Fruit and Jelly Punch

Fruit and Jelly Punch

I love food and I love drinks too! Aside from my ever favorite beer, I also love drinking punch! Here's a simple way to make punch without having to go through all the fuss...

Fruit and Jelly Punch Ingredients:

2 cans fruit cocktail, drained

1 small pack strawberry Kool Aid

Water, just enough

Gin, according to your tolerance hahaha!

Ice, lots of it

Spiked Jelly*

Mix all ingredients in a punch bowl and serve. Take it easy on the jelly!

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*Spiked Jelly:

2 boxes Strawberry gelatin

Water

Gin

Cook gelatin according to instructions but with lesser water. After taking it off from the heat, add gin and stir. Set in a mould and refrigerate. Cut into squares or fun shapes.

Tuna Garlic Mushroom Pasta

Tuna Garlic Mushroom Pasta

Here’s another batch of pasta from the kitchen! I know a lot of you might find tuna “fishy” but I fooled my “food tasters” with this recipe…They didn’t even know it’s tuna that’s in the sauce!

Ingredients:

• Onion - 1 medium bulb, chopped
• Garlic - 10 cloves, minced
• Button Mushrooms - 1 can, half sliced, half finely chopped
• Hot and Spicy Tuna Flakes - 1 small can, drained
• Tomato Sauce or Spaghetti Sauce
• Salt
• Pepper
• Oregano – dried
• Cheese
• Pasta - Spaghetti or Macaroni, cooked al dente

Directions:

• Heat oil in pan and toast the minced garlic. Take them out from the oil and heat.
• Sauté onions, mushrooms and tuna. Add tomato or spaghetti sauce. Add cheese in the sauce and half of the toasted garlic.
• Season with salt, pepper, and oregano.
• Add to pasta.
• Serve with cheese and toasted garlic on top!

Buon appetito!

Bring Me The Chef's Salad!

Chef's Salad at Mom's Corner

Mom's Corner along Pabayo-Chavez Sts. in CDO is just a stone's throw away from where I work and they serve tasty yet affordable meals. Whenever I feel like eating salad, I just go there and order Caesar's Salad or the Chef's Salad.

Traditional Chef's Salad usually consists of ham strips, hard-boiled eggs, croutons, cheese, cucumbers, tomatoes, roast beef, chicken, turkey, and salad greens and Thousand Island dressing. Mom's Corner's version of the salad has about the same contents except for the roast beef, chicken and turkey.

I love eating salads since they are healthier to eat than pure meat. Every now and then when I don't feel like eating a lot, I just mix my own batch or go to the nearest resto that serves greens. I prefer not to put dressing and cheese on my salad though.

I'm hungry... bring me the Chef's Salad!

Exotic Food Chronicles: SISIG

Butcher's Best Sizzling Sisig

I don't know if sisig can be counted as exotic food but for people who are not from here, it is indeed exotic!

Sisig is a very popular Filipino dish that originated from Pampanga. It is made from finely chopped pork and it is usually served sizzling on a hot plate. The parts used for sisig are a pig's head (cheeks, snout, ears) and liver and it is usually seasoned with chili peppers and calamansi or Philippine lemons.

Sisig is prepared in three phases; the pork is boiled, broiled and fried before it becomes the exotic dish that it is! Boiling tenderizes the meat and broiling gives it its rich smoky flavor. Frying with onions gives the sisig more flavor and serving it on a sizzling plate makes it more exciting to eat!

Over the years, the curious palate of the Filipinos have created different sisig variants with a variety of add-ons such as chicharon, eggs, etc. Tuna, chicken, squid and tofu sisig have also popped up in many restaurants' menus and have also captivated the cravings of the locals.

Sisig tastes good especially if it's served with steaming rice! You can actually eat more than you've imagined!

Exotic Food Chronicles

The Philippines is an exotic country. I don’t care if many of you beg to disagree but I believe it is as exotic as I see it to be. Aside from the exotic people, traditions and customs, and atmosphere, the Philippines has a lot of exotic food that people from various parts of the world never imagined could be considered to be called food at all.

We Filipinos are known to be innovative and practical (and some think we’re gross) especially when it comes to food considering that our country belongs to the third world. Our exotic food may be considered unpalatable by other nationalities but once they get the knack and guts (bwahahaha!) to taste our line of unusual food, they may not want to leave the Philippines anymore and stay here for good. Not every foreign tongue may like our exotic dishes, but for most of us Filipinos who are proud of our heritage and idiosyncrasies, there’s no holding back in exploring the more interesting line of the food chain.

Once in a while I will be posting “exotic” stuff here. Believe me I will not post gross pictures! Hahaha!

It’s Not A Hotdog! It’s Hungarian Sausage!

No, what’s in the photo is not an ordinary hotdog that you can buy from the supermarket and fry in your pan. It’s Vienna Kaffeehaus’ Hungarian Sausage! As usual I went to my favorite place not for coffee but for their super cold beer but before I gulped down San Miguel Strong Ice I had to eat something first.

I went with Liz to Vienna Kaffeehaus along Velez St. and since they offer a variety of dishes on their menu, we were dazed and confused on what to choose for lunch. Since I wanted something spicy yet not too much on the tummy (and on the pocket hehe!), I ordered one of their popular treats, Hungarian Sausage served with coleslaw and rice. I chose rice over mashed potatoes since I had plans of taking beer with my meal; I wanted something heavier than potatoes.

The sausage was ok, cooked in the way sausages are supposed to be cooked yet its distinctive flavor made it more exciting. It was made spicy with pepper and spices but it was mild and tolerable especially for spicy hot chili lovers like me. I’m not going to say the Hungarian sausage was super amazing but it was just ok. Liz had a cheese sausage served with the same stuff but I can’t really say if she was that amazed with her lunch too.

The highlight of that rendezvous was the beer drinking. I told her nothing beats Vienna’s beer because they serve them super cold and they have super chilled mugs to go with the beer. I guess she agrees with me on the beer part…nothing beats the smooth yet strong taste of Strong Ice with a smokin’ mug…each of us drank a couple of bottles and then we went back to where we were supposed to be at that time. Haha!

Vienna Kaffeehaus serves meals, pastries, desserts, and super yummy cakes but I keep going back for the beer. I think the usual waitress gets pissed every time she sees me walking through their doors. Oh no, it’s that beer girl again! I must admit that for the several times I have been there, I have never ordered anything from their coffee list yet. Next time I promise I’ll try their coffee with their cute cakes and tell you all about it!

Meatless Spaghetti

Images: No good photos... Ugly phone cam... :-(
Food: YUMMY!!! :-D

I love spaghetti (I can't say though that everybody does). Yesterday I came across some gourmet spaghetti sauces in the supermarket and my mother told me too cook spag. I only said yes if it's ok with her that I wouldn't put meat in the sauce and she agreed. I was supposed to take some of this meatless spaghetti to Odessa's because we were supposed to meet and do some brainstorming BUT the weather didn't cooperate and we were both not feeling very well.

Anyway, here's the recipe. Try it out! ;-)

Meatless Spaghetti

Ingredients:

• spaghetti, cooked al dente
• oil
  
• 1 head garlic, minced
  
• 1 medium white onion, chopped
  
• 1 can sliced button mushrooms
  
• salt
  
• pepper
• ground oregano
• parsley, finely chopped
  
• Del Monte's Gourmet Beef and Mushroom Sauce (hey this is free advertising! hahaha!)
• cheese

Directions:

• Cook spaghetti according to package directions. Cook it al dente...don't ruin the pasta...drain.
• Sauté garlic, onion, and mushrooms in oil. Add parsley and spaghetti sauce.
• Season with salt, pepper, and oregano.
• Add cheese.
• Simmer for a while.
• In a plate serve pasta with sauce and cheese.
• Eat!!! Buon appetito!

*Strict vegetarians may find this recipe non-vegetarian since the sauce is beef flavored. Well I didn't say that this is supposed to be a vegetarian recipe BUT it has no meat in it.