Italian Wedding Soup (What a lovely name for a soup!)

My sister-in-law Sherry's hubby posted that they were having Italian Wedding soup one night and that got me intrigued. A soup you only serve during weddings? I found out it was simply soup with meatballs and pasta in it. I found a simple recipe from Rachel Ray and adapted it.

Mini-Meatball Soup (Italian Wedding Soup)
Recipe courtesy Rachael Ray

Prep Time: 20 min
Inactive Prep Time: --
Cook Time: 27 min
Level: Easy
Serves: 4 big servings

2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil (I used butter)
2 carrots, peeled and chopped
2 ribs celery, chopped
1 medium onion, chopped
2 bay leaves, fresh or dried
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
1 pound ground beef, pork and veal combined (I used 1/2 pound ground beef and 1/2 pound ground pork)
1 egg, beaten
2 cloves garlic, minced
1/2 cup grated Parmigiano-Reggiano or Romano, (I omitted this)
1/2 cup plain bread crumbs, a couple of handfuls
1/2 teaspoon freshly grated or ground nutmeg
6 cups chicken stock or broth
2 cups water
1-1/2 cups dried pasta, rings, broken fettuccini or ditalini (I used broken spaghetti)
1 pound triple washed fresh spinach, coarsely chopped (I used kale)

1. In a deep pot over medium heat add oil, chopped carrots, celery and onions and bay leaves. Season with salt and pepper. Cover pot and cook veggies 5 or 6 minutes, stirring occasionally.

2. While the veggies cook, in a large mixing bowl combine meat, egg, garlic, grated cheese, bread crumbs, salt, pepper, nutmeg.

3. Uncover your soup pot and add broth and water to the pot. Increase heat to high and bring soup to a boil. When soup boils, reduce heat a bit and start to roll meat mixture into small balls, dropping them straight into the pot. You are making meat dumplings that will cook in the broth. When you are done rolling the meat, add pasta to the soup and stir. Cover and simmer soup 10 minutes. When pasta is tender, stir in chopped spinach in batches. When spinach has wilted into the soup, the soup is done and ready to serve. Salt & pepper to taste.

I served this with garlic bread for the kids. It was a hit, especially with Jai who had two bowls.

Chicken Pot Pie from scratch

Some can get intimidated by chicken pot pie. It does take some work to make it, especially if you don't have access to ready made pie crust. Some thinks its a breeze by just using cream of mushroom soup, frozen veggies and canned chicken. But nothing beats the taste of homemade Chicken Pot Pie made lovingly for your family. If you want to know how to make chicken pot pie from scratch, read on.

Personally, making chicken pot from scratch can take literally a day to make. It's something I have to plan in advance. Before when I started making it, only hubby enjoyed this oven-baked goodie. But now I found a new fan - our eldest son Jai. Also, Jai has taken to eating a whole pie by himself. Now that's what I call a big thumbs-up. :)

Pie crust

1 1/2 cups all purpose flour
1/2 stick of butter
4 tablespoons of lard (yes lard or else it won't be flaky)
1 tsp salt
6-8 tablespoons of ice water

Dump all the flour in a large bowl. Cut the butter into pieces, add to the flour along with the lard. Add the salt and start mixing the butter and lard into the flour, rubbing it between your fingers. Once everything is incorporated into the flour (which now resembles like oatmeal) add the ice water slowly and begin kneading the dough. Try to add water and then kneading the dough until the dough comes together into a ball and is smooth and elastic. It should have the color of golden wheat. Wrap in plastic and store in the fridge for 30 minutes to let it rest.

Chicken Pot Pie

4 chicken breasts, diced
2 potatoes, peeled and diced
1 large carrot, peeled and diced
2 celery ribs, diced
1 large onion, minced
2 cups chicken broth
1 cup milk
1/2 cup flour
salt & pepper
2 tablespoons butter


1. In a large pot, cook the carrots, onion and celery together. This is called the mirepoix. Cook this for 5-7 minutes until you see golden bits of crust form at the bottom of the pan. That is good.

2. Add the cube chicken and cook until the chicken is cooked through. (Note, you can used cooked chicken too but don't stirfry as long).

3. Add soup broth and turn the heat up to let it boil. Once it starts to boil, turn the heat down and let it simmer until the carrots are cooked through (about 20-25 minutes).

4. Add the potatoes and let cook for 7 minutes. Salt and pepper the soup to taste.

5. Add the flour to the milk and stir until everything is mixed thoroughly. Add the milk-flour mixture to the pot and stir. Cook until the chicken mixture becomes thick. Turn off the heat and let it cool.

To assemble: Get a pie pan and oil it well. Add about 2-3 cups of the cooled chicken mixture. Roll out the dough that you have chilling in the fridge. Cover the pie pan with the dough, brush it with milk and cut some slits for the steam to come out. Bake in your over, at 345 degrees F for about 40-30 minutes, or until the top is nicely golden brown all over. Take out of the oven, let it cool for about 15 minutes before serving.

Serve and watch your brood demolish the pie.




Note: You can make mini pot pies but ladling the chicken mixture into custard pots and covering each with its own pie crust cover like the picture I have up on top.

A Recipe from the early 18th Century (Meat Rolls)

Jai's Favorite Meat Rolls

I've always been a fan of recycling everything. Being a Filipina, it makes me cringe when stuff goes to waste. That's why I culled a recipe from The Old Foodie's blog (she's a fellow eGullet.com foodie member) that uses meat scraps and leftover veggies. The recipe is from an 18th century British cuisine for housewives.



Here's my adaptation.

Ingredients:
2 cups of cooked meat (pork, chicken, beef and even fish)
1 cooked potato
1/2 carrot
1/2 onion
1 cup breadcrumbs
1 egg
1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
salt & pepper to taste
3 slices of bacon, cut into 2 pieces each

1. Chop the onion, grate the carrot and dice the potato finely. You can use a food processor to do this to make it easier for you.
2. Shred the meat or mince using the food processor.
3. Combine all the ingredients in a large bowl. Mix very well.
4. Grab about 2-3 tablespoons of filling and shape into a mini-roll (about the length of your palm.
5. Lay a slice of bacon on top of the mini-roll and do the same with the rest of the fillings. You will be able to make about 6 mini-rolls with this recipe.
6. Heat the oven to 345 degrees F and bake the rolls for about 20-30 minutes until the bacon is crisp and the rolls are evenly golden-brown all over.

Serve rolls with your favorite gravy.

New Eggs and Mushrooms Adobo

I am fortunate to have a good friend who works for a huge poultry farm. Catherine, a poultry vet, is married to the son of a poultry farm magnate. They have about 200,000 to 300,000 chickens at their farms every month. They sell chicks to little poultry farms everywhere in Korea. Once in a while, Catherine comes over to give me two trays of new eggs. What are new eggs? They are eggs laid for the very first time by young hens. They are quite tiny and the yolks are rich and utterly delicious.

So after countless omelets and egg dishes, I thought of making eggs adobo. Then, in a brilliant after thought, I remembered I had a bunch of button mushrooms in the vegetable bin in the fridge. How about adding that too? I've always loved Adobo Mushrooms as an appetizer. Let's go to recipe, shall we?

Ingredients:

6 new eggs (or 12 quail eggs as substitute)
20 pieces button mushrooms
1 whole head of garlic (yes a whole head, peeled and minced)
1/2 cup soy sauce
1/4 cup vinegar
1 tsp salt
1 tsp pepper
2-3 tablespoons oil

1. In a saucepan, put the eggs and add cold water. Heat up until the water boils and turn off the heat. Cover and set aside for 10 minutes. After 10 minutes, drain the hot water and dunk the eggs in cold water to stop the cooking. Crack and peel the eggs and set aside.

2. Wash the mushrooms (trust me, its ok even though the other sites tell you not to do it) and cut the ends off if necessary.

3. In a large wok or pan, heat the oil over medium heat. Add the minced garlic and stir-fry until golden brown. How do you know that the garlic is nearly done? You can start to smell the fragrant garlic. And it is easy to burn it so once you smell it, add the next ingredient right away.

4. Add the button mushrooms and stirfry for about 3-4 minutes (or when the mushrooms begin to exude liquid). Add the cooked eggs.

5. Add the soy sauce, vinegar, salt & pepper. Let it simmer for about 5 minutes. Make sure to stir every once in a while to make sure the eggs get thoroughly coated.

6. Serve hot as a side dish or as a main dish with freshly cooked rice.





For my lunch, I had it as a side dish with meat torta patties. It was wonderful!

Making Flied Lice

Ok, ok I am just kidding. I really mean Fried Rice, specifically Chinese Fried Rice or more commonly known as Shanghai Rice in the Philippines. The neat thing about rice is that leftover rice is great recycled into a new dish - fried rice. One very important thing to remember is that to make fried rice you would need cold, leftover rice. Freshly cooked rice just won't do.

To make Chinese Fried Rice, you would need: chinese sausages (the ones with whole fatty pieces in them), dried scallops (or dried fish), small shrimps, eggs, spring onions, soy sauce and cooking oil.

Ingredients:

3 or cups of cooked, leftover rice
1 chinese sausage, diced
dried scallops, (soaked, squeezed dry, and minced)
small shrimps, peeled
eggs, beaten lightly
spring onions, cut into small circles
1 teaspoon soy sauce
4 tablespoons corn oil

1. In a large bowl, dump the rice. Wet hands and mash the rice until the grains are separated and not clumped up.

2. In a large wok, heat up 1 tablespoon of oil and cook the eggs (scrambled style). Take it out and set aside in a bowl.

3. Put the rest of the oil in the wok and fry the chinese sausage. Add the scallops, shrimps and fry for a minute. Dump all the rice and begin to stir-fry for 5 minutes. Make sure the rice is evenly mixed and keep stirring all the time.

4. After about 2 minutes more of stirring, add the scrambled eggs and continue stirring for a minute and then the soy sauce. Stir some more.

5. Take out the rice and put in a large platter. Sprinkle the chopped spring onions over it and serve hot.

*TIP: Fried rice is not limited to the above ingredients alone. It can be a clean-out-your-fridge type of fried rice. You can add carrots, leeks, cabbages, ham, mushrooms, etc. Anything you find delicious you can add to your rice, make sure that the ingredients are diced or chopped up small. It will make for even cooking when you add it to the rice.

Stinky Tofu Stew (Lunch with My Friends)

I was invited to lunch by my best friend Catherine, along with Imelda (one of my English tutorial students) and a couple of women from Catherine's church. We went to this traditional Korean restaurant that specializes in set menus. The rice served with the set menu is barley rice or called "boribap" (rice and barley grains cooked together).


Here's Catherine and Imelda. Catherine has been my closest friend for several years now. She's a veterinarian and specializes in poulty medicine. Imelda was referred to me by a Filipina friend for English conversation studies. Imelda runs a private dog shelter and she was the one who gave Buttons (our adorable Yorkie) to us to adopt.



Catherine's church members (busy preparing their boribap bowls). They helped identify most of the dishes that were served in our meal. They were interested to see my reaction to the Chongukjang stew that is one of the side dishes served. The latter is made out of "natto" or fermented tofu beans. It has been describeda s a funky mixture of old sweat socks marinated in cabbage juice with a sprinkle of sewer gas.

Our Meal

The boribap bowl. I love barley rice. There's a certain nuttiness to the flavor of the rice, added by the barley. I was surprised that the boribap was given to us in a large mixing bowl. Then one of the ladies pointed out the ceramic bowls for us to put the rice in.





This is called "keran jjim" which is literally Egg Stew in Korean. I love this steamed dish, with some restaurants' version that comes with fish roe on top.







This spicy mixed green salad came with small snail meat. It was a pleasant surprise and gave a nice chewy twist to the spicy-crunchy salad. Even if it added a nice burn in my mouth, I keep going back and getting bites of this wonderful salad.








The namul or veggie side dishes. The key is to take small portions of each mound and add to your rice bowl. You then add a little red pepper paste (gochujang) and mix everything up. The mounds (starting on the upper right, going clockwise) are eggplants slices, soybean sprouts, braken and spinach.





The cooked cabbage and raw green chili peppers are to provide a nice crunchy contrast throughout the meal. Imelda showed me how to dab a little mixed seasoning paste (I shall delve more on this later) on the cabbage and then eat it. It was wonderful! I am still intimidated by the chili peppers since some can be fiery hot even if they are green.





The chongukjang stew. Oh yes, it did um, reeked but it was tolerable (for me). My husband would have fainted or gagged. The first taste was not bad. Then I saw Catherine add some to her rice bowl and mixed it up. I did the same and ate a spoonful. It was great! I begged my friends to teach me how to cook it and Imelda promised to show me how to make it.





Here's some seaweed laver (wrapper cut into strips) to sprinkle over the rice and some lettuce if one wants to wrap up the rice in it. The mixed seasoning paste here is made up of soybean paste, red pepper paste, garlic, sesami oil and some sugar. I love this seasoning, especially on grilled korean barbeque meat.




Pickled slices of radish. There are about a hundred ways that Koreans pickle radish. There's the tiny raddishes complete with their leafy tops, huge radishes that are bigger than my thighs, cubes of radishes in spicy sauce and even slices of radish in clear pickling liquid. I love the last one the best.




Lastly, here's a shot of my bowl and some more veggie dishes. The one on the farthest right is made out of peeled sweet potato stalks. I swear I will learn how to prepare this dish as it is so simple but taste so delicious.



It was a wonderful lunch with good friends and good conversation. I heartily recommend this restaurant in Icheon City to whoever wants to try the Boribap-Chungukjang experience

Guinataang Baboy (Pork Stewed in Coconut Milk)

Now I've always been saying that Filipinos love their pork. One of the many ways we enjoy our pork is stewed in coconut milk. There is actually a province in the Philippines that specializes in everything cooked with coconut milk - the Bicol province. That province is also known for its fiery, hot chili-spiced dishes. Anyway, I digress. Here is a quick and easy recipe for Guinataaang Baboy or Pork Cubes Stewed in Coconut Milk.

"Guinataan" means cooked with coconut milk. It can be a savory dish like Guinataang baboy or Guinataang Isda (Fish Coconut Stew) or it can be a sweet dish like the common afternoon snack just simply called "Guinataan". The latter contains cubes of plantains, sweet potato, rice balls, slices of jackfruit, etc. So, keep that in mind whenever you come across the word - Guinataan.

Now, onto the recipe. You'll need:

Ingredients
1/2 kilo (or 1 pound) Pork cubes (preferably with some fat on some pieces)
3-4 cups of water
1 coconut, grated and then extracted (milk)++
1/2 onion, sliced
4-5 cloves of garlic, coarsly minced
1 red bell pepper, seeded, cored and sliced into 1-inch squares
5-6 pieces of yard long beans, cut into 2-inch pieces
3-4 pieces of green chilis (the mild, sweet kind)***
Optional: cubes of carrot (which I added for a nice touch of color) and potatoes.

++Substitute a can of coconut milk or two pouches of powdered coconut milk mixed with 2 cups of water.
***If you like your stews fiery-hot, substitute habaneros or other hot chilis of your choice.

1. In a wok or deep pan, add the water and pork. Cook for about 30 to 45 minutes or until the pork has become tender.

2. Take out the pork stock and set it aside for other dishes. Take out the pork and set it aside. Put a little oil on the pan and heat it until hot.

3. Add the garlic and cook until it is golden brown. Add the onion slices and cook until they are translucent (about 2 minutes). Add the green beans, carrot and potato cubes too.

4. Add the cooked pork and saute until the pork edges turn brown. Add the coconut milk and turn down the heat to low. Add the green chilis (sliced if you like or cut in half) and bell pepper.

5. Simmer for 10 to 15 minutes or until the coconut milk turns thick and saucy.

Serve hot with freshly cooked rice. This also makes a perfect side dish to a fried fish meal like what I had for lunch today.