Salmon in Soy Sauce (Tinuyoang Salmon)

Pin It One of my favorite Filipino dishes is tinuyoan.  Literally translated, it means "soy sauced".  The tinuyoan that I grew up with is made with pork.  Yes, we Filipinos love our pork.  But, again, in my efforts to healthify (I know, it's not a word.) our meals as much as possible, I made it with salmon steak.  Salmon is not the cheapest fish, but I got it for 40% off at the seafood counter.  The health benefits of omega 3 fatty acids are well advertised so I went through a huge salmon phase that the hubby decided to put a stop to.  Although he is careful not to encourage it too much, he actually liked this salmon dish.  And like most of the dishes I make, it took less than 30 minutes and just five ingredients to make.

2 salmon steak cuts (or whatever is on sale)
1 medium white onion
about 1 and 1/2 cooking spoons of soy sauce (I use a Filipino brand:  Marca Pina or Silver Swan, but if you haven't had it, you won't know the difference.)
about 1 cooking spoon of water
black pepper
1 tsp sugar
canola oil

Heat oil in sautee pan. Pan sear both sides of the steak in medium-high heat.  As Anne Burrell put it, the fish will unstick itself when it's ready.  So just sear until the fish unsticks itself.  The fish will still be undercooked at this point. Take the salmon out of the pan and set aside.  Sautee the onions in the same pan only until slightly translucent.  Add soy sauce, water, and sugar.  When sugar has dissolved, add the salmon back and season with black pepper.  Braise in low heat for about 10 minutes just to let the soy sauce flavor the salmon.  Serve over rice.

First Pinterest Refashion Project: Work Shirt to Summer Blouse

Pin It Having lost all that grad school weight (20 pounds, to be exact), I am left with relatively nice stuff that are now way too big.  Shopping for new clothes isn't really an option right now, and I actually like sewing so recycling my old clothes was a no-brainer.  (After all of 20 years, I will confess that while my classmates in Home Economics class were swearing at our projects, I was secretly enjoying them.)  So inspired by all the upcycling and refashion projects on Pinterest, I decided to try this particular project from madebylex.com.

The project probably took me a total of five hours to complete, doggie distraction included.  I only did one layer of ruffles, though.  One, because I really didn't want to go overboard with the ruffles, lest I get haunted by nightmares of our very ruffly grammar school uniform.  And more importantly, I found that making the ruffles was actually the hardest step to do! And of, course, because I don't have a serger and I had an incredibly fray-prone fabric, the hemming took some time.  (That's next on my wishlist:  a serger.) Also, I decided not to do the belt.  The shirt's fabric had a pretty nice stretch that hugs the body quite nicely, and I never look good with these fabric belts anyway.

Before

After

I can't deny how proud I am of this.  Although this is not my first refashion, this was the quickest.  I hope I've made my grandma, Nanay Mitang, proud.  After all, I do come from a family of seamstresses!

Crunchy Sweet Chili Shrimp

Pin It

What??? You still don't have Panko in your pantry?! These Japanese bread crumbs simply have the ability to transform a blah dish into something special.  Running out of dinner ideas, I decided to use the same technique in my Baked "Fried" Chicken recipe on shrimp.  The beauty of any shrimp dish is that it is always the quickest dinner you'll ever make.  So for this dish, I used exactly the same flour, egg, and Panko breading that I did with the chicken recipe.  I peeled the shrimp but left out the tail so that I have something to hold on to when I'm breading them.  Bake in a 375-degree preheated oven for about 10-15 minutes until the egg in the breading is visibly cooked (when it is not very yellow anymore).  You will know that the shrimp are cooked when you see that the tails have changed color to orange.  I served this with my favorite sweet chili sauce--Mae Ploy brand, which you can get in most Asian grocery stores--, along with steamed rice and spinach sauteed with garlic and oyster sauce.  Don't worry about getting a whole bottle of this sweet chili sauce.  If you think you'll only be using it for this one dish, you are terribly mistaken.  After you try this, you will be working your menus around this dipping sauce.  It's that good.  This was another inexpensive, quick dinner that the hubby and I both enjoyed as if there was more effort put into it.

There's Always Time for Banana Puddin' Pie!

Pin It And I'm back from my CFA exam hiatus. Hopefully, I pass it so I never have to take the darn thing again!

Anyway, I was obsessing about making this pie the two weeks prior to the exam, my way of finding delicious distraction from all the studying I'd been doing. So despite the test looming, I spent a little time trying this recipe that didn't use instant pudding.  My first try had a great meringue, but my pudding sucked.  It was delicious, but the pudding itself was too soupy.  That was mainly due to my impatience.  I was thinking, it had eggs, it had flour, so maybe it didn't need to be too thick when I poured the pudding over the bananas.  Big mistake.  This is a relatively easy dessert to make, so take the time to actually thicken the pudding into the desired consistency before pouring into the banana.  On my second try a week later (the husband told me I don't wait too long to correct my mistakes), it took about 20 minutes for the pudding to thicken with constant stirring. So the pudding was great, but my meringue wasn't so great.  I might have to wait a little longer for the third try, though.

Meringue from the first attempt

Pudding from the second attempt

So here are the tweaks I made.  For some reason, I have a resistance to making my own pie crust.  So I used ready made crusts for both attempts: shortbread and graham.  I know, I know... I refused to make the pudding with instant mix, but I used store-bought crusts, so sue me.  I find that the shortbread keeps its crunch better than the graham crust so I actually prefer it. 

For the pudding, this recipe was, as the Chopped judges would have put it, cloyingly sweet. I had cut the sugar in half for the first pie, and it was still too sweet for me.  So for the second pie, I only used 1/2 cup plus about 2 teaspoons of sugar for the pudding, and only about 1/8 cup for the meringue.  Also, I used fat free half and half instead of whole milk, which is probably why my first attempt wouldn't thicken.  So I used slightly less half and half and more flour than the recipe.  Two cups of milk made too much pudding for my ready made crusts anyway.  I ended up using 1 and 1/2 cups of half and half, and 1/4 cup plus 1 teaspoon of flour.  Make sure you bring the pudding to a boil before lowering the heat so that your pudding doesn't taste like raw flour.  Finally, I squeezed a little bit of lemon juice onto the bananas to keep them from turning brown.

Even though there was still something to be desired from my second attempt, this is still a delicious and inexpensive dessert that I hope to get right someday.  Heck, I finished the whole of the first soupy pie myself! Hubby couldn't bring himself to eat sweet banana soup.  This is definitely a dessert that must be consumed within two days, so it's best when you're having company.  Even with the lemon juice, the bananas turned brown after some time. Oh, and the pie must have cost less than $5 to make, so it would be a crowd pleaser and a money saver at the same time.

Light and Easy Weeknight: Pan Seared Tilapia with Parmesan Broccoli Pasta

Pin It This dish literally took 30 minutes to make, partial clean up included.  After feasting on real Southern fried chicken yesterday, this was a good dish to recover from the weekend.  It was light, yet flavorful.  The nuttiness of the parmesan perfectly complements that similar note on the broccoli.  And tilapia is just so good even with a simple preparation.  It also doesn't cost much.  The splurge in this dish would be good parmesan cheese because it makes the dish. Although more expensive, with good, flavorful parmesan you actually won't need as much.  I'm not saying that you should use the $25 per pound Parmigiano Reggiano, but grating a slice from a less expensive wheel should be better than the ones that come from a green can!  These are the times when I miss living by Arthur Avenue where I can get good olive oil and cheese from Teitel Bros. Italian grocery for a very reasonable price.

Pasta

1/2 pound of pasta (I used rotelle.)
1/4 c olive oil
about 5 cloves of garlic  peeled and slightly pounded
1 lb broccoli florets, chopped
2 tsp unsalted butter
salt and pepper
1/2 cup grated parmigiano reggiano
red pepper flakes (optional)

Drop the pasta in the water before making the sauce.  You will be done making the sauce before pasta is even al dente.

In a sautee pan, heat olive oil over medium fire.  Add garlic and pepper flakes and let the flavor infuse the oil.  Watch as you do not want this to burn.  Turn the garlic cloves over to let the other side brown.  Fish out the garlic as soon as the other side starts to brown.  Add the broccoli.  Season with salt and freshly ground black pepper.  Cook until slightly tender but with a bit of crunch left.  Add the butter.  When pasta is done cooking, use a strainer to take the pasta out of the water and put directly into the sauce.  Use some of the pasta water to add more liquid into your sauce.  Re-season with pepper (I suggest to taste after you've added the cheese if you need more salt).  Add grated parmigiano reggiano and toss.  When serving, you can drizzle a little bit more olive oil and grate some more cheese onto the pasta.

Tilapia

2 T olive oil
2 tilapia fillets
salt and pepper

I was making the tilapia while making the pasta so that they all finish cooking at the same time.

Heat the oil over medium fire.  Season both sides of the tilapia with salt and pepper.  Sear the tilapia about 4 minutes each side. 

Frankenstein Enchiladas

Pin It

So it's turning out to be Mexican week.  Mostly because the ingredients were on sale at my grocery store.  And having made tacos last Sunday and chili burritos last week, I had some leftovers.  So to change it up a bit, I decided to put leftovers and extra ingredients from different dishes together in one dish--hence, the post title.  In my last post, I said the pulled chicken tacos were my new favorite Mexican dish to make. I change my mind.  THIS is my new favorite.  Best of all, it was made solely from ingredients that I already had.  One of the things I've learned from watching all these Chopped episodes is even if we're having leftovers, they can be transformed into a whole new dish.

Oh, and just a note, I am completely aware that what I call Mexican is far from authentic. So the recipes I have here are my take on easy homemade Mexican.

They don't look too pretty with my tortillas breaking, but they were GOOD!

leftover pulled chicken from the taco recipe
leftover turkey chili (will include the recipe below)
leftover corn tortillas
leftover sour cream (I use fat free)
leftover shredded cheese (I used Mexican blend, cheddar, and mozzarella)
fresh cilantro

Preheat oven to 375-degrees.  Spread some sour cream over the each tortilla.  Add the pulled chicken and top with cheese.  Put just enough to still be able to roll the tortilla.  Place rolled tortilla flaps side down on a greased tray.  Use the turkey chili to top as the enchilada sauce.  Top with cheese.  Bake for 15 minutes or until cheese melts.  Serve with chopped fresh cilantro.

Turkey chili:

1 lb. ground turkey (I use lean--93/7)
about 5 cloves garlic, minced
1 large can of tomato sauce (Depends on how thick or soupy you want this, actually)
1 medium onion, diced
chili powder
ground cumin
ground cayenne
ground paprika
1 tsp cocoa powder (I use dark cocoa powder)
salt
pepper

Sautee garlic and onion in a just enough oil to brown the meat (You really don't need a lot).  Add turkey and brown.  Transfer to a slow cooker.  Add tomato sauce, liberal amounts of spices and blackpepper, moderate amount of salt and cocoa powder.  Cook on low for at least three hours to develop the flavors.  Serve as a soup, over rice, in a burrito, or as an enchilada sauce substitute!

Post-Cinco de Mayo Celebration: Pulled Chicken Tacos

Pin It With my last (hopefully) CFA exam looming, I have been unable to find the time away from studying.  But in an effort to keep my hordes of readers (and by hordes, I mean, three) interested, I'm writing about my new favorite Mexican dish to make at home. I've made the barbecue pulled chicken from a recipe that I found on allrecipes.com (I can't seem to find it now, though).  I thought I'd put a Mexican twist by adding my standard spices. It was delicious!  And I made enough to do chicken and cheese enchiladas (along with some leftover turkey chili) tonight.  But that will be for another post.

 For the Chicken:

4 chicken breasts (can be frozen)
1/2 c molasses based barbecue sauce (I use Sweet Baby Ray's)
1/2 c Italian salad dressing
water
ground cumin
chili powder
onion powder
granulated garlic
ground paprika
ground cayenne (this is very spicy, so use according to your taste)
black pepper

Line the chicken breasts on the bottom of a slow cooker. Add barbecue sauce and Italian dressing.  To make sure there's sufficient liquid covering up to half the chicken breasts, add water.  Add seasonings. Basically, cover the exposed part of the chicken breast with the seasonings.  Use thongs to turn the chicken over to make sure that all sides get in contact with the sauce and seasoning.  Cover and cook on low for at least 3 hours if chicken is thawed and around 6 hours if frozen. Pull or shred the chicken and mix so that it absorbs the juices.  The chicken will be so tender, you will not have a hard time shredding it.  This, of course, can also be done on very low heat on the stove top as long as you're planning on staying inside the house for the duration of the cook time.

Taco:

soft corn tortilla (Love the flavor of this and I discovered they don't have as much sodium as the flour tortilla.  The ones I get actually had no sodium!)
greens (can be shredded cabbage or lettuce.  I used baby spinach just because it was all I had)
salsa (in this case, I used my ever dependable mango salsa.  Recipe in the burrito post.)
sour cream
shredded cheese (I used Mexican blend, but use any cheese you want.)

Warm the tortillas in a 300-degree oven for about 3 minutes on each side.  I like to layer my taco as such:  sour cream, greens, chicken, salsa, then cheese. We also like to add some Frank's Red Hot sauce for an extra punch. Serve and enjoy!