There is no sincerer love than the love of food.
7.27.2008 - Weird as they may be, my food combinations are yummy!
I have been tripping out on muesli as an attempt to eat healthier. Last night, I wanted to try something new. Most of you know that I have a penchant for coming up with the weirdest and grossest food combinations. So dig this. I mixed up muesli, plain yogurt, skim milk and.......honey and apple cider vinegar. Yeah, yeah sounds gross but believe me, it was delicious! Why apple cider vinegar? Because i have a bottle in my room that has half apple cider vinegar and half honey, which I take when i have a sore throat or a cough. It is my home made remedy for when am not feeling well, and it really works. And when I had the muesli last night, I was lazy to go down and get honey so i used that instead. The results were tasty. In fact, I had it again for breakfast this morning. :-)
7.25.2008 - Crunchy granola with milk, an apple, and a mixed fruit and vegetable juice
Yummy granola with low fat milk. An apple to keep me awake during the day, instead of a cup of coffee (Mica's tip, and it works!), and a glass of mixed fruit and vegetable juice. Healthy and yummy.
7.24.2008 - Breakfast : Savoury oatmeal with lamb meatballs and a cucumber salad on the side, fresh Orange Juice
I kinda got sick of having sweetened oatmeal every morning, so I decided to have some savoury oatmeal instead. The oatmeal reaplaces the rice, and ends up like a congee. It is actually pretty good. It's an extreme change from sweetened oatmeal. Oatmeal is actually very versatile, and can be used in numerous ways. I used to hate oatmeal when I thought that the only way to eat it was with milk and sugar. Now that I have found new ways to eat it, I have developed a liking for it.
Lamb Bolognese
I had a small dinner at home with friends and I had no idea what tome make for them. Then I remembered Mica telling me about Inez's lamb lasagna, so decided to make some lamb bolognese. It came out so good, much better than a regular beef bolognese.
Here's the recipe in case you want to try it out.
300 grams of ground lamb
olive oil
2 Tbsps finely chopped onions
2 Tbsps finely chopped celery
1 Tbsp finely chopped garlic
1 big can whole tomatoes
1/2 cup tomato sauce
1 Tbsp chopped green olives
1 Tbsp chopped black olives
3 Tbsps chopped button mushrooms
salt and pepper
oregano
dried basil
Saute the lamb in olive oil til a bit caramelized.
Add the onion, celery and garlic.
After about 2 mins, add the canned tomatoes,tomato sauce, olives and mushrooms.
Put in the dried herbs and season with salt and pepper.
Simmer until cooked.
Enjoy!!!
FOOD STYLING SHOTS
Pesto on Spaghettini topped with grapes and nuts
It's my brother's birthday and I saw some freshly cooked spaghettini i the kitchen. Perfect because i was holding a bottle of pesto, red grapes, and cashew nuts from the fridge upstairs. I was gonna make a chicken salad sandwich, but decided to eat pasta instead.
I have a penchant for weird flavors and for mixing up food that isn't often eaten together. Today, my combination was spaghettini tossed in basil pesto with halved red seedless grapes and roughly chopped cashew nuts. So it had the saltiness of the cheese in the pesto, the sweetness of the grapes, and the nuttiness of the cashew nuts.
All I can say is that, it was good! Don't believe me. Go and try it and see for yourself. :-)
Quince nectar
My new discovery. Like I said in my prior post, I have a penchant for food and beverages that most Filipinos will not really enjoy. Quince isn't something that is sold here nor is it readily available. It is from the apple and pear family. It's nectar is quite thick, like a more liquid apple sauce. It actually reminds me of prune juice. But it's really yummy and healthy. In fact, I plan to make a membrillo out of it.
Quince is high in fibre and therefore helps regulate digestion, helps strengthen the stomach and intestine, cleanse the blood. And also quince supports more efficient activity of the liver. It helps reduce stress and palpitation.
Nothing is more comforting than a cup of soup
Lentejas, or lentil soup is something that I could never get sick of. I grew up eating lentejas, it's something we have at home almost weekly.
So today, i woke up feeling the effects of being soused the night before with not enough sleep. I needed comfort! And what was cooked for lunch? You got it, Lentejas! The lentils were cooked to perfection married into a thick tomato based soup with slices of chorizo. I ate it topped with chopped fresh tomatoes and onions, marinated i olive oil, salt and pepper. Eating it was like tapping into the 99%...for a while at least.
So here is the recipe.
I bag of lentils
1 whole onion, chopped
1 whole garlic
1 celery stalk, cut in half
1 carrot, cut in 4
i big can whole tomatoes
1 cup tomato sauce
1 cup sliced chorizo
olive oil
salt and pepper
Cook the lentils in water and throw in the whole garlic, celery, carrots and chorizo.
In another pot, saute the onions in olive oil until translucent.
Add the tomato sauce and the whole tomatoes. Cook for about 5 minutes then add it to the pot with lentils.
Simmer until cooked and thick, season with salt and pepper
Yum, enjoy!!!!
Shawarma Rice, my version
I had my first ever encounter with Shawarma rice yesterday at the Food Channel stall in Market Market. I've been hearing about how good it is for like a month straight, so I decided to finally give in to Mica's craving and go for it. It was good but I got excited to try making it at home. So I did a lot of research to find the best recipe, and made it today. It came out even better than the one I had in the food stall.
Youvetzi
This is one of my all time uber favorite dishes. I used to order this in Mati all the time!
Ingredients:
1/2 kilo of lamb cubes
2 teaspoons fresh lemon juice
1/4 teaspoon oregano
1/b teaspoon dried thyme
1/2 cup red wine
1/2 cup melted butter or olive oil
1/2 cup water
1 can pureed or diced canned tomato
1 large onion, minced
2 garlic cloves, minced
1/4-1/2 teaspoon cinnamon (depending on preference) - try with dashes first
orzo pasta (if you dont have orzo, use rice. this is like a risotto.)
freshly-grated parmesan cheese
Directions:
1. Wash and pat dry lamb cubes. Rub with the lemon juice and pour melted butter or olive oil over. Season generously with salt, pepper, oregano and thyme.
2. Brown in a pot and pour wine, 1 cup water, the tomato puree, minced onion, garlic and cinnamon around meat . Give the sauce a stir and cook until the meat is tender.
3. In a large saucepan, bring plenty of water to the boil, salt generously and boil the orzo pasta for 8 minutes. Remove and drain - retain a cup of the cooking water. 4. Add the pasta to the lamb casserole and give everything a stir to distribute orzo throughout the pan.
4. Increase the heat and cook until the orzo is cooked through. If the pasta is too dry, stir in enough of the pasta cooking water you've retained to keep it sauce.
5. Adjust the seasoning.
5. Have lots of freshly-grated parmesan to sprinkle over pasta at table.
Tofu Sisig
I have never attempted to make tofu sisig but the ingredients would be the same, you just replace the pork with tofu. The basic components of sisig would be the crispiness of the "meat" and the spicy, sour and salty tastes.
But Mica made this and said it kicked ass!!!
let's start with ingredients
* Firm tofu, chopped (depends how big or small you want them)
* chopped onions
* siling labuyo, seeded and chopped or you can use the gree chilis that are for sinigang so it's not so anghang. i really dont know what kind of sili you have there. or use tabasco.
* calamansi juice (lemon juice)
* garlic, minced
* whole black pepper (crushed)
* 1 pc bay leaf (crushed)
* Salt to taste but I would use Knorr, it would be much tastier specially with the tofu that has no lasa!
* mayonnaise if you like or crack a egg on the sizzling plate, or in the pan as soon as you take it out of the heat
so what you wanna do is this:
1. fry the chopped tofu in oil until it is crispy. i would chop them really small. make sure its the firm tofu, if not it will be wet and runny and will look like mush. Then remove to drain.
2. Then leave some oil to saute a lot of onions and a bit of garlic, plus siling labuyo (depends how anghang you want it) or hot sauce kung walang sili.
3. When onions are translucent add the tofu back, season with knorr seasoning, freshly squeezed calamansi, salt and pepper to taste, then just before serving add mayonnaise or top with a raw egg.
Grilled Salmon with Tomato-Cucumber Salad
I was watching the Food Channel and the show that was on featured a grilled cowboy steak and a fresh vegetable salsa, with some grilled onions on the side and garlic mashed potatoes. I was seriously getting hungry watching the show, but am avoiding meat at the moment. What was there in the kitchen to substitute it? Oh, salmon!!!
So I had a grilled salmon fillet, just seasoned with salt and pepper. Then I made a fresh salsa of chopped tomatoes, chopped cucumbers, olive oil, apple cider vinegar, and pepper. I actually flaked the salmon and mixed it woth the vegetables.
It was light, fresh and healthy. Yum!!!
