Bicol Express

Estimated preparation time: 30 minutes
Estimated cooking time: 30 minutes

Bicol Express Ingredients:
1/4 kilo pork, thinly sliced
1 cup Baguio beans
3 cups long chili or jalapeno peppers
1 onion, minced
1 head of garlic, minced
1 cup coconut milk
1 cup coconut cream
2 tablespoons of cooking oil
Salt to taste

Bicol Express Cooking Instructions:
In a bowl of water with salt, soak chili peppers for 30 minutes then rinse and strain.
In a cooking pan, heat cooking oil and brown sliced pork for a few minutes.
In another pan, sauté minced garlic and onion.
Add to the sauté the browned pork.
Then add the coconut milk, bring to a boil and simmer for 10 minutes.
Add the chili peppers, Baguio beans and cook until dish gets a little dry.
Add the coconut cream and simmer until the sauce thickens.
Salt to taste.

Pork / Chicken Adobo

Estimated cooking time: 50 minutes. Adobo is the most popular Filipino dish enjoyed by all classes. Adobo is typically served with steamed white rice.

Adobo Ingredients:
1/2 kilo pork cut in cubes + 1/2 kilo chicken, cut into pieces or
choice of either 1 kilo of pork or 1 kilo of chicken
1 head garlic, minced
1/2 yellow onion, diced
1/2 cup soy sauce
1 cup vinegar
2 cups of water
1 teaspoon paprika
5 laurel leaves (bay leaves)
4 tablespoons of cooking oil or olive oil
2 tablespoons cornstarch
Salt and pepper to taste
3 tablespoons water

Adobo Cooking Instructions:
In a big sauce pan or wok, heat 2 tablespoons of oil then sauté the minced garlic and onions.
Add the pork and chicken to the pan. Add 2 cups of water, 1/4 cup of soy sauce, vinegar, paprika and the bay leaves. Bring to a boil. Cover and simmer for 30 minutes or when meat is tender.
Remove the pork and chicken from the sauce pan and on another pan, heat cooking oil and brown the pork and chicken for a few minutes.
Mix the browned pork and chicken back to the sauce and add cornstarch dissolved in water to thicken.
Add salt and/or pepper if desired
Bring to a boil then simmer for an additional 5 minutes.
Serve hot with the adobo gravy and rice.

Adobo Cooking Tips:
You have the option to add crushed ginger to the onions and garlic when sautéing. Ginger adds a unique flavor to your pork/chicken adobo.

Pork Sinigang

Estimated cooking and preparation time: 1 hour

Pork Sinigang Ingredients:

3/4 kilo Pork, cut into chunks
3 tomatoes, sliced
2 onions, diced
5 cloves of garlic, minced
100 grams Kangkong (river spinach)
100 grams String beans
2 pieces horse radishes, sliced
3 pieces gabi (taro), pealed
2 pieces sili pag sigang (green finger pepper)
200 grams sampalok (tamarind)
3 tablespoons of patis (fish sauce)
1 liter of rice wash or water

Sinigang Cooking Instructions:

Boil sampalok in water until the shell shows cracks. Let cool then peal off the shells and with a strainer, pour samplalok (including water) into a bowl. Gently massage the sampalok meat off the seeds, strain again.
In a pot, sauté garlic and onion then add the tomatoes. Let simmer for 5 minutes.
Add pork and fish sauce then add the rice wash. Bring to a boil then simmer for 15 minutes then add the gabi. Continue to simmer for another 15 minutes or until the pork is tender.
Add the horse radish and simmer for 10 minutes then add the string beans, kangkong and sili (for spice-optional). Let boil for 2 minutes.
Serve piping hot.

Sinigang Cooking Tip:
Instead of sampalok fruit (tamarind), you can substitute it with any commercial souring seasoning like Knorr sampalok seasoning or tamarind bouillon cubes for this pork sinigang recipe.

Korean Pan-Fried Fish (Saeng Sun Jun)

I usually like to make this with fresh flounder or cod but almost any white fish works well in this recipe. The best option is a fresh fish with delicate white flesh like flounder, cod, pollack, sea perch, halibut, orange roughy, and yellow croaker but even frozen fish tastes good cooked this way. The thin coating of egg and flour make it easy to eat and prepare. Good with spicy dipping sauces or just soy sauce, kids and even meat-eaters love this sauteed fish.

Prep Time: 5 minutes
Cook Time: 10 minutes
Total Time: 15 minutes

Ingredients:
1 lb white fish fillets, rinsed and patted dry
3 tsp salt
1 tsp pepper
3 Tbsp flour
2 eggs

Preparation:

Salt fish on all sides.

Beat eggs with any remaining salt in a bowl.

Put flour in a bowl next to egg next to stove.

Heat up lightly greased pan over medium heat.

Dip each fish piece into flour to coat, dip into egg mixture, and place in frying pan.

Fry fish for 2-3 minutes and then flip over to finish for another 1-2 minutes, or until the batter becomes a light yellow. Try not to overcook, as the fish will become dry.

(Serves 4)

*This fish is wonderful with the basic or spicy dipping sauces. I often make the fish and eat it without any additional sauce, so if you find it too salty you can decrease the amount of salt in the recipe to 1-2 tsp.

Spicy Korean Rice Cakes (Duk Boki)

This Korean dish of cylindrical rice cakes (duk) covered in a thick, spicy sauce is a popular street food in Korea. It is also eaten as a casual meal at home or as a drinking snack.

I prefer to make dukboki with fish cakes (oden, o-mook) in my kitchen, but it's also good made with beef or no meat at all for a vegetarian version. I like to make and eat it with Napa cabbage at home, but again, I've had good versions with bokchoy too. You can change the vegetables to suit what you like or what you have at home.

Prep Time: 1 hour

Cook Time: 15 minutes

Total Time: 1 hour, 15 minutes

Ingredients:
1 lb cylindrical rice cakes (duk), cut into 2" pieces
1 Tbsp kochujang (hot chili pepper paste)
1 tsp kochukaru (hot chili pepper powder)
1 Tbsp sugar
2 tsp minced garlic
1.5 Tbsp soy sauce
1 package rectangular fish cake (oden or omook), sliced into 1" pieces
2 cups Napa cabbage, chopped
3 shiitake mushrooms, soaked and sliced into pieces

Preparation:
Soak rice cakes (duk)for about an hour in cold water.*
In a pot, mix 3 cups water with kochujang, kochukaru, garlic, sugar, and soy sauce.
Bring to a boil.
Add fish cakes.
Bring to a boil.
Add the mushrooms, cabbage, and rice cakes.
Bring up to a boil again, simmer for about 3 minutes, and then turn off the heat. The sauce will thicken upon standing.

*If you don't have time to soak the rice cakes for an hour in advance, you can add the rice cakes into the pot in the very beginning with the sauce. Simmer for about 10 minutes before adding fish cakes and simmer for a few minutes more after adding vegetables.

Cucumber Kimchi (Oi Sobaegi)

It's hard to keep this stuffed cucumber kimchi (or kimchee) on the table or in the fridge, because it's so popular with Koreans of all ages. Full of snap, crackle, and layers of flavor, oi sobaegi can also be eaten the day you make it.

Prep Time: 35 minutes
Cook Time: 8 hours
Total Time: 8 hours, 35 minutes

Ingredients:

10 Korean, pickling or kirby cucumbers*, with ends sliced off
1/4 cup salt
4 cloves garlic, minced
1/2 cup kochukaru (Korean chili pepper)
1/2 cup Asian chives, cut into 1 inch pieces
1/4 cup fish sauce or liquid from brined sauce
1/3 cup shredded carrots
2 Tbsp sugar

Preparation:

Wash cucumbers.
Place end of cucumber on cutting board and cut in half down length, without cutting through to the end.
Rotate the cucumber and make another cut without going through the end, so that the second cut is perpendicular to the first.
Fill a large bowl with water and dissolve the ¼ cup salt into it.
Fully submerge cucumbers in salt bath for 30 minutes.
While cucumbers are marinating, mix all other ingredients together in a bowl to make the stuffing.
After 30 minutes, remove cucumbers from salt bath but do not rinse.
Fill each cucumber between the connected spears with spicy stuffing (but do not rinse out bowl).
Place cucumbers next to each other in a glass container.
Fill seasoning bowl with about a cup of water, dissolving remaining seasonings in bowl.
Pour liquid over cucumbers until they are almost submerged.
Cover with a tight-fitting lid and store at room temperature for 8-12 hours.
Move cucumber kimchi to the refrigerator.

Korean Grilled Steak (Deng Shim Gui)

Almost nothing compares to the smoky flavor of meat cooked on the grill. But thinly slicing and cutting the raw meat for bulgogi or having to turn many individual pieces of galbi on the grill can be time-consuming. Korean grilled steak is an easy East-West compromise, as it holds the deep bulgogi flavor but is still easy to cook and serve to a larger group for an outdoor meal.

Prep Time: 1 hour

Cook Time: 5 minutes

Total Time: 1 hour, 5 minutes

Ingredients:

2 lb thin steaks, tenderloin, sirloin, or other good steak cut
salt and pepper
bulgogi marinade

Preparation:

Pound meat to tenderize and try to flatten to about the thickness of a pancake.

Score meat on both sides.

Season steaks with salt and pepper.

Marinate in bulgogi sauce for at least 1 hour.

Grill or broil about 2 minutes per side, depending on the thickness of the steak.