Food!

Tags

food, Food trip!, Food: Cocktales, Food: Golden Fortune, Food: Peanut Butter Company, Food: Singapore, Food: Xocolat

I don’t think I’ve ever posted food photos here, and what better day to start than today! It’s Blog Action Day and the topic is food.

Before I begin with the food photos, all of which I have never posted on The Lunch Buddies before (if only because I’ve forgotten), I’d like to give a simple message so that this post is not just a photo dump: Don’t waste food! My heart breaks every time I see someone leaving behind food and dumping it into the trash. We’re currently facing a bleak future where our energy resources will be completely depleted, and it’s our duty as human beings to save the planet so that the future generations can enjoy it as much as we do. So much energy goes into producing food, and when we throw it away, all that energy is used for nothing, when it could have gone into other more useful things. Just because you pay for it doesn’t mean that you have the right to waste it! Money is not going to save our planet! Every time you decide to leave behind food in a restaurant, think about all the things that went into that dish, where those ingredients came from, how much energy was used in creating it, and remember that all of that will be wasted as well.

Finally, the food photos! And don’t worry, I didn’t leave a single gram of any of this!

Bon Appetit!

Xocolat – Oriental Chicken Salad

Makan Makan Singapore – White Chai Tow Kway (Radish Cake)

Makan Makan Singapore – BBQ Wings

Golden Fortune – Beef Balls

Golden Fortune – Hakaw

Peanut Butter Company – BBQ Wings w/ Rice

Xocolat – Xocolat Chicken Pasta

Xocolat – Pork Belly

Flaming Wings – Smokey BBQ Chicken Tenders with Ranch Dressing

Xocolat – Frozen “Hot” Xoco

Cocktales – (I have no idea what this is called but it had melon, mango and bananas in it.)

 

 

 

 

Japanese Food Blog!

Tags

Japanese food

If you’ve been following my blog for some time already, you’d know that I’m obsessed with making new blogs. I don’t even put stuff in them. I just make them, add designs and themes, say hello in my very first post, and leave them to die.

Yes. I made another one. BUT this time, I’m not just idly wasting time. This is actually for my Japanese Food Culture class, perhaps the funnest class I’ve had in a long long while. Imagine a class where we just talk about foooood. *sighs*

One of our requirements is to write a journal about Japanese food. As in, generally ANYTHING about Japanese food. And so I decided to blog!

The blog is called “Japanese Food, Filipino Tastebuds” and will be less “review-y” and more “insightful”, so expect to see more stuff about Japanese culture, whatever.

My first post is a rehash of an old “The Lunch Buddies” post about Kozui Green Tea, so it’s probably not interesting for you, but just in case, here’s the link:

http://livingjapanese.wordpress.com

In the future, I’ll talk about other things regarding Japanese food, but for now, enjoy~

The Most Wonderful, Wonderful Time of the Year

Tags

Chinese food, Peanut balls

Yes. My second favorite holiday (after Christmas) is finally here! No, I’m not talking about Valentine’s Day. I’m talking about tomorrow, the 15th of the first month in the Lunar calendar. That is, Yuan Xiao Festival (元宵節) which means… well, I have no idea what it means, but it supposedly celebrates the first full moon of the new year.

And… you know the Chinese and their obscure food metaphors. Apparently, these little nuggets of heaven, called peanut balls here in the Philippines, but actually called “tang yuan”(湯圓) in Chinese, literally “soup balls”, resemble the full moon (well, mooncakes are supposed to resemble the full moon too, because they’re round. So really, the only qualification for any piece of food to resemble the full moon is to be round.) are these mochi-like balls made of glutinous rice and often filled with sweet paste made of peanuts, sesame seeds, beans, sugar, etc. etc.

The variant available here in the Philippines is big, with thinner “skin” and bigger and more solid filling, often peanut. I’ve tried the ones from Hong Kong (that are available all year round, everywhere, and not just at this time of the year like here in Manila) and they’re smaller, with thicker skin, and more liquid black sesame paste filling. They’re also served plain with ginger soup which may sound strange but is quite good when you get to appreciate its spiciness.

We buy ours at Eng Bee Tin, one of the most famous Chinese pastry shops in Manila. It’s pretty expensive, P300 for 25 pcs, but they’re quite big, perhaps around 1.5 inches in diameter each.

This is what it looks like uncooked:

They’re frozen, rock hard, and covered in flour (to prevent sticking to each other).

Here’s how to cook them! It’s super easy and even a kid can do it!

1. Boil water. Around 5 liters for 25 pieces would be enough (I’m totally guessing) but make sure to use a pot that’s large enough so that the water reaches only half of it.
2. At this point, you can add random flavorings that you like, such as ginger, orange peel, etc. No need to add sugar, since the filling is really sweet already. (Unless you want to, then fine.)
3. Once the water is boiling, slowly drop the balls in. BE SURE they don’t splash, because trust me, you do not want boiling hot water to splash onto your hand. If you’re inexperienced, use a ladle or something and put them in slooooowly.
4. While boiling, leave it alone. Lower the heat if it’s on the verge of bubbling over.
5. From time to time, mix them to prevent the balls from sticking to the side of the pot and also to each other.
6. You’ll know that they’re done when they start floating to the surface. See? No need to throw them at the wall and/or cut them in half to find out if they’re cooked!
7. Serve in bowls, preferably round because it symbolizes the moon togetherness.

In my family, we eat them in even numbers because it’s apparently more lucky. Don’t ask me why.

Look at that little round ball of perfection.

Beautiful golden peanut/sesame paste inside ♥

I ate four today and that’s actually plenty already (normal people have only 2), but it’s so good. I get excited every time it’s Chinese New Year, not because we get tikoy (we don’t really like tikoy that much) but because there are only 15 days left before we get to eat peanut balls! So happy~

So anyway, if you get to have them at home, enjoy! If you don’t, it’s time to visit Chinatown and grab some for yourself~

What has Charmy been up to?

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Yeahhhhh my sister and I baked oatmeal chocolate chip cookies today! Actually, don’t be so amazed, because we bought one of those ready made mixes, haha! And since we don’t have an actual oven, we just used our toaster oven… Still, it was fun, and the cookies ended up slightly burnt but super yummy.

As always, I still have tons of schoolwork that have yet to be done. I should be panicking, but I’m having too much fun bumming around the house. Oh, procrastination. When will I ever get rid of you?

Tuna Basil Pasta

Tags

Cooking, pasta

I cooked for my family again last Sunday! And yes, it’s pasta again. Someday I will cook something different, but for now, I’m trying to exhaust all the possibilities for pasta.

So I call this pasta “Tuna Basil Pasta”. I didn’t follow any recipe this time and just went with what I felt like, and the result was pretty good!

Here’s the “recipe”!

Ingredients:

• a 400g pack of penne, boiled with a little oil to avoid sticking, and a little salt for taste. It’s best to cook al dente, but since I’m cooking for my grandma too, I overcooked it a bit so it would be easier for her to chew.
• a 560g pack of Del Monte Italian Style Spaghetti Sauce. I always use Italian style because Filipino style is too sweet for me.
• a large can of Century tuna in vegetable oil. I would have used the hot and spicy flavor, but my dad and my grandma doesn’t like food that’s too spicy. I mashed it a bit with a spoon so that it wouldn’t be too chunky.
• a large can of button mushrooms, sliced.
• a medium sized red onion, diced.
• lots and lots of garlic.
• lots and lots of dried basil! I don’t have any fresh herbs so I use the dried one, but it’s pretty good too.
• Salt and pepper. And vegetable oil (use any variant you have).

Steps:

• After heating your pan enough for any water in it to evaporate, add vegetable oil. I used about 5 tablespoons but it depends on how much you’ll be cooking. If you’re using a non-stick pan, you can use less oil.
• After the oil heats up, saute the garlic until golden, and then add the onions. Saute them together until the onions are slightly transparent.
• Add the tuna and saute with some salt and pepper. I also added the basil here just so that the tuna will taste of basil too.  Add the mushrooms and saute some more.
• After the mushrooms have slightly cooked, add the spaghetti sauce. When the sauce is boiling, I also add some hot water to the sauce just so that my pasta won’t be too dry. Add a bit of sugar to taste, in case the sauce is too sour for you.
• Let the sauce simmer for a while. Stir constantly to prevent the sauce from sticking to the bottom/sides of the pan. At this point, you can also add some grated cheese or cream to the sauce. I didn’t because I wanted the sauce to be light.
• After a few minutes, add the pasta! Stir constantly to mix the sauce with the pasta, and also to prevent the paste from sticking to the bottom/sides of the pan.
• Once the pasta is completely mixed with the sauce, you can just cover the pan and let it cook for a few minutes in LOW HEAT. This will make sure that the sauce and paste can combine and the pasta itself wouldn’t be tasteless.
• Aaaand… it’s ready! Turn off the heat and serve!

I love making pasta. It’s so easy, and everything is instinctive. But this is only because I spent years watching my mom or our household help making it, so I’m confident about how things should be done. If you’re a first time cook, then make sure you ask someone more experienced to watch over you to prevent you from doing anything stupid! The most important part of cooking is knowing when to turn up and turn down the heat. This determines how tasty, how tender, how well-cooked, and how unburnt your food is, so I suggest you learn this before cooking anything by yourself. Now that I’m used to cooking, I don’t have to think about it anymore, but it takes time and practice and lots of experience.

Have fun!