So Much Food, So Little Time

I just returned from a whirlwind trip back to Asia. Flew to Singapore, but the main purpose was to make it to Manila to celebrate my grandmother's 96th birthday (and see her since she was unable to travel for our wedding in June). I was gone for 8 days, but taking travel time into account and being home in Singapore for a full day on each end of my trip, I had less than 4 days in the Philippines. My family knows how to pack in a lot of food into a short period though, much of which is documented below.

My mom and I arrived in Manila in the early afternoon on Friday and after checking into our hotel we headed straight over to the nearest Via Mare branch for merienda (afternoon snack).

A tangy salad with greens, tomatoes, red onion, crispy pork, and a salty bagoong (translated as shrimp paste) dressing. The salad makes up with flavor what it may lack in healthiness.

Pancit Luglug (round rice noodle smothered with a thick shrimp sauce with pieces of squid, chicharon, and hard boiled egg)

My favorite part of this meal - hot corned beef (left) and queso puti/white cheese (right) pandesal sandwiches

Got to have your condiments - this one is patis (fermented fish sauce) and kalamansi

A couple hours later we met up with friends for dinner at a new homestyle Filipino food restaurant

Ensalada Talong - eggplant salad. It's served as shown above for you to personally mix to your liking (below). Items in this version of the salad included salty duck eggs, red onion, tomatoes, green (unripe) mango, okra, eggplant, and bagoong.

Soft tofu with a shrimp and chili sauce. A bit of a Filipino-Chinese fusion dish (of which there are many)

A variation on the typical pork adobo. This one is made to have a crispy outer skin and served with roasted garlic.

Back: Eggplant and ground beef omelet
Front: rilled boneless bangus (milk fish) belly

We accompanied our meal with two types of rice. Jasmine rice topped with dried salted fish (above) and fried garlic rice (below)

Condiments at this meal: bagoong and vinegar

On Saturday morning we drove to Tagatay, a highlands region about an hour and a half outside Manila, to spend the weekend with my grandmother and other immediate relatives. First order of business: lunch

The lunch spread (there were six eaters)

Another version of the ensalada talong (no okra in this one, but I liked that the tomatoes were shredded - made mixing it all up easier)

sinigang (traditional Filipino soup with a characteristic sour taste)

Sizzling pork sisig (dish made with head meat and liver flavored with kalamansi and chilis). It's good despite the ingredients...both Owen and I will vouch for it

BBQ squid

A whole array of condiments
Liquids on the left: patis, vinegar, soy sauce
Right: crushed garlic, ginger, chilis, and red onion

The majority of our meals in Tagatay were home-cooked at my uncle's home. This is the best type of Filipino food, especially when the produce comes from your own garden and chicken coop.

How we spent most of the day - lounging and eating (I think this photo was taken sometime between breakfast and lunch)

Chicken coop underneath the house

A mature rooster that I watched be slaughtered for a future meal a few minutes after taking this photo.

An evening meal (lettuce in the salad from a neighbor's garden; tomatoes from my uncle's; the chicken was not their own though)

Freshly harvested and steamed corn

The source of the corn

Other items ready to be harvested in their garden:

long beans


pineapple

spring onion

Lunch on our final day - mainly made up of leftovers from previous meals, with the addition of fresh tilapia steamed in banana leaves (below)

Besides main courses, we ate a lot of snacks and dessert. No visit to the Philippines is complete without this activity.

A sampling of snacks: including sampalok (tamarind candy); calamansi and honey juice, chicharron (pork rinds); dilis (dried anchovies)

so many options...

Buko (young coconut) shake on the left, with Buko juice on the right

Left: Green mango shake
Right: Ripe mango shake

Ube (purple yam) pies

Mango puree and sago (tapioca pearls)

Ube-macapuno (a type of coconut) cake


Queso de bola cheesecake

The reason for my visit - my grandmother is looking good for 96

The Long Road Home

As we mentioned three posts ago, we had a very long trip home (Hangzhou-Shanghai-Vancouver-San Francisco-Charlotte-Nashville-Huntsville-14 hour drive-Rochester). Below are a few of the things we ate on the way:

1) June 6: Shanghai

Our last real Chinese meal.

Braised Eggplant (with the same topping that is found on ganbian siji dou)

Tender fatty pork with radish shavings on top

Our final dish of niangao...oh how we will miss you

2) Taking advantage of free food at the airport
One of the perks of having done a lot international travel for work is racking up enough mileage points to gain entrance to the Star Alliance airport lounges, regardless of what class you're flying. We had lots of layovers on this trip home...and learned that lounges in airports abroad serve better food than ones in US domestic terminals.

Not a bad spread by Shanghai Airlines

3) June 7: San Francisco - reuniting with friends over a good example of good ol' American-style Italian food

The menu at Emmy's Spaghetti Shack

Heirloom tomato, fresh peach, and mozzarella salad

spaghetti and meatballs

4) June 9: Huntsville to Rochester

No, we did not eat the Fritz. Just wanted to upload this photo to show how Fritz got to live the relaxing life while we pulled off a straight 14 hour drive to get him home.

5) Finally back in Rochester


Too tired to make anything fancy or time-consuming, so we threw a bunch of ingredients together (broccoli, chicken, pepperoni, garlic, olive oil, mozzarella, Parmesan) and rolled out some defrosted dough for a simple homemade pizza.