Visitors gave us some souvenirs from Japan. These turned out to be small cans containing sable cookies. As is usual of omiyage or souvenirs from Japan, the packaging was interesting, attractive. Here is the can of cookies.
The can features popular representations of Japan including the Tokyo Sky Tree (the tallest building in Japan), Hachiko the dog, the Shinkansen or bullet train, temples, and sakura (cherry blossoms).
Details on the cookies including the manufacturer
Decorations on one side of the can.
The other side of the can.
Inside the can is bubble wrap to protect the contents and a pamphlet on the maker.
The cookies come in different shapes and each is a different kind of cookie. The mountain-shaped cookie is pistachio. The lighthouse-shaped cookie is ichigo (strawberry). The station-shaped cookie is cacao. The train and square-shaped cookies are butter. The small sakura-shaped cookies are blueberry. There are also small candies sprinkled around the can.
Here are the cookies.
The cookies side by side with the guide.
These were not large cookies but small or bite-sized. The taste is not really spectacular. They're regular as far as cookies go. The experience of eating them though is enhanced by the packaging. I keep the can as my pens and other items fit in the can. I have other cans like this that I kept and use to store a variety of items including office supplies and stuff for my hobbies.
I bought a pack of Krapao mix last April when we were in Bangkok. I finally was able to prepare the Krapao last December for one of our dinners during the break.
I got this pack from the airport prior to our travel back from Bangkok last April.
We just followed the instructions for cooking the Krapao. I made sure we had all the ingredients.
The result was actually good (not to be too proud of it) as we all enjoyed this for dinner.
And so I asked my brother to get me a few packs of Krapao mix when he traveled to Bangkok last December. I now have my Krapao mix to satisfy my cravings for what is probably my favorite Thai food.
Tupig is a rice cake delicacy you'd find in many places. Made from glutinous rice, coconut milk and (prefereably) muscovado sugar, its origins are supposed to be the Ilocano provinces as well as Tarlac. On our stopover at Sison, Pangasinan the stop had a tupig station. I wanted to buy some but unfortunately, it was still a couple of hours on our way to Baguio and dinner was also waiting for us at the hotel. I didn't like my tupig to be cold or eaten the next day without being heated.
This tupig is branded to be identified with the province.
Tupig fresh from the grill
I will return to Baguio very soon and perhaps will be able to get some tupig on the way back home.
I'm back in Iloilo City but before I write about our most recent meals here, I'm posting a late one from the trip last July. This one is about our dinner at Buto't Balat, which is located in the middle of the Plazuela buildings near the Diversion Road. Friends here made the reservation.
Entrance to the restaurant
Steamed lapu-lapu in soy sauce
Grilled tanguigue
Their version of the popular molo
Shrimp sauteed in garlic
Lechon kawali
Native design lamps
Another native inspired lamp at the restaurant
We have not eaten at this restaurant for over a decade so it was a welcome alternative to Tatoy's and Breakthrough. The ambience was still good and many families and groups of friends or officemates patronize the restaurant. It should be no surprise because the food is good and priced right. Buto't Balat is definitely a place you would like to come back to for a nice meal.
We had our lunch at the Carcar Public Market where they have lechon, of course. There were many stalls selling roasted pig and you can purchase lechon along with puso rice (rice cooked in coconut leaves). There are tables located at the second level where you can also purchase other food and drinks.
Upon entering the market, one is greeted by stalls selling lechon.
You may purchase to eat there or to take home.
The market is clean and absent is the smell you usually expect from a wet market.
We purchased 2 kilos from this vendor.
What looks like special sauce is vinegar. The coloring is probably from the chili mixed to it. The taste to me is somewhat like sinamak and goes well with the lechon.
Puso rice is sold at nearby stalls.
Other stalls sell achara (pickled papaya), lumpia and a variety of pansit (noodles).
Instead of measuring your rice by the cup, you can probably use the puso as a unit.
The lechon is terrific and can easily derail a diet.
We joked that perhaps the local government in Carcar should be monitoring the average life span of people there considering two of their main products are lechon and chicharon. While these are definitely delicious and tempting, one should exercise self control and avoid indulging in too much of either. As they say jokingly, these are "nakakabata" meaning you probably won't reach an old age if you ate too much lechon and/or chicharon.
Perhaps among the preferred or popular pasalubong (souvenir) from Cebu is chicharon. The town of Carcar has many stores lined up along the National Road selling chicharon. It helps of course that Carcar is also well known for its lechon. Our driver/guide tells us we can actually visit a chicharon "factory". The mention of "factory" brough back memories of field trips when I was a child when we visited several actual factories that produced stuff like ice cream and soft drinks. Later when I was in college, the field trips were of construction sites, treatment plants and hydro power plants. Back to chicharon, which is basically deep fried and popped pork skin, here are a few photos taken in Carcar when we bought pasalubong.
Chicaron stores along the national road in Carcar, Cebu
Among the bestsellers are regular chicharon (right) and spicy chicharon (left). There are also variants of the regular chicharon depending on whether you like some meat to go with the pork skin.
The spicy chicharon looks like cheetos. It is more sinful, or perhaps unhealthy.
We ended up buying a few bags of chicharon each to bring home and to our office as pasalubong. The pasalubong were received well and didn't take long for people to enjoy and consume.
A couple of Saturdays ago, as we were visiting my parents' home in Cainta, a balut vendor came by. My daughter liked to eat balut so I ended up buying a couple for her. Balut is fertilized egg embryo steamed or boiled. It is usually sold with the unfertilized variety that is referred to as penoy. Many people are squeamish about eating balut once the developing chick emerges when you remove the shell. I myself only drink the 'soup' and never ate the chick. My daughter isn't so squeamish so my folks were quite amused to see their apo consume 2 baluts that evening.
Balut is usually sold together with penoy. Many balut vendors also sell chicharon or fried pork skin. The latter goes well with vinegar.
We greet the month of April by previewing a series of posts on our recent trip to Thailand. Here are a few photos that are sort of a sneak peak into what I will be posting this month.
Nice to be walking around Bangkok again. I would say its generally safe and you get to see a lot including the shops and restaurants.
A friend took us to dinner at this restaurant
The restaurant was highly recommended by her colleagues at her office. And no wonder, the restaurant has been recognized by Michelin for many years.
A preview of the Grand Palace as we walked towards the entrance
The structures always impress unless you're really not into history and architecture
Guardians at the gate and the distinctive Thai architectural elements
Two dishes that were usually cooked or prepared during Undas are biko and valenciana. Both are rice dishes that use glutinous rice and coconut milk. While biko is practically a version of suman, valenciana has similarities with paella.
Biko ingredients include malagkit (glutinous rice), gata (coconut milk) and brown sugar. Vanilla may be added for aroma and flavor though calamansi (citrus) leaves would be the more likely ingredient for aroma and flavor. We used both for our biko.
Close-up of the biko while it was being cooked.
The finished product with a sprinkling of coconut curds (derived from the coconut milk).
A version of the Arroz Valenciana or simply Valenciana as prepared by our kasambahay who is from Negros Occidental. This is usually a more complicated dish with much more ingredients including seafood, shellfish, eggs and other items that invites comparisons to the Spanish paella.
Close-up of the valenciana
I enjoyed the biko and it brought out a lot of happy memories with loved ones. Biko was cooked at our home and in our houses in Iloilo. In Iloilo, it is cooked not only during Undas but also during the Holy Week. Our house there was at the cross roads of the town proper and the road to the more rural part of Cabatuan, which they referred to as 'uma'. The latter term is probably equivalent to the Japanese 'inaka', which is also used to refer to the more rural parts of a town. Many relatives and friends pass by the house before they proceeded back to their homes in the 'uma'. A meal or drink is always welcome before they proceeded, and they were always welcome to have that meal at my Lola's house. The meals are always accompanied by stories or even small talk for those in a hurry. When we were on vacation this meant reconnecting or reacquainting with old friends especially for Tatay.
Our hotel accommodations did not include breakfast. We got a really good deal way before the conference and we thought we can just grab a bite for breakfast nearby. It turned out that there wasn't a lot of breakfast places near the hotel except if you count the usual eateries or restaurants at the ground floor of residential buildings. These are similar to the eateries in Singapore and I am sure the breakfasts there were okay and inexpensive. However, my companions that morning were not as adventurous as I am when it comes to eating at these places so we had to settle for waiting for the nearest Starbucks to open.
Tuna roll and iced apple juice - I already had my hot drink at my room at the hotel so I decided to go for some cold drink instead. The tuna was on the spicy side but I recall it was also like this even in the Philippines so its not a Malaysian thing.
More on meals during our stay in Shah Alam in the next posts.
We begin the month of November with a video. Yes, I took this video one time I was at the public market to get our seafood, vegetable and fruit supplies for the week. As I passed by to join my companion who was getting some buko (coconut) water, I saw a lumpia wrapper maker and took the video below to show how the wrapper is made.
Here are some photos I took after the video:
There are two flat metal plates where the dough is poured to make lumpia wrappers. Since the area is a cubicle at a relatively cramped part of the market, the electric fan provides the ventilation. I can imagine it can get really hot here during the day. [It was cooler at the time I took the video and photos as I go to the market at 5:30AM.]
The wrappers are grouped in 10s. 10 pieces are priced at 9 pesos. I got 20 pieces for the lumpia we were planning to have for Sunday lunch.
The dough is in a large pot and cloth is used to get just enough dough to lay out on the two plates. I assume it takes some experience to estimate how much dough you need to have 'absorbed' by the cloth. Otherwise, there would be a lot of wasted dough.
You can request for different sizes of wrappers. The small and medium size wrappers (smaller than what is in the photos) are what are usually used for lumpia. The ones in the photos are large size wrappers that you can also use for lumpia but is commonly used for turon or saba bananas wrapped and fried, a popular snack (merienda) in the Philippines. The largest size they make, I was told, was XL, which are also used for turon. The XL size meant only 3 wrappers can be laid out on each of the plates.
The wrappers did not disappoint. We had them for lumpia and turon. They were the crispy kind when fried the right way (deep fry). Add this guy to my suking (favorite) vendors at the Antipolo Public Market.
I love sauces and dips as well as certain salad dressing like vinaigrette. This post features one of our favorite dips or sawsawan as we term it in Filipino. Sinamak is a popular dip in the country and you can use it for a variety of foods including seafood/fish, pork, beef or poultry. It is basically vinegar loaded with spices such as chili pepper and garlic. People from different regions tend to favor certain vinegar (my father, an Ilonggo, favors coconut vinegar) and certain amounts of spices. The concoction and spiciness depends on the tastes and preferences of those who would be using it for their meals. The sinamak is not necessarily a quick mix as it may also be aged. I must do some research on the aging but letting the mix stand for a couple of weeks to a month is apparently enough for this acidic dip.
Sinamak by our family driver Larry 'formulated' using a recycled bottle of botrytis
I like sinamak as a dip for my dried fish (danggit, dulong, dilis, pusit, lapad, etc.). These usually are part of my breakfast and goes well with eggs and fried or garlic rice. Tatay used to bring a bottle or two from Iloilo whenever he traveled for homecomings. My aunts and uncles there have these prepared at our home and theirs and Tatay just picks a bottle or two he could bring back. He also mixed his own sinamak at home but the ones from Iloilo used vinegar an uncle himself used to make from the coconuts there (home-made). I thought that was what it made those sinamak so special.
