Food
Bulanglang Recipe (Boiled Vegetables) -repost
I will soon turnover this blog to my wife in the coming days, and her plan is to fill this up with her favorite filipino recipes and more recipes she invented and learned from others. And while it looks like she’s not got the time to blog yet, let me repost my favorite vegetable recipe I posted long way back. It’s called the ‘Bulanglang‘. A recipe I only find in Batangas, though I heard there’s a similar recipe in Bulacan.
Here’s the list of the primary ingredients of Bulanglang
- 1 Papaya fruit
- ¼ regular-sized squash (kalabasa)
- 5 Okra
- 5 tomatoes (kamatis)
- ¼ Garlic bulb (bawang)
- 2 tsp. salt
- patani (i don’t know the en.
it belongs to beans family) - sigarilyas (in Batangas, it is called as kalamismis I don’t know the en.)
- string beans
- malunggay leaves
- squash flower and leaves
How to cook Bulanglang
Preparing ingredients
- Peel off the papaya fruit. Divide it into several cuts. *Tip: before peeling a papaya, slightly cut it first on its vertical lines so you have the marks where to cut it when you already peeled it. Make french-fries-like cuts from each part.
- Peel off the squash. Slice it into thin chunks.
- Slice the Okra diagonally into 3 parts.
- Slice the tomatoes into 4.
- Press the garlics.
- Separate the patani beans from its skin.
- Chop the sigarilyas into several chunks.
- Chop the string beans about 2 inches each.
- Separate the malunggay leaves from its stem
How I cooked my Bulanglang
- Boil tomato cuts and garlic on a pot of 1.5L water until tomatoes become saggy.
Add 2 tsp of salt. Adding salts, btw, depends on your taste. - Put other vegetables in the cooking pot. Normally, those that are easily get cooked should be put first. But it depends on you. You can put them all at once as well. Vegetables normally get cooked for about 10-15 mins only depending on the amount of heat.
- Wait until all vegetables are cooked. Serve hot.
- That’s it.
The Chicken Adobo that charmed me!
I’m definitely not a food lover. I don’t have an ability to differentiate taste between tastes. I don’t know how to cook. And I totally don’t know anything about food.
Just about 4 minutes ago, something strange happened to me. I had a short nap and dreamed about the Chicken Adobo that a friend cooked for me before. It was not an ordinary dream because I can taste the chicken and the flavor of that recipe. And while I’m enjoying it, I suddenly fell off my chair. That made me write about this and I think I’m on the mood of sharing a bit more for its sake.
5 years ago, I have a friend who just love to cook. She used to bring different recipes to the office so that everyone can have a taste of her best recipes. And man did she got some talent in cooking.
One day, out of the blue, she asked me if she can cook Chicken Adobo for me. Well, she cooks very good. She’s the best on that. So who would disapprove? I was more than excited to say YES.
So she cooked for me Chicken Adobo, enough to last a week. It was my lunch everyday and I did not even thought about asking for other recipes. I admit, I have a feeling for her before, and tasting her Chicken Adobo just helped that feeling grew bigger. No worry now. I can have chicken adobo anytime I ask. That friend is now my wife. Haha…
I’d like to post her recipe, but I might just mess it up. I will ask her one of these days to post it.
My Dinner at Bagoong Club
Last night, me, my good friend and officemate Reych, and her good friend Glen went to one of the most talked-about restos in the metro.
Reych invited me to dine with them at Bagoong Club, I called Aldrin and Reych asked permission from Aldrin so I can go with them. I’m not sure if he agreed but I went with them.
Text Messaging keeps your children healthy
As parents, we always want our children grow healthy but not fat, thin but strong. During the early years, kids are very hard to feed, specially if there are distractions around like TV and toys. Sometimes, instead of letting the kids starve because they do not want to eat the healthy food you give them, you ended up feeding less healthier food or sometimes, not healthy at all. The result is more likely that your kids grow up thin and weak or fat and unhealthy. Or the worst, obese. Their diet is one of our primary concerns.
In a study at University of North Carolina’s School of Medicine, a group of kids were asked to monitor their snack intake, TV time and activity time, and report back to the monitoring team through text messaging. The monitoring team then replies back words of encouragement like “Wow, you met your step and screen time goals – congratulations!” Another groups were asked to report via pen and paper. The result favors the first group.
On the scenario, text messaging only serves as the medium, but the main ingredient I see are the words of encouragement. There are many way to encourage your kids, however, text messaging might be the best – in this case.
A Sweet Mother’s Day Adventure
Whew!It’s been a long time since I last posted. Been very busy lately. But I certainly will not let the Mothers’ Day pass without posting something for everyone to enjoy. So just sit back, relax and enjoy a light read.
Yesterday, Aldrin and I together with Sam and Ley, my mom, my bro Kev and our ate Joy and Hazel, went out for lunch at Max’s Restaurant to celebrate the Mothers’ day.
And so we went to SM Dasmarinas and when we got there, the PA was announcing that a Cake Decorating contest for moms and kids sponsored by Goldilocks was on-going at the activity area. My mom invited me to join the contest.
We went there, my mom registered Sam and I, and we purchased a rectangular mocha cake which comes with sugar and chocolate candies for decorating.
At first, we didn’t have any idea where to put the flowers so we decided to start with the gum paste. I drew butterflies at the sides of the cake and my mom wrote “Sam and Ley” at one side of the cake and “Happy Mom’s day” at the center of the cake. Her handwriting was fantastic. We were all chaotic at first since Sam and Ley were all around my mom and I. But we still got to finish the cake. We submitted it then we left to have lunch.
While at Max’s, we heard over the PA that the contestants were called to be interviewed by the host. So I hurried, I carried Sam to the contest stage. The host asked me what the concept was behind the cake decoration. I said that Sam liked butterflies and flowers so that’s what inspired the cake decoration.
After the short interview, we went back to Max’s to finish our lunch. But after a few minutes, my bro who was already outside waiting, was knocking at the glass wall, and told me that we won the grand prize and that the host was looking for me! I was really surprised!
Again, I hurried to go there with Sam. Everyone congratulated us. And I was really happy. My mom was also happy, she told me she knew we will win.
So, we won 5000 pesos worth of SM Gift cards, 2 MyTribe bracelets, Scents and Blends GCs, Akari products, and Goldilocks goodies of course!
Happy Mothers Day to everyone! I hope you all had a fun day like me!