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Bagoong: Ohhhh, The Smell Of It!

January 16, 2012 //
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Visit any Filipino kitchen and you’ll find this holy trinity: patis (fish sauce), suka (vinegar) and – no, I’m not including toyo or soy sauce in this list as that it is really a culinary adoption from the Chinese – but the third most ubiquitous Filipino sauce or condiment, the bagoong. It’s a paste made from shrimp or sometimes fish, pungent and dry (or wet, depending on the province or region it comes from) and rather similar to the belachan of our asian neighbours.

Bagoong is the base, the flavor enhancer in many Pinoy dishes, without which kare-kare or pinakbet is just never the same, nor green mangoes as enjoyable, and my favorite pork binagoongan, well, a misnomer.

On my short trip to Manila for the holidays, I had to cook a couple of bagoong-based dishes – thanks to an oversupply of this salted, fermented paste in my fridge. I had just come back from the grocery with stuff – you know, cooking oils, rice, garlic, onions and tomatoes, as well as patis, suka, toyo and bagoong – to stock my pantry for the length of my stay, when I saw what probably were left-over Barrio Fiesta bagoongs from two visits past. Good thing, bagoongs don’t go bad (or do they?)

So I cooked Sitaw at Kalabasa with Bagoong and, for the first time, Pork Binagoongan.

There’s really no need to refer to a recipe to cook pork binagoongan. Just sauté some bagoong in garlic, onions and tomato, drizzle some lemon juice and, at the last few minutes of cooking, add the pre-boiled slices of pork belly. For my version, I first boiled, dried, then fried the pork before adding them to the sautéed bagoong – as I preferred my pork crunchy. Of course, I love things with a lot more zing, so I also threw in a couple of finger chillies to the mix. This I served with a side dish of steamed bok choy – a perfect complement of bland and salty, green and brown, good and bad.

My friend and food taster C. suggested, though, that I added more bagoong – for texture. So I took a mental note – to top my next dish with a bit more sautéed bagoong – for texture and, yes, flourish.

Ohhhh, the smell of it!

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Deconstructing (a Taste of) Rome

November 15, 2011 //
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One of the highlights of our recent trip to Rome was tasting this pasta dish simply labelled Rigatoni in Eggplant, Pachino Tomato and Mozzarella Sauce. It looked quite plain, too – no chunky bits, no toppings of cheese, no sprinkling of herbs. How could it taste so good? The pasta was more al dente than we’re used to, but the sauce… the sauce just had that deep, smoky flavour that made me want to go home and recreate this dish in our kitchen.
Our server – probably a member of the family that ran the restaurant (with the matriarch herself manning the stoves, we were told) – seemed too harassed to oblige us with more information on the food and their ingredients. Eggplant, tomato, mozzarella – that’s all the clue we could get from the menu. As for that smoky flavour –  I could only guess the vegetables were roasted before they were stewed, as it would take more than smoked paprika to build such depth.

Deconstructed in Rome that evening and reconstructed as soon as we got home, here’s our own version of that unforgettable Eggplant, Tomato and Mozzarella Sauce. This recipe substitutes Roma tomatoes for the Pachino variety, smoked gouda for the mozzarella, and penne for the rigatoni. We also added chili flakes, so it’s a bit spicy – ‘coz, hey, we’re Asian that way!
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The recipe looks long and intimidating, but it’s really simple and can be summed up in three steps: a) Roast vegetables; 2) Cook with rest of ingredients; 3) Serve and enjoy!
1 eggplant, sliced
a handful of salt
1 bell pepper (green, red or yellow), sliced
4-5 Roma tomatoes, sliced
1 bulb/head garlic
Extra virgin olive oil
salt and pepper
1 onion (diced)
1/2 teaspoon chili flakes (optional)
1 (28 ounce) can diced tomatoes
1 teaspoon oregano
1 teaspoon paprika
1/4 cup grated smoked gouda
1 pound pasta
1/4 cup grated parmesan, for topping
chopped parsley, to garnish
Directions:
Roast the vegetables:
1. Toss the eggplant in the salt and let sit in a bowl or colander for 20-30 minutes.
2. Rinse the salt off the eggplant and pat dry.
3. Toss the eggplant, tomatoes, bell pepper slices in olive oil, salt and pepper
4. Arrange vegetables in a single layer on a baking sheet.
5. Bake in a preheated 400F oven until tender, about 20-30 minutes.
Roast the garlic:
1. Chop off top portion of garlic bulb.
2.  Lay bulb on tinfoil and drizzle with olive oil, about 2 tablespoons. Wrap tightly.
3. Roast in 400F oven, about 40 minutes.
4. Remove from heat; when cool, squeeze out the cloves and discard the skin.
Prepare the sauce:
1. Heat about 1 tablespoon olive oil in a pan.
2. Add the onions and saute until tender, about 5-7 minutes.
3. Add the roasted garlic and red pepper flakes and saute until fragrant, about 1 minute.
4. Add the roasted vegetables, the canned diced tomatoes, oregano, paprika, grated mozzarella or gouda cheese and bring to a boil.
5. Reduce the heat and simmer until the sauce starts to thicken, about 30-40 minutes.
11. Remove from heat. When cool, roughly pureé with a handheld blender. Store in refrigerator.
To serve:
Reheat the sauce while cooking the pasta per package directions.
Top pasta with sauce and garnish with grated parmesan cheese and parsley.
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Salted Eggs, DIY

October 20, 2011 //
0

Salted Egg Sliced Open

It gets my goat whenever I crack open a salted egg and find the yolk missing that bright yellow-orange hue and that oily but firm, grainy center. There’s also that level of saltiness I expect from the white, the one that grips the surface of the tongue, but nicely blends into the tartness of tomatoes and the pungency of cilantro, one that I can push a little bit more to the edge with a drizzle of patis, then pull back to safety with some fried rice. It’s a little tug-o-war I love to play with salted eggs, but with the dull, bland ones I get occasionally from the Chinese grocery, it’s game over even before they’re plated.

So, why not make the salted eggs myself?

I found this link in Purple Yam’s Facebook page and proceeded to buy (chicken) eggs and (a lot of) salt. Except for the waiting part (14-20 days), making salted eggs was easier than I thought. The only challenge was keeping the eggs submerged in the water, but a ramekin placed on top of the eggs effectively pushed the lot down as soon as I closed the jar. It was also important to ensure that the water was properly salted, but the recipe was very clear on how to achieve that.

While I was satisfied with the results, I thought I do a few things differently with my next batch.

1) Use duck, instead of chicken, eggs. Yes, I just spotted fresh duck eggs in my favorite store in Chinatown! Duck eggs are generally bigger; they’re also fattier, so they’ll give that sought-after oily rim and center. The yolk is also brighter. If I have to use chicken eggs, I’ll get the organic ones; their yolks are naturally deeper in color than the hugely commercial brands.

2) Pump up the saltiness level by keeping the eggs in the brine solution for at least 20 days. A 22-day soak was more to my liking.

3) Boil the eggs in tea-infused water. It won’t flavor the eggs, but tint the shell so it’s easy to differentiate the salted eggs from the regular ones. Better than painting each egg a hideous red which stains hands, cutting board, kitchen counter and, ironically, everything in the kitchen that I want to keep immaculately white.

4) A dark green color around the yolk means the eggs have been over-boiled or cooked. Check this article for tips on how to boil eggs. Purple Yam also mentioned that a friend prefers to steam duck eggs (10 minutes). Hmmm, very interesting. Will definitely try, next time!

Need I say I saved money, too? Not much, maybe 15-20 cents a piece. But in the end, it’s not really about the money, but the pleasure of the harvest. Awwwww…..

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Here’s the recipe for Salted Eggs (Khai Kham):

Ingredients

12 Raw Large Eggs
500 gms Salt
4 Litres Water
Large Boiling Pan
Big Glass Jar

Preparation
1. The eggs are salted in a saturated brine solution. This means the maximum amount of salt you can dissolve in the water!
2. Boil water in a large pan.
3. Add the salt to the water and dissolve it. Add more salt until the salt can no longer dissolve.
4. Leave to cool, as the water cools, salt crystals should form. If they do not, heat it up and add more salt.
5. Put the cold brine and eggs into a jar, the eggs must be submerged in the brine.
6. After 14-20 day take it out of the jar. They can be kept for a long time in that salted condition.
7. They can be used boiled or fried or to add salt to a dish.

Salted Eggs with Fried Rice

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A Vegetarian Kare-Kare and A Truce with Eggplants

October 7, 2011 //
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When Rama said she missed sinigang, Poch and I resolved that October 3-7 was going to be a Pinoy Food week for the family. To up the level of difficulty a bit – a challenge I assumed was directed at me – it was also going to be vegetarian. Now, we all know that Pinoy ≠ vegetarian. Even pinakbet, which Filipinos swear is vegetarian, has bits of pork or shrimp in it – pampalasa lang naman, as a friend once argued.

The vegetarian sinigang (Monday) and the kalabasa at sitao sa gata (Tuesday) were easy enough, as we had cooked them fairly often. But vegetarian kare-kare? Sans bagoong, to boot!

Me, Chef Geoff Hopgood, and Mr. Neil. Chef Geoff was the featured chef at my recent birthday party.

My first and last attempt at a vegetarian version was more than a year ago, a dismal failure, with the vegetables ending up mushy and unrecognizable in the peanut sauce.

Chef Geoff's take on Kare-Kare proves it can be served in a beautiful, appetizing way.

Inspired by the kare-kare that Chef Geoff Hopgood prepared for my birthday party, I thought I could do better this time. The secret, as I found out with my oxtail kare-kare, was to blanch the vegetables quickly, throw them in an ice bath and serve them separate from the sauce. But then, Chef Geoff cubed and fried the eggplants – a neat trick, as eggplants and I had been long-time adversaries in the kitchen. Maybe if I treated them special too, they would keep their beautiful purple color and firmness and we could be friends finally. Hence, eggplant slices in panko crust! They turned out visually interesting and, on the taste front, crunchy and flavorful. On my vegetarian kare-kare, they shared star billing with the peanut sauce.

P.S.

Here’s a short note about blanching vegetables: I learned from my mom that adding baking soda in the boiling water helped the vegetables keep their color and crunch. Maybe I’ll try this trick when I don’t have enough time and patience for panko-crusted eggplants. I also added baking soda to the flour to make a firmer, crunchier panko crust, a tip I read somewhere. Hmmm, baking soda… it’s even good for scouring stovetops and kitchen counters.

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Eggplant in Panko Crust

1 asian eggplant,  1/2-inch diagonal slices

1/2 cup flour combined with 1 tsp of baking soda

1 egg beaten

1/2 cup panko crust

Dip eggplant slices in the flour mix, egg and panko, then fry in canola oil. When slices turn golden brown, transfer to a plate with paper towel to drain. Keep warm.

Peanut sauce

1/2 cup diced onion

1/2 cup diced tomato

2 cloves garlic minced

2 tablespoons canola oil

1 tablespoon peanut butter

1 tablespoon annato oil

1/3 cup roasted unsalted peanuts and toasted rice, finely ground

2-1/2 or 3 cups vegetable broth

Salt and pepper to season

Bagoong, on the side for the non-vegetarians

Saute onion, garlic and tomato. When softened, add peanut butter and stir until smooth. Add broth and the annato oil. Bring to a boil then add the ground peanuts and toasted rice. Lower heat and simmer until sauce is in your desired consistency. Season with salt and pepper.

Blanched Vegetables

Boil about 4 cups water and add a teaspoon of baking soda. Blanch the long beans and  baby bokchoy for one minute or less and immediately put in an ice bath or cold water to stop the cooking. Drain and arrange on a platter, with the panko-crusted eggplant slices.

This recipe serves 3.

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Beef Soup for the Wintry Soul

September 21, 2011 //
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It’s so easy to complicate this soup with the addition of carrots, corn cobs and some other greens like broccoli. But I prefer the simpler, Pinoy version, with just the basic ingredients of beef shanks, potatoes, cabbage and/or green beans.

Keeping it simple and Pinoy: Beef Shanks, Potatoes, Cabbage, Green Beans. Don't forget the Patis!

That’s how my grandfather, a butcher, preferred his nilagang baka too. In his family, beef – an expensive meat, even to someone who worked in an abattoir – was served only on Sundays. But what he brought home was always good, fresh beef, of such quality that it could be served in nothing more than a clear, well-seasoned broth, with nothing else that would overwhelm the pure beef taste, perhaps just some potatoes and cabbage, to make a more substantial fare for his family of 10 kids.

I made this soup for the first time for my friend G. He had told me it was his favorite, and I also knew of his dread of the colder months and the inevitable winter. The temp had started to drop, and I couldn’t think of a more comforting dish to serve than nilagang baka : beef simmered to fall-off-the-bone tenderness, its broth ladled generously onto a bowl of rice, a hot and steamy dish usually served – and so curiously perfect – on a summer day.

In Toronto, with potatoes and cabbage available even during the coldest, bleakest of months, this could well be the soup for our winters. Winter – I’d like to think – is nothing but a longing for home.

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3 lbs of beef shanks

1 white or yellow onion, peeled and quartered

10-15 peppercorns

1-2 bay leaves

water

2 large potatoes, peeled and quartered

1/2 medium cabbage head, sliced into quarters

1 bunch of haricots verts, ends trimmed and stringy parts removed

patis/salt and pepper to taste

Wash meat thoroughly. Place in a stock pot and add enough water to cover. Add onions, peppercorns and bay leaves. Simmer until tender, skimming the scum off the top.

Drain broth. If you have time, chill in refrigerator overnight to remove excess fat that solidifies on the surface.

Add potatoes to broth and continue to simmer until potatoes are cooked but firm. Add cabbage and green beans, then turn heat off  and cover. Steam the vegetables for 5 minutes or until tender, yet still green and crisp.

Season with patis/salt and pepper. Serve hot with steamed white rice. Serves 4.

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Our Daily Bread, the Pan de Sal

September 7, 2011 //
0

Not many know of the days when pan de sal was peddled on a bicycle, from a wooden box tied on its rack, in a thin, ocher-brown paper bag that would get as warm as the freshly baked buns it held. I remember our “magtitinapay” would signal his arrival with three short, tinny rings of his bicycle bell, a sound I swear brought – at least to my mom – both a sense of relief and an almost palpable swell of anxiety. She would pour the coffee before she rushed to the door – but what if Mang Turing reached into his box, found many “supot” marked with all the other housewives’ names and none marked with “Aling Nena”?

This was way before little home bakeries sprouted like, well, pan de sals selling pan de sal. And way before a nation woke up to a shrunken version and an economy that had begun to head south. Most probably don’t even remember that pan de sal, paired with coffee, was our people’s breakfast of choice – not Payless or Lucky Mi Instant Mami.

The pan de sal is that one taste of my childhood I hardly remember, but one that I will instantly recognize. Give me one that is soft, stretchy and chewy inside, with a crust that always and inevitably leaves a trail of tiny crumbs on the floor. It’s the one with the smell of yeast as strong/subtle as, I was told, the sweat of the baker who kneaded its dough.

  • 1-1/4 cup warm skim milk (I used Almond Milk)
  • 1 packet of active dry yeast
  • 3 tablespoons white sugar, divided into 1 and 2.
  • 2 tablespoons vegetable oil
  • 1 teaspoon salt
  • 3 cups all-purpose flour (I used 1 cup all purpose, 2 cups whole wheat)
  • 1 cup fine bread crumbs
  1. Dissolve 1 tbsp of sugar in the warm milk. Add the yeast and let stand until frothy, about 10 minutes.
  2. In a large mixing bowl, combine the remaining sugar and the oil and mix until smooth. Add the salt, 1 cup of flour and the yeast mixture; stir well. Add the remaining flour, 1/2 cup at a time and mix until the dough is smooth and pulls away from the sides of the bowl.
  3. Turn the dough onto a lightly floured surface and knead for about 10 minutes.
  4. Lightly oil another large mixing bowl, place the dough in it and turn to coat the dough with oil.
  5. Cover with a damp towel or plastic wrap and let sit in a warm place until the dough has doubled in volume, about 1 hour.
  6. Turn the dough onto a lightly floured surface and press gently to remove air in the dough. Knead for about 2 minutes and let rest, about 10 minutes.
  7. Divide dough into 2 and form each piece into a cylinder about 1 inch in diameter. Using a sharp knife, cut each cylinder diagonally into 2-inch long pieces, about 10-12 pieces.
  8. Roll each piece on a plate of bread crumbs. Place the pieces onto a lightly greased baking sheet. Gently press each roll down to flatten.
  9. Cover the rolls with a damp cloth and let rise until doubled in volume, about 30 minutes.
  10. Bake at a pre-heated 375 degrees F oven (190 degrees C) until golden brown, about 20 minutes.
Most recipes use water instead of milk. I thought milk (I had almond milk in the ref) would make my pan de sal a little healthier. I also found some recipes that had eggs as an ingredient, but I don’t remember tasting an “eggy” pan de sal when I was young. Maybe there was neither milk nor eggs in the pan de sals of those days. After all, wasn’t the pan de sal supposed to be our basic, simple, inexpensive daily bread?
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Taste of the Wild

August 11, 2011 //
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Curious, I asked if they had wild boar. “No,” the young hipster of a butcher answered, “but a delivery is coming in tonight. It will be clean and ready tomorrow morning. How much do you want? A whole hog?”

Of course, he was boasting. Sanagan’s Meat Locker in the Kensington Market carries just about any kind of meat and poultry: rabbit, goat, venison, Berkshire, Tamworth and Iron Age pork, quail, capon, pheasant, name it. And you’ll find the animals’ prized internal organs here as well: tongue, heart, liver. I haven’t seen horse meat nor foie gras sold in the store, though. But I’m sure if I asked and PETA wasn’t looking, they could easily score some of this stuff for me. I also love that their meats are organic or naturally raised and locally sourced. The wild boar, for example, was from a small farm near Stratford, Ontario, raised in the same field and forest conditions as its natural habitat.

I was about 8 years old when I had my first taste of wild boar meat. My Tito Dado brought a bayong-ful from Cagayan Valley where he was assigned as captain in the Philippine Constabulary. My young mind conjured up images of a wild hunt, my uncle’s rifle still smoking, a huge, bristly but limp boar slung on his shoulders. I know now that my uncle always told tall stories, but the one about the boar that he stalked for days I believed completely. Tapang baboy rrrramo, he rolled his r as he laid the meat on the table. It was trophy meat, lean, deep red, with a taste as dark and wild as the forests it foraged.

This child never forgot.

Sanagan's at 206 Baldwin Street, Toronto. Open Monday-Saturday, 8am-7pm. Sunday, 12noon-5pm. 416-5939747

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I found this recipe for Langgonisa using Baboy Ramo in Memories of Philippine Kitchen. This was the first time I was making sausages, so I opted to prepare and serve this hubad, or “naked”. Wrestle the wild boar into tiny pork casings? I wouldn’t dare.

2 lbs wild boar meat, finely chopped or ground

1 lb pork fatback, finely chopped or ground

2 tbsp achuete oil

2 tbsp rice wine

1 tbsp rice vinegar

1 tsp minced garlic (about 4 cloves)

1 tsp zest of lime

1 tbsp salt

1 tsp freshly ground black pepper.

Wild boar meat is lean, dark red, gamey - but low in cholesterol!

Combine all the ingredients in a large bowl. Mix very well to incorporate all the ingredients. Cover and refrigerate for at least 2 hours or overnight. Pan-fry using canola oil.

(Tweaks: Preferring langgonisa with less fat, I used pork belly instead of the pork fatback. For a spicy kick, I minced twice the amount of garlic and added half a teaspoon of chile flakes. I also stirred in a bit more rice vinegar and the juice of half the lime I zested since, well, it was there. Wild boar has a gamey taste and I thought a little more acid would temper this gaminess. And, oh, I used disposable gloves to mix everything by hand. That achuete oil could leave a nasty stain, you know.)

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Oh my, my Kare-Kare!

August 8, 2011 //
1

Finally, my recipe for kare-kare!

Though I improvised a bit as I cooked this dish, it’s based largely on the recipe shared by my sister Cora and the one I picked up from Memories of Philippine Kitchens. Since the kare-kare was well-received at “my open kitchen” last Friday, I guess I’m sticking with this:

Ingredients:

Oxtail, about 3 pounds, cut into 2-inch pieces

8 garlic cloves, smashed

1/2 cup roughly chopped onions

3-4 dried bay leaves

3 tbsp of oxtail fat

2 tbsp garlic, minced

1/2 cup onions, chopped

1/2 cup tomatoes, diced

2 tbsp peanut butter

5 cups oxtail broth

1/3 cup rice, toasted then ground

1 cup unsalted roasted peanuts, ground

2 tbsp salt

3 tbsp achuete oil (recipe here)

1 bunch sitaw or longbeans (about 20 pieces)

2 eggplants, cut into 1/2-inch pieces

1 bunch bok choy (about 10-15 pieces)

1 cup bagoong or shrimp paste (sauteéd in garlic, onions and tomatoes)

Preparation:

1. Wash oxtail pieces thoroughly and place in a pot with 6 cups of water or enough to cover. Add the smashed garlic cloves, dried bay leaves and the roughly chopped onions. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat to simmer, until meat is fork-tender, about 1 1/2 – 2 hours.

2. Remove from fire and drain when cool enough. Discard the bay leaves, onions and garlic pieces; remove the oxtail and set aside in a bowl or ziplock bag. Transfer broth into a bowl or pot, cover and refrigerate overnight to separate the fat. Refrigerate the oxtail pieces, as well.

Cooking Process:

1. Skim the separated fat from the oxtail broth and reserve 3 tbsp. Discard the rest.

2. In a casserole over medium heat, sauté the minced garlic and onions in the oxtail fat until onions are softened, about 3 minutes. Add the tomatoes and cook until softened, about 2 minutes. Stir in the peanut butter until creamy and well-blended.

3. Add the reserved broth and cook for 15 minutes, then add the oxtail, ground rice, peanuts and achuete oil.

4. Season with salt and continue to cook until the broth has reduced partially, about 20 minutes. Keep in mind that vegetables will be added later and therefore the stew must not be too thick. Add some water if needed.

5. As the oxtail simmers, prepare the vegetables. Blanch the bokchoy, eggplant and long beans in a pot of salted boiling water and immediately transfer to iced water  in order to stop the cooking process and let the vegetable retain their color and crunch. Drain, then arrange in a platter.

6. Just before serving, mix the vegetables with the oxtail, or serve separately.

7. Serve with bagoong on the side.

With apologies for my hideous lighting and non-existent camera skills, here are photos of Purple Yam’s Kare-Kare (top) and my version (bottom). I know, I know, I still have a long way to go before I come close to the genius that is Romy Dorotan. For one, I forgot the salt! And I used some peanut butter. What a cop-out! Oh well…

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Seeing Red at Purple Yam

August 5, 2011 //
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I just posted a shout-out on Facebook for an Open House Friday – or more accurately, an Open-Kitchen Friday. It’s a clever way of rounding up friends for my kitchen experiments. For this Friday, I was thinking of reprising my kare-kare.

My first kare-kare, which I cooked a couple of months ago, tasted okay; in fact, it was good. But its color was off-putting: a brackish orange-brown.

What went wrong? Could it be the banana blossom which discolored the moment I sliced it and then stained the rest of the ingredients in the pot? Or the bagoong that I stirred into the sauce to season it?

My friends and I were in New York over the weekend and, as planned, had dined at Purple Yam in Brooklyn. That’s when I had the compulsion to cook kare-kare. If Purple Yam didn’t do fusion – just good old traditional Filipino cooking – how come their kare-kare looked and tasted different?

Purple Yam’s peanut sauce was almost brick red, a color I didn’t associate with kare-kare. Kare-kare was always orange – no thanks to Barrio Fiesta, which seemed to have set the standard in terms of color (bright and perky) and consistency (thick and very peanut-y). Very much like we did it back home, actually.

Another thing: there’s no heavy peanut taste in Purple Yam’s kare-kare. And surprisingly, I preferred it that way. I was tasting the toasted rice with the peanuts and, I was almost sure, there was no peanut butter in it. The sauce was closer to thick broth than cream.

Chef Romy Dorotan, right, with Gene F and me.

As I ate, my mind was busy tweaking my recipe for kare-kare. 1) Use equal proportions of toasted rice and roasted peanuts, 2) Omit the banana blossom and 3) Serve bagoong on the side, as tradition called for. I’d also scratch out peanut butter from the list of ingredients and, yes, make my own achuete oil.

And I did, right after we got home. To make the achuete oil, I followed the recipe I found in Memories of Philippine Kitchens, a book written by Purple Yam owners, Amy Besa and Romy Dorotan.

There’s more to Dorotan’s recipe than just annatto seeds steeped in hot oil. There’s bay leaves, garlic and ancho chiles – all these, I figured, added a dimension of taste, not just that trademark reddish hue, to the dish.

After an hour or so, I got a small jar of achuete oil sitting in my ref, actually more than I needed for Friday’s kare-kare.

Hmm, do I see langgonisa in my next open kitchen?

Is this where Purple Yam's kare-kare gets its trademark reddish hue?

Here’s Purple Yam’s recipe for Achuete Oil:

2 cups vegetable oil; 1/2 cup achuete (annatto) seeds; 6 whole garlic cloves; 2 bay leaves; 2 ancho chiles, crushed, stemmed and seeded (I used chile flakes – a generous pinch of!)

In a medium saucepan over medium heat, warm the oil with the rest of the ingredients. When it begins to bubble, turn off heat and allow the mixture to steep for at least 1 hour or up to 2 hours. Strain the oil through a fine-mesh strainer and let cool. Store in an airtight container and refrigerate.

The achuete oil can be refrigerated for up to 2 weeks.

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