Pochero

This dish is very basic and simple. Potatoes can also be added. At home, we use cooking bananas (saba) and sweet potato (camote) instead of carrots, beans and potato. For a nice smell, we also add edible lemon grass.

Ingredients:
Tenderloin pork (cut into pieces) - can be substituted with beef, chicken or fish
Carrots
Beans
Cabbage

How to cook:
1. Boil the meat until tender.
2. Add carrots and beans. Cook until soft.
3. Add cabbage. Season to taste.
4. Bring to boil one time and remove from fire.

Italian Spaghetti

So easy to make! Italian spaghetti is quite sour compared to the Filipino spaghetti sauce. But it is still delicious, of course!

An exciting Friday evening!

Great news! The long-missed Thai Isan food vendors are back on campus! Just before the year 2007 ended last year, all the vendors in the campus cafeteria had to move out. Gone! Coz cafeteria services have been outsourced to a company. So gone were our favorite food sellers. Our acquired taste of the food that is truly authentic campus cafeteria taste could not be satisfied by this new group. That's why we had been having fun with our food marketing and kitchen adventures. But then, this evening when we were moving around the campus, we saw a crowd at the Thai Isan food kiosk by the swan lake. It was announced last week that a new concessionaire has taken over there selling Thai Isan food. It did occur to me that maybe this Isan couple might come to sell food there. But since I was so busy during the past week it slipped my mind to go and check. Anyway, tonight I was planning to cook pasta with tomato sauce and pepper ham. I had already taken them out to prepare when we had to go out. And thus we passed nearby the kiosk. So we decided to see what was going on there, and maybe we were hoping that the new vendors would be our favorite one! And we were not mistaken! We were so excited to see them and we were so happy also to know that it was them! I bet that nearly all their loyal customers on campus feel the same way as we do! So we decided to eat dinner there. Al fresco! By the lake, with a huge monitor lizard coming out once in a while to say hello. Unfortunately I did not bring my camera so I could not show all the favorite food we ordered, namely som tam, namtok mhu, kho mhu yang, sticky rice! And coke. We were being bad but we just shared a bottle. And we were celebrating. Now I am drinking ampalaya tea. So I think it would be ok. Our taste buds were so happy to be tasting some delicious Thai Isan food again. Aroy mak mak! Sep lai lai!

He can cook, thank God!

Last night I left the office at 730 pm coz we had to do some more budget calculation for our annual work plan. So my husband had to cook dinner. Again since it was already towards the end of the week, the food supplies in the kitchen were nearly depleted. When he called me at around 6pm or so to inform me that he had already arrived, and I mentioned that I would be late coming home, he volunteered to cook dinner. Yehey! So nice of him! It seems it is becoming a habit! Anyway, we only had morning glory and mushrooms left in the crisper. No more meat and fish. We did have some pepper ham and eggs. When I got home he had already prepared the veggies and he was about to cook them. It was good he did not forget to cook rice!

I left him to cook it and I just took photos so I can post them here! I gave instructions only ha ha ha! So first was to heat the wok and add some oil, then saute the chopped garlic and the sliced red onions. The smell started to come out from the spices! And my stomach started to growl. I was already hungry and it was only the initial ingredients! Then add the veggies, oyster sauce and some powdered black pepper. Just stir fry for a few minutes and dinner was ready!