Home-Multiplied Yogurt

I love yogurt.

But I am going to wreck my budget if I will get a store-bought yogurt for each time I get a craving for yogurt dessert, tzatziki dip or muesli.

So I am sharing the splendid solution for this. Yogurt need not be expensive. Here is how it goes:

Get a small tub of plain yogurt from the store. Make sure it says it has live micro-organisms.

Prepare as much milk as you want. Use full-cream milk. I use powdered milk and dilute it in warm water - not boiling okay. It should be warm in such a way that it will still be comfortable to dip your finger in it.

Take a tablespoon of the yogurt and mix it in the prepared milk. Cover and place in a warm place away from sunlight for 8 to 10 hours.

After that, you'll be surprised to see that your milk has coagulated and cultured into a liter of plain yogurt, yahoo!

Go chill in the ref. It keeps for one week. I personally love adding honey and dried mangoes to it. It is also a clever way to clean up that fruit jam jar. When a jar of jam is almost empty (except for thos bits sticking in the corners), I just pour some yogurt into the jar, shake and then, you have flavored yogurt!

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Beef Rendang (Anne's Version)

Awesome picture www.aglugofoil.com. That is how my dish really turned out!

I do not claim to have a found an improvement to this Malaysian dish but I did found my way around the limitations in ingredients here in Quezon City. So it is good news that we can still enjoy this rich stew even if it is quite a search mission to get hold of some key ingredients.

The cooking style is definitely not familiar because instead of just chopping the aromatics, we need to blend or pound it into a paste. Also I did not let my beef go through the pressure cooker and just let it simmer in the electric stove. I do have a gas stove but I use the electric stove for stewing. The heating plate retains heat even if turned off so I just turn it on for 5 minutes and turn it off for 15 minutess through the 2-hour cooking time. The flavor slow cooking delivers is definitely worth it. A coal stove will also work wonderfully for this. Cook this the night before you intend to serve it to really get the most flavor, as with any old stew.

Ingredients:
Flavor paste
1 pc siling haba, seeds removed, chopped
4 pcs siling labuyo, seeds removed, chopped
2 medium red onions, chopped finely
4 cloves garlic, chopped finely
1 tbsp finely sliced fresh lemongrass (or about 4 inches worth of the white part near the roots)
1 tbsp galangal paste (I found Thai Galangal Paste in Cherry Foodarama)
1 thumb-sized ginger, sliced
1 - 2 tbsp water, to thin the paste as needed

1/2 cup dessicated coconut, toasted dry on a pan
1/2 kilo beef brisket cut to chunks
1 cup coconut milk (or simply milk of one coconut - put all that milk in!)
2 cups water (as needed)
2 tbsp Lee Kum Kee Premium Soy Sauce (it's supposed to be Malaysian thick soy sauce)
2 tbsp regular soy sauce
2 tsp curry powder
8 asitaba leaves, sliced thinly (but it's really supposed to be lime and turmeric leaves. Asitaba tastes nothing like them but hey, those are the only leaves I can get in my front yard))
Pepper and patis to taste

Procedure:
In a mortar and pestle, combine first 7 ingredients and pound together until it becomes a paste. Otherwie, use a blender and whiz away to make a paste. Add water if necessary to thin the paste ito a manageable texture. Set aside.

Toas the dessicated coconut until golden brown. Grind to a paste or blend in the blender again. Set aside.

In a pan, heat oil in medium-high flame and add the flavor paste. Saute until it becomes very aromatic about 3-4 minutes. Add the beef and stir in for about 3 minutes more.

Add to the beef mixture the coconut milk, the water, the curry powder, both soy sauce and pepper. Bring to a simmer. Then add blended toasted coconut and asitaba leaves. Mix thoroughly, cover and bring to a slow boil.

Now lower the heat and you can go back surfing, wash the laundry or watch Sherlock Holmes and let it stew for about 1.5 hours or until beef is tender. Just make sure that you stir it occasionally, every 10-15 minutes so it will not burn at the bottom.

When it is done, it will be brown, thick and grainy from the coconut. Serve it with hot rice and cucumber slices.

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#45: Keeping a Nice-Smelling Kitchen

Aahh... the smelly goodness of tuyo served with vinegar.
Thank you panlasang pinoy for the pic!

Our kitchen is our kingdom. It is our lair. It is where our family's delight are sauteed, stewed and baked so we better make it a nice place to stay in. I have a number of things in my mind that will keep our kitchen (at least) smelling clean. Filipinos most especially need to do this because we just loooooove garlic and patis (fish sauce) and bagoong (fish paste) of all colors, tastes and odors. Not to mention tuyo, buro, dilis, tinapa, durian... the list goes on and on! Yes, I know there is still the clutter but perhaps we can talk a bout that on another (looong) entry, hahaha. The Clutter Monster, after all, is a very tough foe. So let's attend to the smell first. :-)

#38:Friendly Oatmeal Biscuits

If you feel that the Mango Sesame Cookies  was a bit too much for beginners, then this one should be good fit for cookie rookies like you. I present to you the Oatmeal Biscuit! Not only can you boast of cooking something that is packed with fiber, this baby also boasts of a buttery melt-in-your-mouth texture with little crunches here and there. It is perfect with your milk tea and a good book like, say, the Hobbit or Remember Who You Are by Ed Lapiz. You only need the bare minimum of cookies, of course, with the addition of the oats: butter, sugar, flour, vanilla. So yeah, this is certified for beginners. :-D

Oats. It's such a friendly pantry item. You can make porridge from it, granola, muesli and desserts like cookies. Whenever you are attacked with a hunger pang, oats always lend a helping hand, filling (and cleaning) your tummy and patting you on the back, affirming you that you made the better choice by snacking on them. In this era where people are suddenly clamoring for wellness, oats have been elevated to a new level of popularity and for a good reason.

#38: Peeling Pineapples

A cyber-friend of mine was talking about her woes of wanting to eat a pineapple but not knowing how to eat it.  I thought it will be a good entry for this blog because I used to have the same problem too. It may be convenient to just pop open a can of syrup-drenshed pineapples but it already lost all the enzymes it has and just has Vitamin C that was artificially added to it.


Now there are two ways to skin a pineapple. The classic way and the easy way. Let's discuss the classic way first.

#36: Macing's Year-Round Puto Pumbong

This is the "bumbong" used to cook this
rice cake. Nice picture from Female Network!

Puto Bumbong is a classic Filipino rice cake snack that is most popular during Christmas time. Over the years, it has become a traditional snack for those who are attending the early morning Christmas mass that starts from December 16 to 25. This rice cake is made from a special kind of purple sticky rice called Pirurutong. The rice is soaked in salted water, dried and ground then placed in a narrow bamboo called bumbong then steamed. It is then placed on a banana leaf and served slathered with butter, shaved coconut, ground raw sugar also known as muscovado and sometimes, grated cheese. This is officially my favorite rice cake variety. Nothing beats the warm, soft texture of the cake, this made more lavish by the creamy butter, the milky coconut and the sharp, melt-in-your-mouth sweetness of the muscovado. Oh yeah. Then the cheese... This must be the gate of rice cake heaven.

If I had my choice, I will want to eat this regularly all year round. But as I mentioned earlier, these only litter the streets during Christmas. And lately, the really good puto bumbongs have gotten far and few in between. Most of the puto bumbongs sold during Christmas has mostly become imitation versions. They don't use pirurutong anymore. They just use the regular sticky rice and color it purple. Baaaah! I had no choice but to endure the longing until the next Christmas season. That was my plight until my husband introduced me to Macing's.

#35: Coffee Roasted Chicken

Coffee.. I am so in love with it that I even add it to my chicken! Haha! you may think that this will taste funny but really, what coffee adds to this is the smoky flavor without the actual carbon crust on the chicken. This is so delicious and simple, you can almost do this even if you don't have any cooking experience at all. And, it adds a truck load of pogi/ popularity points if you serve this to your friends. Little do they know that it is made of only 5 ingredients. 

#34: How to Avoid Common Cooking Mistakes

There are more cool stuff you can use
here on ClipArt Pal. 

A lot of  non-cooking individuals always tell me that they are scared of treading the path of cooking dishes for the family. They fear that it may not turn out right and all their time and ingredients are are gonna end up an uneaten dump of  food in the fridge. For all you kitchen newbies, don't be fazed. I am not the hustler in the kitchen that you think who flies around in flawless movements, making a perfect meal every time. I am only able to write these things after much experiments, successes , failures, tears and salty (or burnt) dishes.


That's why I want to share with you some tips that hopefully will get you to be friends with the kitchen. Perhaps these may save you from encountering the horror stories I experienced before.

#33: Cucumber for All Occasions Part 2

Now we have come to the second installment of our cucumber festival. The first couple of recipes are quite common but these two here are more adventurous.

Tzatziki's Long Lost Pinoy Brother

Now where getting somewhere! And that somwhere is Greece. This is a traditional Greek dip but we will try to make it more down to earth, ok? Strictly, it should be made with Greek yogurt which is richer than the yogurt we know. But hey, yogurt is already a bit pricey here so I guess we can make do with that. It's up to you if you want to scour the international aisle in your supermarket and find the real thing. :-D

#30: Investment Ingredients for an Exciting Kitchen Part 1

Eating gourmet food in your home may be way more affordable than eating the same Fish Fillet meal in a restaurant. But of course, you will have to little by little, stock up on these items that will spell the difference on your meals. I have made a list of my favorite flavoring ingredients that I feel are not usually present in the Filipino kitchen. Investing on these items can help you to be well on your way to experimenting on new flavors with your dishes. Here are some items on the top of my head (and my kitchen shelf). 

#16: Why Saute?

Filipinos, being stove-top-cooking creatures, love dishes that involve sauteing. When my friends ask me to teach them how to cook most common Pinoy viands my first line is always "So long as you learn how to saute, you will be well on your way." That is because that is the foundation of most Pinoy favorites like afritada, menudo, kaldereta, guinataang gulay, pininyahan, tinola and of course adobo. The next thing you should know after that is an idea of how long your ingredients cook. The only rule there is, you place first the ingredients that cook longer, then add later the ingredients that cook faster (unless you need to sauté them).

Thanks to http://food.rlove.org for thepicture! 

So why sauté?

#14: In Lieu of an Oven

We Filipinos are not the type that will cook in an oven. We are a stove-top people and we will try to do as much as we can on top of a fire. Besides, a gas range with an oven is not the most affordable kitchen appliance there is. I got mine as an exchange wedding gift from my gracious mother-in-law. She saved up a sum of money from her dressmaking gigs and bought herself a gas range even if she never baked. So, knowing that I do bake dishes and pastries, she agreed to just exchange the 2-burner stove we got with her gas range as a wedding gift. She knows that I will be able to maximize our gas range friend better. Anne was happy! 

This funny cartoon came from
http://www.funnydb.com/Pictures/Cartoons.
Thank you!

So most Pinoys cannot afford an oven and some of us with an oven think that cooking in them uses up more gas. I'm not so sure about that.

#13: Simple Pinakbet (The Recipe)

Calm down, calm down...

The recipe you waited for is here. :-D This is simple because it only has the bare necessities: kalabasa, string beans and malunggay. The more elaborate ones include eggplant, okra, malunggay fruit, patani, kalabasa flowers, some wrinkly vegetable that looks like short string beans like the one in the upper right of the picture here. Are you familiar with that? Anyway, the more vegetables you use, the more bagoong and pork you should use as well to make sure that it will stay flavorful.

#7: Pollo al Ajo

What's for lunch mom?


It's gonna be Pollo al Ajo and Buttered Vegetables. *wink*


Naaaks!


Just saying the name makes you feel like a hotel chef. Remember my post when I said I'll share a recipe that involves chicken, garlic and ginger but it is not tinola? Well, here it is. I learned this dish from a bargain bookstore recipe book. It turned to be a very tasty dish! We have another featured ingredient here that will spell the difference and make an ordinary P50 chicken dish taste like P250. ;-) It's time to try THYME! It is an herb that has a fresh minty, woody bouquet or scent. The dried variety of these little leaves is so potent that a little goes a long way. 

#4: Making Peace with Omelettes

Torta.

It's a bit unglamorous calling them that so let's just call them omelettes.  I am usually discouraged to cook these because one, they turn out to be hard, dry and gummy. Two, they don't fly out of my pan looking immaculately intact. In fact, the last 5 attempts before this successful last attempt looked more like messed up scrambled eggs. Three, I can't seem to think of anything decent to fill up these omelettes with. I mean, do I really have to cook ginisang giniling first AND THEN make it into an omelette? Isn't that too much effort? Might as well eat the ginisang giniling as it is, right?

Well, I finally made my peace with the omelette and here are the tips and tricks that I learned to make the omelette your friend in the menu list.