Beer Braised Pork

Hello there my foodie friends!  It's been months since my last post about my musings in the kitchen and here I am again with something to share for you!

For some time I have tried a different diet and survived mostly on vegetables and I did not miss eating any kind of meat at all.  However, as I slowly integrated back into the world of omnivores, I can't help "playing" with food and the following recipe is my take on what most people call Beer Braised Pork.

Beer Braised Pork

Ingredients:

Pork (chops or butt, even ribs would do!)

garlic

onions

salt

black pepper

sugar

catsup

a few tablespoons of vinegar

a few tablespoons of vegetable oil

a can of your favorite beer

Directions:

* Rub salt, pepper, and garlic on pork and let stand for 30 minutes or longer.
* Place a few tablespoons of oil in a heated skillet and sear pork for about 5 minutes at each side.
* Add garlic, onions, salt, pepper, a few tablespoons of vinegar and a can of your favorite beer into the skillet.
* Simmer pork in beer and spices.  Add a bit sugar and catsup to taste. Continue to simmer until liquid is reduced.
* When pork is tender, transfer it into a baking or roasting pan and baste with the reduced liquid.  Roast in oven for 10 minutes or in microwave (medium high, and covered with cling wrap) for 20 minutes.
* Before slicing through the pork, let it rest for about 10 minutes from the oven so the juices will remain in tact.

Marinate pork

Sear pork

Add spices and beer

Simmer

Roast in oven or microwave

This Beer Braised Pork is best served with steamed rice, or potatoes and vegetables, and of course -- a tall glass of beer!   

Cheers!

Yin Yang Jelly

Yin Yang Jelly
A contrast of sorts tastes heavenly!

Hello there!  It's been a year since my last post and I bet some of you might have wondered if and when I am ever going to publish another post on this blog.  Sorry to keep you waiting Food Lovers!  I'm back and this time I got something for those who love desserts!

Yin Yang is an Eastern concept that encapsulates the interdependent and interconnected harmonies of polar opposites.  The concept may seem to cover opposite forces but in reality, opposites could be complementary and this is what this Yin Yang Jelly concoction is all about - an amalgam of opposites that work well when combined!

I wanted to make this dessert in the form of the Yin Yang symbol but I didn't have enough time and equipment to do so that is why I resorted to layering.  It's a combination of different ingredients: light/dark, sweet/bitter, smooth/rough, liquid/solid, and so on.  If you want to know how good it tastes like, better make it on your own using my recipe below!  Use your creativity to make it even better!  

Yin Yang Jelly

Ingredients:

Base
1 envelope of clear and unflavored gelatin
water

Yang (Light)
1 can sweetened condensed milk
a few drops of vanilla extract

Yin (Dark)
2 sticks of unsweetened instant coffee
crushed Oreo cookies


Directions:

Yang

• Separate 3/4 of the contents of the envelope of gelatin  and set aside the 1/4 for the Yin recipe. 
• Dissolve the gelatin in 3 cups of water.  
• Add condensed milk and boil the solution for a few minutes.  
• Add a few drops of vanilla extract and continue stirring until well mixed.  
• Pour into a mold.

Yin

• While the Yang jelly is allowed to cool and set, crush Oreo cookies including the cream filling.  Sprinkle the crushed cookies on top of the white jelly when it is set.
• In a pan, dissolve the instant coffee into a cup of warm water.  
• Add remaining gelatin and simmer.
• Pour coffee jelly on top of the crushed Oreos.

When it comes to jelly desserts, it is best to chill the whole thing before eating it.  I know this is just a simple dish but I enjoyed making and eating it!

Until then! ;-)  

START THE NEW YEAR WITH A SMILE

Okay..........

It's my birthday!!! It's my birthday and it is a fresh and new year for me!  

My day started with a smile... a BIG smile from a big yellow cake my cousin gave me.

Ginataang Kalabasa at Sitaw: Squash and String Beans in Coconut Milk

Ginataang Kalabasa at Sitaw with Garlic Rice

Okay, I don't really know how to call this dish in English but that's the closest thing my mind can "translate" it into. Anyway, I did not cook this dish.  I have only made that huge mound of garlic rice on the plate.  My father cooked the ginataang kalabasa and I'll try to cook it one day soon.

I once have heard that "the best chefs in the world are men" and though I believe we women are catching up, I would still agree that some men do cook well.  My father is no chef but I do believe he cooks better than most of us here at home.  I asked him how he cooked this and he told me how he did it but he's betting that I wouldn't be able to make it because I don't know how to prepare the coconut milk.  Hahahaha! I asked him to cut that out from the whole process so here goes, I'm sharing his cooking directions!

Ginataang Kalabasa at Sitaw

• Sauté garlic, onions and ginger.  Add coconut milk (2nd extraction, gata) and simmer until it smells good! (awwww)

• Add sliced squash and string beans.  When vegetables are half done, add the coconut cream (1st extraction, kakang gata) and let it simmer until the vegetables are tender.  At this point you could also add dried salted fish to add flavor to the dish.  If you would prefer a vegetarian version, skip the dried fish and season with salt instead. Add a dash of pepper to add more zing to the dish!   

• When the dish is done, eat it while it's still warm with rice. :-D

Ginisang Ampalaya: Sauteed Bitter Melon

it's a bitter(sweet) symphony

Ampalaya or bitter melon is a fruit that has a lot of benefits.  Ampalaya can be consumed as food yet nowadays it has become more popular for its medicinal effects especially as an anti-diabetic.  Here in the Philippines, there are some vegetable dishes that include the bitter zing of the ampalaya to make the dishes an amalgam of flavors.

I love ampalaya.  Even though it is bitter, if it is cooked the right way, it wouldn't be as bitter as first perceived.  I love ampalaya cooked with eggs but for this recipe I decided to leave out the eggs and make this dish sort of vegetarian.

In order to make ginisang ampalaya, the following ingredients are needed:

ampalaya/bitter melon, sliced thinly
garlic, minced
onions, chopped
tomatoes, chopped
salt
pepper
oil

What I did was heat about a tablespoon of oil in a pan and sautéed the garlic, onions, and tomatoes.  I then added the sliced ampalaya and immediately added salt and pepper and cooked it until the ampalaya became a bit wilted from the heat.  That's all!  It's best served with freshly steamed rice!

Ginisang ampalaya is a healthy dish and it is so easy to prepare you have to try it out!

Binignit, Init!

a burst of colors and flavors!

During cold nights, it is so easy to crave for something warm and homey and it just turns out that I am craving for binignit!  I don't know how folks would call this native Filipino dish in English but what I am only aware of is that it is made of rootcrops, bananas, and sago pearls cooked in diluted coconut milk and sugar.

I haven't tried preparing binignit on my own yet.  This one on the pic was made by somebody else and I couldn't wait to have a taste while it was cooking in the kitchen....and it's really, really good!!!!

Picadillo Dreaming

ground meat and veggies

Picadillo is a traditional Latin American meat dish which also has a Philippine version made out of ground meat and vegetables.  In the Philippines, this dish is better known as giniling (ground/minced) not only for the ground meat used but also for the finely chopped vegetables.

The picadillo you see on this post is a product of my own recipe.  I bought ground beef and a pack of frozen vegetables (carrots, peas, corn) from the grocery and cooked them up and came up with this!  What I did was sauteed onions and garlic and added the meat and stock and cooked it until it became tender.  I added the frozen vegetables and potatoes that I have diced, and seasoned the dish with salt and pepper.  When the picadillo was done,  I scooped some on top of steaming rice!  The rest is history... How I wish I could have some right now... 

Until then, I'll just be picadillo dreaming...