Filipina Soul

Are you familiar with the story of the “stone soup”? As the story goes, a traveler starts a pot of soup using just water and a stone. Villagers add to the pot whatever they have on hand. A delicious and nourishing pot of soup is the end result.

While nilaga (literally: “boiled”) doesn’t have a single stone in it, except perhaps by accident, it is also easily made with ingredients that are on hand. It’s practically a no-fail soup. The amounts of all the ingredients can be modified to taste and availability.

4 Comments

I was organizing my pantry today, when I came across a tub of rice flour. What to do with it? Apparently, not a lot. Unlike sweet rice flour, there doesn’t seem to be many recipes that use rice flour. The only one I can find in The Philippine Cookbook (by Reynaldo Alejandro) is Putong Puti (Rice Muffins). I had most of the ingredients on hand, so I figured why not? I was up for a bit of a cooking adventure.
   

15 Comments

My son is allergic to soy, so I have held off on using soy sauce for cooking. The other day, I was lamenting the fact that I miss adobo and that it might be a while before I can make it again. So I looked for a soy-free adobo dish that will satisfy my cravings.
I found this recipe for Filipino Adobo with Coconut Milk on Chowhound. This rather blurs the definition of adobo for me. There is no soy sauce, or even a substitute other than salt. It’s white, instead of dark. But there is vinegar in it. And, regardless …read more

5 Comments