Pinakbet or pakbet is a popular Ilokano dish, from the northern regions of the Philippines, although it has become popular throughout the archipelago. The word is the contracted form of the Ilokano word pinakebbet, meaning "shrunk" or "shriveled".The original Ilokano pinakbet uses bagoong, of fermented monamon or other fish, while further south, bagoong alamang is used. The basic vegetables used in this dish include native bitter melon, eggplant, tomato, okra, string beans, chili peppers, parda, winged beans, and others. Root crops and some beans like camote, patani, kadios are also optionally added. The young pod of marunggay is also added. It is usually spiced with ginger, onions, or garlic.
Chop suey (simplified Chinese: 杂碎; traditional Chinese: 雜碎; pinyin: zá suì; literally "assorted pieces") is a Chinese dish consisting of meat (often chicken, fish, beef, prawns, or pork) and eggs, cooked quickly with vegetables such as bean sprouts, cabbage, and celery and bound in a starch-thickened sauce. It is typically served with rice but can become the Chinese-American form of chow mein with the addition of stir-fried noodles. Chop suey has become a prominent part of American Chinese cuisine, Filipino cuisine, Canadian Chinese cuisine, German Chinese cuisine, Indian Chinese cuisine, and Polynesian cuisine. In Indonesian Chinese cuisine it is known as cap cai (雜菜, "mixed vegetables") and mainly consists of vegetables. Filipinos love deep fried crispy pork with its skin on like crispy pata, lechon kawali and chicharon, this dish is no different as it uses the same concept of deep frying. These dishes might look the same but there are some subtle difference between them and usually it is the part of the meat used and the sauce that comes with it. Crispy pata uses pork leg and vinegar as a dip, chicharon uses pork skin and vinegar dip as well, lechon kawali uses pork belly cut into bite size pieces and it comes with a sweet liver gravy and bagnet uses pork belly which is usually served as a whole with a bagoong monamon (fermented anchovies) dip. These subtle differences not just exist in this dish but with other Filipino dishes as well due to the fact that the whole country is divided into 1704 islands definitely each areas will have evolved their own unique cuisines. A simple dish from the wonderful province of Vigan, it barely have any ingredients at all but certainly loved by many. Sinampalukang Manok is a sour soup dish composed of chicken , vegetables, and tamarind leaves. This chicken soup recipe is similar to Sinigang. The only difference is the use of tamarind leaves. Rellenong bangus or Stuffed Milkfish is a very special Filipino dish because of the amount of work involved in cooking. Cooking process itself involves several processes, preparing the vegetables and fish. Removing the fish meat leaving the fish skin intact, steaming, de-boning, flaking, marinating, stuffing and frying. Embutido is a generic term for sausages found in Spain, Portugal, the Philippines, and Central and South America (including Brazil). It generally contains hashed meat, generally pork, seasoned with aromatic herbs or spices (black pepper, red pepper, paprika, garlic, rosemary, thyme, cloves, ginger, nutmeg, or others) that is served wrapped in the skin of the pig's intestines.[citation needed] Mass-produced sausages of these types are often wrapped in a type of artificial, sometimes edible, skin. Although the Filipino longaniza is roughly equivalent to the traditional embutido, there is another Filipino dish that shares the same name, but is better described as a kind of steamed meatloaf and lacks a casing. In the Philippines, flan is known as leche flan (the local term for the originally Spanish flan de leche, literally "milk flan"), which is a heavier version of the Spanish flan made with condensed milk and more egg yolks. Leche flan is usually steamed over an open flame or stove top, although rarely it can also be seen baked. Leche flan is a staple in celebratory feasts. A heavier version of leche flan, tocino del cielo, is similar, but has significantly more egg yolks and sugar. Kare-kare is a Philippine stew. It is made from peanut sauce with a variety of vegetables, stewed oxtail, beef, and occasionally offal or tripe. Meat variants may include goat meat or (rarely) chicken. It is often eaten with bagoong (shrimp paste), sometimes spiced with chili, and sprinkled with calamansi juice. Traditionally, any Filipino fiesta (particularly in Pampanga region) is not complete without kare-kare. In some Filipino-American versions of the dish, oxtail is exclusively used as the meat. |