The following recipes have been prepared for health front-liners.
Bambi Javelosa cooks Japanese food with her own flair. Her sushi is fully loaded and tasty. Her Tori Kuwayaki is my favorite—fried chicken tossed in a special light sweet soy sauce that stays crisp even when cold. It is delish served with any of her fried rice offerings.
Bambi‘s tempura has endeared her to many of our modern-day heroes. Like her chicken, it, too, stays crisp.
Vegetable tempura
Eggplants, diagonally sliced into ¼ inch pieces
Okra, cut in half
Orange kamote and squash, sliced ½ inch thick. Submerge in water and pat dry when ready to cook.
Bell peppers, cut to bite-sized pieces
Fresh shiitake mushrooms
Refrigerate vegetables until ready to cook.
Tempura batter:
⅓ cup tempura flour
1 egg yolk
⅓ cup iced water to make tempura crunchy
Combine in a bowl and mix gently. Do not overmix!
Fill pan with vegetable oil, ⅔ full. Heat oil to 320-340 F. Dredge vegetables in tempura flour, then dip in batter. Fry.
Serve with spoonfuls of the thickened tempura sauce
Thick tempura sauce:
1 cup dashi stock
3 Tbsp Kikkoman soy sauce
3 Tbsp mirin
Sugar to taste
1-2 Tbsp cornstarch (mixed with ¼ cup water)
1 Tbsp grated ginger
⅓ cup grated radish
Boil dashi stock, soy sauce, mirin, sugar. Add ginger and radish, boil three minutes. Add cornstarch mixture, boil until thick.
Tip: Adjust soy sauce and sugar to taste; adjust cornstarch according to desired thickness of sauce.
The Philippines is home to Greek Chef Anthony Kouroutsavouris. His Greek-style chicken pork adobo brings a touch of the foreign to the familiar.
Greek-style adobo
1 kg chicken or pork or a combination of both, cut adobo size
½ to ¾ cup of lemon juice instead of vinegar
1 can of beer instead of water⅓ to ½ cup of pomegranate juice or Worcestershire sauce instead of soy½ head garlic, cleaned and crushed
1½ tsp peppercorn or freshly ground pepper
3 bay leaves
2-3 Tbsp petimizi (Greek molasses) instead of brown sugar
Combine meat, garlic, bay leaves, lemon, half beer, petimizi and pomegranate juice in a bowl. Cover and let meat marinate for at least one hour in the fridge. Transfer meat with the marinade in pot and bring to a boil. Simmer 20 minutes for marinade to evaporate, but be mindful to not let meat dry out by adding the remaining can of beer if necessary.
Cover and continue simmering until the meat softens for at least one hour. If cooking pork and chicken together, remove chicken once soft and continue cooking pork. Return chicken toward the final steps.
Add a little more petimizi (or brown sugar). Dish should look and taste “caramelized.”
Age adobo overnight in the fridge and serve the next day with rice, fried or mashed potatoes or macaroni.
Home kitchen
The Barangans are a family of cooks. Vic is the executive chef of Richmonde Hotel Eastwood, while sister Abel and mom Terry opened their home kitchen to cook meals for our new coronavirus disease (COVID-19) fighters. Their Laguna Laksa pairs nicely with fried tilapia.
Laguna Laksa
3 Tbsp Magnolia Coconut Oil1 red onion, chopped
4 garlic cloves
¼ kg pork, sliced into strips
2 Tbsp patis
2 big tomatoes, chopped
½ cup water
1 medium puso ng saging, cut into small pieces
⅛ kg sotanghon (soaked in water, 5-10 mins)
2 eggplants, sliced diagonally8 pcs okra, sliced diagonally
6 sitaw, cut into 2 ½ inch lengths
½ Tbsp pepper, to taste
Saute onion, garlic, pork in oil. Add patis. Add tomatoes and ½ cup water. Add sotanghon and puso ng saging. Add talong, okra and sitaw.
Bicol Express
1kg kasim cut into small, thumb-sized pieces
(Marinate pork for 30 minutes in the juice of five calamansi and one onion.)
4 Tbsp oil
2 onions, chopped
6 cloves garlic, chopped
1 thumb-sized ginger cut into strips4-5 pcs siling labuyo6 green siling pangsigang, thinly sliced diagonally
3-4 Tbsp patis
2-3 cups coconut cream
1 cup coconut milk
½ tsp pepper
4-5 Tbsp bagoong alamang
Saute onions, garlic, ginger, chilies. Add marinated meat and cook until meat changes color. Add coconut milk and simmer for 20 minutes, cover. Add coconut cream and simmer uncovered.
When coconut cream has thickened, add green chilies and alamang. Turn off fire and leave the pot covered for five minutes.
Chef Buddy Trinidad of Park Avenue Desserts bakes bread for the front-liners, but a recipe of theirs that I wish to share is his wife Rita’s Butter Chicken. So good.
Butter Chicken
500 gm chicken fillet, breast or thighs (cubed)
2 Tbsp olive oil
Knob of ginger (grated)
1 Tbsp minced garlic
1 small onion, chopped
2 Tbsp curry powder
6 oz tomato paste
1 cup coconut milk
Patis (fish sauce) to taste
Chili powder
Saute onions, garlic then ginger. Add chicken; cook till it changes color. Add curry powder, tomato paste and coconut milk.
Season with fish sauce, black pepper and chili. Serve with rice, pasta or naan (Indian flat bread).
Follow @bambi_linkedge, @vic_barangan, @emilitsareyes, @theparkavenuedesserts on Instagram; @iamreggieaspiras on Instagram and Facebook,
www.reggieaspiras.com
