C is for Comfort food



Mommy has decided to take on the challenge of making dinner for five days.

Since it has been cold the past few weeks, Mommy  thought that it would be nice  to have some traditional Filipino comfort food. You seemed to like the arroz caldo the best of them all. You had three helpings!

The basic arroz caldo is fairly easy to do. The secret to making it nice and tasty is Patience - it requires constant attention and regular stirring (needless to say, this is not a dish wherein we can read  "The Story of Peppa Pig" while Mommy is cooking).







Left to right, clockwise: Nilagang baboy, chicken and pork adobo
in coconut milk, arroz caldo, picadillo, and chicken sotanghon soup

Ingredients:

Rice (1 cup)
Chicken (750 grams)
Ginger
Onions
Garlic
Cooking oil
Salt
Pepper
2 hard boiled eggs (slice into quarters)

Procedure:
1. Heat the oil in a deep pan.
2. When the oil is warm, brown the ginger, garlic, and the onions.
3. Add the chicken.
4. After about 15 minutes of cooking, add the rice.
5. Add 2 cups water, slowly stirring.
6. Add water as needed.
7. Continue adding water and stirring for about an hour.
8. Season with salt and pepper to taste.
9.  Serve the arroz caldo in a bowl, garnished with quartered hardboiled eggs.

Remarks:
There are those who put saffron in the rice and there are those who prefer to use patis (a Filipino fish sauce) as seasoning. There are those who prefer to use malagkit (glutinous rice) as an added ingredient. Still there are also those who garnish the arroz caldo with green onions and toasted garlic bits upon serving.

The above recipe however, is the one your lola makes at home in the Philippines and this is  how Mommy prefers it best prepared.

happy father's day!

Port Adelaide gave Daddy a wonderful present for Father’s Day. Today, in their last game, our team tied up with Richmond. Wooohoooooooo!!!!

We’re now on our official countdown, Little Pebble – 15 days to go! We went to the doctor last Tuesday as Mommy has been having tummy pains for two days.  The doctor told us to take it easy little one, we don’t want you coming out before Daddy arrives on the 13^th.  Anyway, the doctor gave Mommy instructions for symptoms to watch out for, and whether we like it or not, we need to rush to the hospital, if she experience any of these signs.  We don’t want to upset Daddy, ... so hang on there until he arrives, ok?

Because Daddy likes seafood and it's his special day today, Mommy made today seafood pesto pasta for us.

Seafood Pesto Pasta

¼ kg shrimps

Tuna (200 grams)

1 bottle pesto (200 grams)

Cheddar cheese, cut into small cubes (about 40 grams)

1 onion, chopped

1 garlic, chopped

Olive oil

Butter

Olives

Capers

Salt and pepper

1.       Heat olive oil in skillet

2.       Brown onions and garlic

3.       Add butter

4.       Lightly cook in shrimp

5.       Add tuna

6.       Slowly add in pesto

7.       Add cheese

8.       Add olives and capers

9.       Add salt and pepper to taste

You definitely love your pasta, Little Pebble. Mommy notices that you even start getting active now even while she is cooking. Seems you’ve really gotten used to your weekend treat.

We’re really, really, really getting near to having you, dearest.  You cannot even begin to imagine how excited Mommy and Daddy are. All we do is keep talking about you now.

ragu sauce

Mommy’s weekends are mostly now devoted to preparations for your coming. Got something very special for you today from Greenhills but Daddy and Mommy will keep this a secret for now :)

Mommy has made you a treat today. She’s made you pasta with ragu sauce she’s read up from a book (the proportions here are Mommy’s call).

1 onion (chopped)
1 clove garlic (chopped)
250 grams minced beef
200 grams bacon
400 grams canned chopped tomatoes
500 grams tomato sauce
Oregano
Salt
Pepper

1.Heat onion and garlic in olive oil.
2.Add bacon.
3.Add minced beef. Cook for about 15 minutes.
4.Add tomato sauce. Simmer for 30 minutes.
5.Add chopped tomatoes. Cook for 10 minutes.
6.Add oregano, salt, and pepper to taste
(Good for 500 grams pasta)

Mommy and Mildred (your nanny) enjoyed the pasta while watching the night scene from our 11th floor veranda.

You really love your pasta. After Mommy had dinner, you started doing fantastic sommersaults inside her tummy.

filipino-style spaghetti sauce

We are lucky little pebble to have somebody looking after us.  Every weekend, Norma comes to Mommy’s place to clean up and cook.  Norma has been with Mommy for around eight years now.

Norma today brought with her Vades, her daughter. Vades made you special Filipino-style spaghetti sauce. It was so good Mommy had to ask Vades to teach her how to make it so you will have a chance later on to whip this up for Mommy and Daddy ;)

Ingredients:
(Enough for about 1 kilo spaghetti)

250 grams spaghetti sauce

1 bottle (320 grams) ketchup (hot-sweet flavour)

8 pcs large hotdogs (chopped)

500 grams ground beef

250 ml all-purpose cream

Soy sauce (4 tablespoons)

Onions

Garlic

Chili powder

Pepper

Salt

Sugar

Canola oil

Procedure:

1.       Brown onions and garlic in canola oil.

2.       Add ground beef.

3.       When beef is cooked, add chopped hotdogs.

4.       Add spaghetti sauce, ketchup, and all-purpose cream. Bring to slow boil.

5.       Add soy sauce, chilli powder, pepper, salt, and sugar to taste.

saturdays

Since you’ve started moving in Mommy’s tummy, she’s been wondering if you can distinguish the days in the week.  For some reason you don’t kick on Mondays and only poke sluggishly throughout the week. But when Saturday comes, oh my, Mommy feels like you’re playing soccer in her tummy. You’re even up as early as 5.30 a.m.!

Mommy gives you a special treat on weekends. She has observed that you love pasta with the sauce Daddy makes.  So she makes it a point now to cook pasta for you every weekend. After Mommy finishes a plate of pasta (usually with a glass of grape or apple juice), you get really quite excited. Daddy says you’re burning off all those carbs by kicking around.

When Daddy comes to Manila, he always makes a lot of pasta sauce and stores these in the freezer.  The sauce is now gone (you eat a lot these days little pebble!) and Mommy has to make you some until Daddy comes back to make a new batch.

So via skype, Daddy has to teach Mommy how to do his special sauce so you can still have your weekend treat.

1.       Prepare the ingredients:

a.      Onion

b.      Garlic

c.       Olive Oil

d.      Tomato sauce (about 250 grams)

e.      200 grams minced pork

f.       3 pieces chicken wings

g.      6 pieces of beef  (smaller than matchbox size)

h.      Pepper

i.       Basil

j.       Olives

2.       Chop up the onions and garlic and brown these in olive oil.

3.       Lightly fry the minced pork, chicken wings, and beef together with the onions and garlic

4.       Pour the tomato sauce over the meat.

5.       Slow cook for at least 2 hours until the meat fall apart.

6.       Add water occasionally

7.       At the end, season with pepper, basil, and olives

Mommy has to make a confession (A confession is when you admit something which you should or should not have done but it bothers your conscience so much that you’ve got to tell your deed. For example, Mommy told you that you can only watch Disney on weekends but you watched a really scary movie that you start having bad dreams at night. You’ll have to confess this to Mommy and Daddy so they can tell you that those scary things you saw are not real and won’t get you when the lights are turned off.)

Going back to the confession.  Mommy has difficulty slow cooking the sauce for 2 hours. It causes so much splatter in the kitchen.  She also doesn’t have the patience watching over the stove for 2 hours. She also easily gets distracted. She goes off to read the papers, write, clean the house, or do some work from the office and forgets that something is simmering in the kitchen. This is why Daddy is the Master Chef in the house. He is patient and watches over whatever he’s cooking with much love and care.

So Mommy was quite relieved that even if she simmered the sauce for only an hour, it was passable for you little one.  How does Mommy know this? After she finished a plate of pasta, you started kicking happily around!

But am sure you can’t wait until Daddy comes back to Manila to make the real thing.

POSTSCRIPT: Daddy dreamt about you last night. He said you were between 3 to 6 months old and he was feeding you (see, even in his dreams he makes sure you’re eating right). You looked so cute and pure. And you had shiny black hair.