taste Of Spain!

Spain’s got to be one of the loveliest places I’ve been fortunate to see. The haunting beauty of its awesome character just made me want to see it a million times all over again.

The picturesque setting set the tone for one unforgettable journey.

The richness in history, cultural heritage,  majestic architecture and the excellent gastronomic treats certainly make Spain the “IT” destination, hands down.

 

 

mime artists do move for a fee, a few bucks should do it.

For some art appreciation, do swing by Barcelona and Madrid when you happen to visit Spain. Quaint museums that are rich in artifacts, historical pieces and world-famous obras abound all over these two cities.

at museo del prado

These are but just some of the few of major attractions in Spain aside from the many other bewitching destinations you might want to visit.

And, for foodies like me, Spain is the place to be. It’s got to be one of the most exciting culinary destinations in the world.

at museo de jamon, madrid.

Great weather, fanatstic company, a heart-stopping architecture at the backdrop with matching sangria for toasting spelled JOY OVERLOAD!

chillin' at plaza mayor

These are but memories on a playback now.

Anyway, last night was a blast. Suddenly, I was back in my “bring-me-back-to-Spain” mode again. I hosted an event that presented the exclusive screening of the Mallorca episode of “Spain On The Road Again” which airs on the Asian Food Channel (Skycable channel 58) every 9pm on tuesdays. 

The show is hosted by my favorite Italian Chef, Mario Batali and actress Gwineth Paltrow.

*photo from brownturtlenecksweater.typepad.com

A cooking demo of pescado ala sal or fish baked in salt, sobrasada or sausage or pate and a paella was one of the main highlights of the event. All dishes wonderfully executed by fantastic Spanish Chef and owner of Tapella by Gaudi, Chef Xandra Got Pradera Cacho.

The paella was a winner. Saffron and broth based paella that used calrose rice witha mix of mushrooms and chorizos, this dish blew me away.

chef xandra's paella

 

the chef and i

Have some sobrasada pate!  Oh, lord! It tasted like a pate version of the Spanish chorizo. It sat well on those cruchy crostinis.

sobrasada

 The event was peppered with tapas all over the serving trays! Add to that the food  served to the guests by Chef Xandra, which she cooked during the demo.

  Great food! Truly delicioso! Isalud!

Bangus Belly ‘Sandwich’

This is perfect for bangus belly fanatics. It’s steamed, stuffed with all the healthy stuff, covered and cooked in fresh banana leaves. Potentially the perfect partner for your ginisang munggo sa hipon or your pinakbet, this dish should work its way to your menu soon, somehow.

Easy to make, too.

Just season two whole bangus bellies with salt and pepper. Chop 1 tomato, 1 onion, mince three cloves of garlic and chop 5 leaves of basil (optional). Dump everything on top of  one bangus belly.  Drizzle with canola oil. Cover with the other bangus belly on top (fat side down) to ‘sandwich’ the filling.

 Loosely cover with banana leaf.

Steam for 45 minutes or until cooked. Serve with the vinegar-soy sauce dressing ( 1/4 cup suka, 4 tbsps toyo, 1 minced small onion and 1 siling labuyo. Just mix all ingredients).

Sweet Ham In Two Easy Ways

I enjoy working with sweet ham. It’s versatile, flavorful and pleasantly juicy. A great  ingredient for cocktail pica, paninis, salads, soups or even for ‘pangsahog’, sweet ham just shines at any given time in any dining event. In Manila, my favorite brands are Adelina’s, Excelente in Quiapo and Salazar’s. Ahh, Adelina’s ham in hot pan de sal with kesong puti, God help me! Sarrrap!

My sister-in-law, Tish,  recently swung by Manila from Cagayan De Oro City. My in-laws had her bring this fantastic Oro ham for pasalubong. The ham just oozed with all its  precious juices. The meat,  tender and moist, perfect for a great omelette. The kind that you would make papak!

Meantime, Jake’s aunt, tita Aling,  gave us some wonderful and tasty  native eggs from her farm. I thought the two would make a perfect tandem for a power omelette. And, it did!

And so went the first of  the two dishes that I used it in.

To do this simple omelette, you will need:

3 eggs, scrambled

3/4 cup sweet ham, cubed

1 red bell pepper, julienned

7 pcs pitted olives, sliced (optional)

1/2 cup cheddar cheese, cubed

1 onion, chopped

1 tomato, diced

3 cloves of garlic, minced

salt and pepper to taste

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1. In a skillet, saute onion, garlic and tomato. Add ham, olives, bell pepper and cheese. Stir lightly. Set aside.

2. In a separate pan, pour beaten eggs creating a round form. Add ham mixture.

3. Flip two sides of the egg to enclose the ham mixture. Serve hot.

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You will be amazed with the next dish, it’s caramelized ham. This one is a personal favorite. I always obsess in having this for breakfast with scrambled eggs with sliced onions to match.

Even your one-year old kid can shine in the kitchen doing this. It involves just three steps all in all. Step one: slice sweet hams. Step two: dredge in white sugar. Step three: Fry.

Sweet hams aren’t really sugary sweet. Intensifying its sweetness  will perfectly strike a balance with its built in saltiness. Best served with hot steamed rice and coffee.

Pan-Fried Lemon-Rosemary Chicken

In the olden times, our Christian brothers and sisters  referred to rosemary as the “Holy Herb”. Why? Well, based on Spanish legend, Mother Mary put her cloak over a rosemary bush during the Holy Family’s journey to faraway Egypt, turning the shade of the blossoms from white to blue.

In this day and age, we regard rosemary as a major herb-cuisine player used in most scrumptious dishes. It shines best with lamb or chicken, perfect with a lot of pasta dishes and salad dressings, and even makes a refreshing summer refreshment! Rosemary sometimes doubles up as a Christmas ornament, potpourri or as insect repellent, or its fanatstic scent used in oils and other aroma-generating  products.

Tonight, I combined it with my chicken and lemon. I loved the way the sauce coated the cooked chicken after I pan-fried and sliced it. The meat just absorbed a lot of the lemony flavor of the sauce, that plus the aromatic component of the rosemary herb. Obviuosly, I’m a big rosemary fan. People at Edsa Garden House (where I buy my fresh herbs), know how big a rosemary fan I am.

Okay what to do, you will need:

4 pcs chicken breasts, halved

juice of 1 lemon

4 cloves of garlic, minced

5 sprigs of rosemary, chopped

1/4 cup soy sauce

salt and pepper to taste

4 potatoes, french fries cut

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1. Season chicken with salt and pepper. Marinate in rosemary, lemon juice, soy sauce and garlic for an hour. Pan-fry in a skillet on medium heat. Remove from pan and let it rest for ten minutes.

2. Meantime, deep-fry potatoes until golden brown. Drain using table napkins. Set aside.

3. Add chicken marinade to the pan used in frying chicken. Try to achieve the “agaw-toyo-mantika” effect.

4. Slice chicken. Toss over to the sauce in the pan until chicken slices are well coated.Add potatoes  or put on a plate with the potatoes on the side. Sprinkle with some more rosemary for garnishing.

 

 

Tinumis!

Mom served our favorite tinumis today with a very wet weather at the backdrop. Can there be anything more soothing than having your best comfort food in the middle of a chilly-rainy-sleep-encouraging day?

Tinumis is a favorite dish among Nueva Ecijanos where it is believed to have originated. It is closely similar to dinuguan, only it uses ground pork (as far as my Mom’s version is concerned) as opposed to dinuguan’s pork that is cut in chunks.

Growing up, I always looked forward to having this on our dining table. The distinct taste of pork blood, combined with the gratifying flavor of ground meat and the zing of the peppers and vinegar just left me pleasantly stuffed each and everytime I had it on my table then.

Now, fast forward to 2009, Mommy had me go back to those days. Her tinumis for lunch just made my day. Great weather, fantastic comfort food, good company, life is great.

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To do tinumis, you will need:

1 kilo ground pork (whole skin included, separated from meat)

200 gms Pork liver , chunked

3 cups pork blood

1 cup vinegar

1 tali tanglad (lemon grass)

8 pangsigang peppers

3 cloves of garlic, chopped

1 medium-sized onion, chopped

salt and pepper to taste

water

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1. Season pork and the pork balat with salt and pepper. Add garlic, onion and vinegar. Dump everything in a casserole. Don’t stir for the first 2 minutes or until vinegar is cooked. Bring to a simmer until vinegar seeps into the meat ensemble. Add water when necessary until the meat is cooked.

2. Midway into cooking, add liver, tanglad and peppers. Remove pork balat and cut into fine cubes. Throw back into the mixture.

3. Meantime, strain in pork blood onto the mixture. Coarsely chunk the blood left on the strainer and throw back into the mixture again. Continue simmering until meat is cooked. Serve hot.

Dampa Forever!

My sister turned a year wiser very recently and decided to mark her natal day by grabbing some great eats made up of baked oysters, crabs, shrimps, etc.

Dampa was to be her ‘party place’. Fantastic!

Dampa destinations have flourished around the metro in the last few years that it made sensation. If my memory serves me right, these dampa places have been around as early as in the 80’s and Roxas boulevard (then Dewey boulevard) has been the original hub since it all began and grew big time.

The concept of dampa or sometimes referred to as a paluto eatery, is that you go to a particular resto (in our case, we went to ChaCha at Julia Vargas Avenue), and will have the option to either personally scour for fresh eats (meat, vegetables or seafoods) at a nearby palengke or ask the restaurant runners to do it for you.

They then cook what has been freshly bought. Next, you are handed a menu that contains plenty of options as to how you want your food cooked  (ihaw, sigang, kilaw, etc). Ahhh, it’s the coolest.

And, FRESH is the operative word here.  I can’t overemphasize how satiating it is to  eat at these dampa places that serve everything fresh and great. Yeah, nothing beats eating anything F-R-E-S-H!

Now, I’m hungry again. Anyway, here goes what we had:

The ‘hot front act’ dish was made of halaan soup with onion leeks.

My family is a crab-loving family. These crabs got amputated in the first ten seconds that it landed on our table!

These shrimps were dipped in a special sauce by the resto. Sweet, nutty and malinamnam, the sauce was a hit.

Baked oyters in garlic and cheese.

Grilled tuna belly. Fat, juicy and smoky, I love this!

Baked scallops. A must-try!

Meet my FOODIE mom, Baby. My nephew, Marty, and my daughter, Sam.

My celebrant-sister, Tina and her hubby, Oliver.

My sis-in-law, Michelle with my brother, Jerome and their son, Marty.

The family!

My husband, Jake.

And me looking very, very stuffed by this time!

Henry’s Pizza!

Today saw me make pizza with my daughter, Sam. Quite laborious, this pizza ate up a good part of my morning, our morning. Sam kept coaxing me since yesterday to go on with our pizza project. And so, we did just that.

sam greasing the pizza pan

It was fun rummaging through the ref for potential toppings for the pizza and we found these:

meatball chunks, tomatoes, bell peppers, capers, mushrooms, olives and garlic

After I made my labor-intensive dough, I started doing the topping assembly, such that:

the dough, topped with the trimmings (although still cheeseless at this point...)

 Now the fun part– ‘cheesing’ the pizza!

now ready for baking!

 

To do this you will need:

For the topping:

3/4 cup tomato paste

1/4 cup sundried tomatoes

1/2  cup mozzarela cheese

1/2 cup monterey  jackcheese

1/2 cup cheddar cheese

1/4 cup capers

1/4 cup pitted black olives, sliced

1 red bell pepper, sliced

2 tomatoes, sliced

6 cloves of garlic, minced

3 pcs meatballs, diced

For the dough:

3 1/2 cups all purpose flour, sifted

1 tsp salt

1 cup warm water

2 tbsp sugar

2 packages dry yeast

1/2 cup olive oil

cornmeal for sheet pan

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How to make the dough:

1. Mix flour and salt in a bowl.  In a  food processor fitted with a metal blade, pour the mixture. Combine the warm water and sugar in a measuring cup. Sprinkle the yeast over the warm water. Let stand until foamy in appearance, about 5 minutes. Pour the water and oil into the food processor. Process until the mixture becomes a ball.

2. Remove the dough from the food processor and put on lightly floured surface. Slightly knead until smooth. Put  in a greased bowl and let rise in a warm place (about 45 minutes).

3. Punch down the dough and let rise for another 45 minutes.

4. Divide the dough into 6 equal pieces. Roll each piece on a clean surface, with a bit of flour if necessary, to a 6-inch circle.

5. Meantime, dust 2 sheet pans lightly with cornmeal. Place the dough disks on the prepared sheet pans and top with sauce and toppings. _____________________________________________________

Meantime, preheat oven to 500F.

Now, you’re ready to do the toppings.

Brush dough with tomato paste the add sundried tomatoes. Distribute evenly all topping ingredients except cheese. Put a dash of salt and pepper.

Add cheese. Bake for 10-12 minutes.

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I would have loved serving this to my late dad, Henry. He wasn’t big on pizza.  He would’ve changed his mind had he tried this. Cheesy, tasty, and oomph-loaded, Sam just munched a lot. Yum!

Arroz A la Cubana

Our favorite Arroz a la cubana means Cuban style rice in Spanish. Its origins traced from Spain (during the time when Cuba was still under the Spanish rule). And, due to its mega combo of meat in tomato sauce, fried egg, fried banana (saba or plantain) and rice, it immediately gained ground among foodies in several countries  including the Philippines.

I particularly like the play of tastes in this dish. The meat providing the spice and succulence, the bananas giving the sweet dimension, the egg yielding the linamnam factor and the rice just binds everything before it slides down to our stomach in the best possible gastronomic way.

There are versions to this dish. Some throw in peas and carrots or sometimes cubed potato bits in the meat dish. Not for me, thank you. I go for the  beefy and savory version of this. Peas, carrots and potatoes tend to steal some degree of beefiness in the process. Better to keep it simple but extremely tasty. Don’t worry, the saba will have to combat the umay factor of the meat. Also, your call whether you want it spicy or mildly spiced. Would taste fantastic any which way, anyway.

To do this you will need:

For the meat dish:

1/2 kilo lean ground meat (preferably, ground round)

2 red medium-sized bell peppers, cubed

1 onion, minced

4 cloves of garlic, minced

1 tomato, diced

1/2 cup raisins

1 cup tomato sauce

salt and pepper to taste

oil

1/2 tsp cayenne pepper (optional)

1/2 tsp spanish paprika (optional)

1 pinch cumin (optional)

salt and pepper to taste (must! hehe)

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10 pcs bananas (saba) cut lengthwise, 5 cups rice (depending on how many will eat!), 5 eggs (again, depending on how many will eat!)

What to do:

1. Season meat with salt and pepper(s). Saute onion, garlic and tomato. Mix in meat then red bell peppers. Cook until brown and tender. Put tomato sauce and bring down to a medium simmer. Throw in raisins about 5 minutes before you turn off the heat. Set aside.

2. In a separate pan, do a sunny-side-up.

3. Fry bananas. Pat dry on a bed of napkins to remove excess oil.

4. Plate all components. Be creative!