VIGAN, Ilocos Sur - Food Trip

We wanted to experience the northern regions of Luzon, Philippines, both for their culture and cuisine. Vigan, the capital of the province of Ilocos Sur, was an obvious choice, since it is on UNESCO's World Heritage Site list of places of cultural significance, primarily because of its cobblestone streets and unique architecture--a mix of Philippine, Oriental, and European design and construction.

                                                         

[Note: All the photos are mine; the map is from Wikipedia. Go to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vigan for touristy details about Vigan; and to http://www.villangela.com/ to read about Villa Angela Heritage House, where we stayed.]

Here was our itinerary:  take the bus up to Vigan City, stay a couple of nights, then take another bus up to Laoag, spend a night in the city, then find our way farther up north, to Pagudpud, where we had reservations for two nights at the Kapuluan Beach Resort. From there, we planned to bus it down back to Laoag, and from its international airport take the one-hour flight back to Manila.

MARIKINA FOOD TRIP!

FOOD TRIP TO MARIKINA
(Mainly on J.P. Rizal St., Sta. Elena, near the Church)
This food trip was planned thanks mainly to the recent The Pinoy Foodie youtube videos (thanks for sharing the link, Brod Philip!) featuring restaurants and eateries in Marikina City, which has won an award for the cleanest and greenest city in Metro Manila. My Mom and I started out at about 11:00 am today, a fine, but typically hot and humid day. 
All the eateries/shops/carinderias shown below are located mainly on J. P. Rizal Street in the Sta. Elena area, one a few steps away from the others. Our final stop, the Cafe Kapitan, has its own full blog posting in this same blogsite.

CAFE KAPITAN, Marikina, Rizal

CAFE KAPITAN RESTAURANT
Kap Moy Bldg., J.P. Rizal St.
Sta. Elena, Marikina City
Tel. 646-4303; 0918-933-7896

     Yes, this gorgeous 220+-year-old ancestral home of Don Laureano (Kap Moy) Guevara is where the Cafe Kapitan Restaurant is located, on the ground floor (the rest of the house is a cultural center for Marikina City). [He could be a relative, because my Grandma's maiden name is Guevara, and the family is from Marikina.] 
     Kap Moy is the "Father of the Shoe Industry," and this house (where he was born and raised, and is so full of history) was where the first shoe was made and the first shoe factory started. The house was commandeered by the Americans and the Japanese for use as headquarters during their respective occupations of the country. After the war, the building was used as a public elementary school (in fact, my Grandma on my Mom's side actually went there). Then, in 1994, the school was moved elsewhere, and the building was completely restored and renovated by then Mayor Bayani Fernando, for use as a cultural center for Marikina City. At the same time, restaurateurs John Lim and Aurora Lim were contracted to convert the left side of the ground floor into a top-of-the-line restaurant, to serve as a venue for government functions as well as be open to the public as a full-service restaurant. 

Cassava Bibingka (Cake)

Today I attended the monthly meeting of CHoWDC (Culinary Historians of Washington, DC). I love it that the group has this very nice tradition of members bringing a home-made dish or two. I decided to bring Cassava Bibingka, to give them a taste of Filipino desserts. This is another Chef Romy Dorotan recipe, from his and Amy Besa's cookbook, Memories of Philippine Kitchens (reviewed on this blogsite). I made a few minor changes, but basically remained faithful to the recipe--the bibingka was delicious, and they loved it (somebody even asked for the recipe). 

Today's guest speaker was Joan Nathan, the doyenne of Jewish cooking, and she gave a very interesting and informative account of the history of Jewish food, which is the subject of her latest cookbook (more on this in a separate blog posting).

Maharlika Restaurant, New York City

Maharlika Restaurant
111 First Avenue & 7th St.
646-392-7880
maharlikanyc.com

Maharlika is still young, having started out in January 2011 as a "pop-up" place serving only brunch on weekends at the Resto Leon (East Village), and then at the Alias Restaurant (Lower East Side). Their food earned consistent raves from critics, and now, owners Nicole Ponseca and Enzo Lim together with their Chef, Miguel Trinidad, have now opened their own place, also in the East Village.


I had heard a lot of good things about Maharlika, so I made sure we visited it on our next trip to New York. We came twice, for dinner and brunch, with a group so we could sample a good number of items on their funky and playful menu.

Spaghetti Sauce, Filipino Style

Whenever I visit my children in New York and Boston (or they come to visit me), I always cook Filipino dishes – both are foodies and love to cook (yes!), but they live such busy lives and don’t often have the time to cook their favorite comfort food from home. Spaghetti sauce is one such dish and back home in the Philippines this sauce is always cooked with ground meat, in Ragu or Bolognese style (see my posting in this blog about Pasta Sauces). Bolognese is a robust meat sauce also known as Ragu; it is hearty, with ground beef or pork, pancetta, tomatoes, onions, garlic, carrots and celery.  The sauce is sometimes enhanced with a bit of wine, cream and seasoning.

Fried Vegetable & Meat Lumpia (Eggrolls)

Lumpia (eggroll) is a wonderful Filipino food beloved by all back home in the Philippines, and it's one of the three most well-known Filipino dishes outside the country (the other two are, arguably, adobo (vinegar-braised meat) and pancit (noodles)). This can be a challenging dish for the uninitiated, and if you've never rolled an eggroll before, you are going to need some practice to make perfectly tight rolls like the ones you see in the photo above. A loosely-wrapped lumpia will not survive the frying -- it will open up and spew out the filling. There are several different kinds of lumpia, and the list is too long to include in this headnote; I'll test a few of them in the near future and post them here. 

Pavlova

Anna Pavlova, the principal dancer of the Russian Imperial Ballet, visited Australia and New Zealand in the 1920's, and the natives went crazy over her and concocted this fluffy, crunchy yet chewy, flamboyant dessert in her honor. Both countries claim they invented this truly scrumptious creation, but that doesn't matter to those of us who break into a swoon at the prospect of having a generous slice of it for dessert!

Talbos ng Kamote Salad (Sweet Potato Tops Salad)

Yet another use for my Anchovy-Mustard Vinaigrette, this time with a very Filipino ingredient -- talbos ng kamote, or sweet potato baby leaves.I had mentioned in another blog that I recently discovered this Asian vegetable farm close to home, and these talbos ng kamote were among my purchases. I haven't had these veggies in a long long while, so I figured that since I still have some of that vinaigrette that I recently made, I'd make a healthy salad for a side dish for lunch. I "blanched and shocked" the talbos (dip them in boiling salted water for 2 minutes, then put them in a bowl of iced water to stop the cooking; dry on paper towels or spin in a salad spinner). I happened to have a pomegranate at hand, so I added some of its seeds and some slices of fresh tomatoes (you can add any fruits or veggies you have at hand). I was having pork adobo and rice, and this was such an excellent accompaniment. My tummy thanked me afterwards!

Misua Soup with Meatballs (a.k.a. Almondigas)

It is a cold and rainy day today, the perfect time for this Filipino comfort food. This dish is also called almondigas in the Philippines (apparently from the Spanish "albondigas," which means meatballs). Misua (or miswa) is a brittle (when raw) thin noodle made from either cornstarch or wheat flour, which cooks very quickly. I recently discovered a local farm that grows and sells Asian vegetables, and it's 5 minutes away from our house, so you can imagine my euphoria -- the farm is run by a Vietnamese woman and her American

Lumpiang Shanghai (Shanghai Meat Eggrolls)

This is a recipe that I adapted from the wonderful international award-winning cookbook, "Memories of Philippine Kitchens," (reviewed in this blog site) by the Filipino chefs/restaurateurs Amy Besa and Romy Dorotan (their popular restaurant, "Purple Yam" is in Brooklyn, New York). I omitted one ingredient, the ear mushrooms, because I could not find them in the Asian supermarkets in my area. I loved the way the lumpia is rolled -- the wrapper is reinforced by a smaller piece inside the big piece, which prevented any pieces from getting soggy and bursting open with holes when frying them. They were delicious with the Thai eggroll sweet chile sauce.

Honey-Tamarind-Ginger Beef Barbecue

We served this at my granddaughter's second birthday party recently, and it was a big hit. The meat came out really tender and flavorful because of the overnight marinating (my son-in-law also expertly sliced it against the grain, which helped a lot in having tender slices). The combination of the honey, concentrated tamarind paste, and grated ginger made for an unbelievable marinade.You don't have to buy an expensive cut of meat -- you just have to make sure you slice it against the grain (they could get stringy otherwise).

Macadamia & Pistachio Sans Rival (Rich Nut Torte)

       My son asked last weekend if I could make Sans Rival for our next Christmas dinner, so I thought I'd bake one today. Sans Rival is one of the most challenging Filipino torte desserts, and I hadn't made one in years, so I figured I better practice making it. (My daughter has also asked me to make Pavlova for Thanksgiving, so that will be the next one on my practice list.)

    Sans Rival (which is French for "without a rival") is a very rich dessert, made with lots of eggs, butter, sugar, and nuts, and I have yet to find a pastry chef who has attempted to make a "lite" version of this torte (or perhaps I just haven't looked closely enough). It is a bit labor-intensive to make, but well worth the time and effort the minute you bite into that first mouthful, which just melts in your mouth and transports you to dessert heaven. 

Easy Chicken Adobo (No Frying!)

This is the easiest chicken adobo you will ever make. I adapted it from a recipe by Millie Reyes (of the famed Aristocrat Restaurant in Manila) -- she combined chicken and pork, but I did not have any pork at hand. I also held back on the vinegar (her recipe called for 1 cup) as I didn't want the sauce to be too sour. The adobo actually tasted very good, and it was simple and quick to prepare since you don't have to fry the meat like you would in the traditional adobo way. I actually like my adobo a little bit on the dry side, as a result of the sangkutsa step (frying), but if you like your adobo saucy (or even soupy), then you will love this.

Chicken Adobo sa Buko (Young Coconut)

I was looking for a recipe for a savory dish using young coconut (buko), and I was intrigued by this one. One can buy fresh buko in some oriental supermarkets here in the D.C. area, but you'd need to crack it open with a cleaver, which I didn't want to do. I used instead frozen buko juice drink, and I found a couple of brands with good bits of buko in them. Both had added sugar though, and I should have omitted the sugar called for in the recipe, but it skipped my mind. So, my adobo came out a little bit on the sweet side, but it was still delicious, especially with steamed rice. The finished dish is very pale, and doesn't look anything like our typical Philippine adobo, but it had just the right amount of vinegary taste, as any good adobo should.

Chicken Afritada

It remains a puzzle to me that this Filipino dish is called "afritada" because the Spanish word "fritada" means "fried," and this dish is not fried at all, but rather sauteed/stewed. As the founder of the Culinary Historians of the Philippines (CHOP in Manila), I need to do some research on this. Stewing or braising in a tomato-based sauce is widely common back home, and different kinds of meats are cooked this way -- among others, Pork Menudo (small cubes of pork mixed in with cubes of pork liver); Beef Mechado (where the beef is "larded," or a piece of beef fat is inserted inside the beef chunks, for flavor enhancement); Beef Kaldereta (chunks of beef, with the sauce thickened with liver pate); Beef Pochero (with a more soupy rather than saucy liquid, often served with leafy vegetables and saging

Tinolang Manok (Chicken in Gingered Broth)

This is a beloved comfort food back home in the Philippines, and it does not matter if the weather is hot and humid--a steaming bowl of Tinola will always be welcomed at the table with a wide smile, especially when served with a large bowl of steaming rice and some good-quality patis (fish sauce) on the side. The wonderful aroma of the ginger while you're cooking will permeate the kitchen, and perhaps the entire house, and everyone at home will be able to guess what's cooking and lick their lips in anticipation. This dish, partnered with rice, offers a complete meal of proteins, carbohydrates, and vegetables -- eat healthy!!! [Note: This dish is traditionally cooked with dahon ng sili (leaves of chile plant), which is not easy to find in the U.S. Spinach is also a good substitute.]

Sugar-Free Stained-Glass Jell-O (a.k.a. Cathedral Jell-O)

My sister Ada made this Jell-O in Manila for an afternoon tea with her friends. She based it on one that I had made a year ago, which had a slight variation (see photo below). It's a great guilt-free dessert, especially for those who are watching their diet.

In my version, which I made for one of the meetings of CHOP in Manila, I added some slices of jarred peaches, which gave a touch of sweetness to the dish. I also used a bigger mold, which was actually a bundt cake pan, which provided the finished dish with some height.(Note: The packs of gelatin have Manila measurements; it would be different here in the U.S., so you may need to tweak the amount of water needed.)

Nora's Callos

This is one of my Mom's signature dishes, and I still remember how she used to spend many hours cleaning the tripe, and cooking it and the beef leg (pata ng baka) until they were fork-tender. Of course, now you can buy well-cleaned tripe in supermarkets. Beef leg is a bit harder to find. Callos is usually served at large gatherings, because it takes such a long time to cook, making it worthwhile to make a big batch for a large crowd. I recently cooked this dish and sent it to my son in New York (his Ate (big sister), hubby and daughter were visiting from Boston), and they devoured it (I think mostly him).

Brazo de Mercedes

This is a very popular meringue-based Filipino dessert, despite its high calorie and cholesterol content (or may be because of it!). A couple of bites surely won't hurt, I suppose, to satisfy one's sweet tooth. This is adapted from my Tito Danny's recipe, and I baked the one in the photograph for him when he and my Tita Chit visited us in Washington, D.C. The recipe is a bit labor-intensive, but well worth all the effort!