I started writing when I was 8. My mom got me a journal where I could rant (prob so I won't be an annoying brat). I stopped writing for 8 years until the pen and then later on the keyboard called on me again. I blog because I like writing and that's just about it. Hope you get inspired though... Bite the apple!
I accidentally* bought a curry plant. It's a tree now and I thought I'd put it to good use. One of the dishes we miss most from our stay in Singapore is salted egg chicken. We usually buy it at a stall in Food Republic (Vivo City). I wonder if the stall is still there.
I found some recipes and made it with Miggy. We decided to bake the chicken instead of deep frying it. We don't like oily food, so thought that would help. It turned out tasty!
We didn't make it too spicy. Just add more chili flakes and sili if you want it spicier. Here's how we made it:
Full recipe: https://recipesformyson.blogspot.com/2026/07/recipes-for-my-son-salted-egg-chicken.html
Let me know if you'll try to make it!
*Garden nursery dupped me. I was aiming to buy lemongrass!
My sewing time has been eroded by gardening activities. By the time I'm ready to sew I'm too tired, haha.
It happened again yesterday since I had to rescue a plant and I had thawed some chicken to cook. I didn't want to disappoint Miggy, so I suspended sewing again.
Anyway, we ended up baking chicken and then cooked a portion of it as salted egg chicken and a smaller portion into buffalo chicken.
We got to use some produce from our garden. Fresh curry leaves and sili were picked from the garden. I'm happy we're able to do that with what we have in our garden.
One of our all-time favorites is baking porkchop with whatever barbecue sauce we find from the grocery. We recently found a honey mustard BBQ sauce variant from SNR and had to try it. Making this is so easy, just marinate the meat with salt, black pepper, calamansi and the BBQ sauce for 30 minutes, then bake it. We ate this together with the homemade atsara. It was so good!
While I was watering the plants, the boys were busy making Jaybucks pizza! It's a simple pizza made with Del Monte pizza sauce, cheese, Purefoods ham and ready made crust. Easy peasy to make.
It's always a treat to have homemade pizza. It's filling and not too heavy for the tummy. One of these days we'll try to make it from scratch (when it's not too hot!).
Another cool day today since it rained. This meant the kitchen was more welcoming than usual for me. I finally got to make some Mac and cheese. This time I used 4 cheeses, gyuyere, mozzarella, cheddar and parmesan.
I just followed the recipe I used for homemade mac and cheese. We got the gyuyere cheese from a shop in Molito and it was so good (but crazy expensive for a small piece!). Anyway, it's just for us, so we can indulge once in a while. Here's the recipe I used.
https://youtu.be/Y1Mgsjfuzfk?si=uZPGP7zhe0T3pNQR
I'm also planning to make some potato salad in the next few days weather permitting!). Good thing it rained because that meant I could use my gardening energy to cook.
We've been observing "no meat on Fridays" since the start of Lent. I'm technically exempted, but I still try to follow it since it's better for me to avoid meat.
Sweetie got a new gadget to make maki, so I got the ingredients for him. After almost two hours, Sweetie managed to make 4 rolls (32 pieces) of salmon maki.
It was delicious and decidedly filling since we used malagkit rice (couldn't find Japanese rice). It's been a few hours since dinner and I still couldn't move, haha.
Since the past few days has been cooler and not horridly warm, I decided to do some cooking.
I marinated some beef last night and Miggy cooked it today.
The recipe I used is just like Jollibee's beef tapa. Its really best to marinate it overnight for beat results. Miggy has perfected cooking it and I just do the marinade. Here's the recipe -
I think I've just sorted the last box of books. I was so surprised to find my first cookbook!
I recall going through it, but I don't remember cooking anything based on the recipes from the book. I learned how to bake first and it was only decades later before I learned how to cook, haha.
Ate taught me how to bake peanut butter cookies and I watched her bake apple pie. I didn't learn how to cook because I was traumatized when our stove malfunctioned. It was like a fire breathing dragon and that was so scary for me.
I still bake peanut butter cookies and here's how I make it -
https://youtu.be/BPtt63o4CH4?si=WGqIGeJY6wlb5mtD
I eventually learned how to cook (to survive!). Nowadays, Miggy cooks more than me. I've been documenting our favorite home made dishes on "Recipes for My Son". It helps us whenever there's something we want to cook again.
I had a busy day today, but I allotted some energy to cook pink pasta. It's been a few weeks since I last cooked, so thought it would be a good day to make something easy.
It turned out a bit too orange though, haha, I think I used a bigger pack of tomato paste. Still delicious and filling nonetheless.
I did some gardening too. Sweetie reported seeing some caterpillars on the gumamela. I guess the rain washed off the Neem oil I sprayed the other day. I also planted two stems of philodendron cuttings. After that I watered some plants with rice water which will help keep them healthy.
Sweetie helped with sorting today. He took care of the electronics boxes. I'm glad we finally found Daddy's old cameras. I asked him to keep it in a box first. I'll check it out eventually. The treasure I found today are a bunch of sea shells which I think we collected over the years. Some are probably Miggy's when we used to go to Pasacao.
Time to rest now, tomorrow will be another busy day.
I was planning to bake salmon with cream cheese last night. I was pulling out the salmon from the freezer when a ball of ham started to roll down towards my foot! Good thing I caught it! I would have been injured if I didn't. Haha. The fiesta ham reminded me that we had planned to cook it before the salmon.
I don't get to cook as often as I want since the effort largely depends on my energy. There are days I have lots of energy and there are days when I just feel depleted. That's the life of someone who has a bunch of medical conditions. Anyway, preparing the ham was easier than baking the salmon.
The fiesta ham has been in the freezer since early this year. It was still surprisingly available last January and we planned to cook it for CNY. Of course, we forgot about it and just got around to cooking it now. I paired it with (unmeat) chicken macaroni salad. We found a can of veggie chicken at the grocery and thought we'd try it out. Let's just say I had to add more cheese to make my usual macaroni salad tastier (LOL).
We'll have lots of leftovers, so what I cooked is good until today. Yay! I'm happy I was able to cook thrice this week. I made salted egg chicken. I set aside some of the chicken and tried making buffalo wings sauce for it. I'm now stuck with a huge bottle of Tabasco sauce. This means I have to make buffalo wings often (hahaha). Next time I'll probably prepare a kilo of chicken and halve it into salted egg and buffalo wings sauce (I prefer strips over wings though). I have to research what else I could cook with Tabasco sauce.
I miss buying salted egg chicken at the hawker's center in Singapore. I got a curry plant by accident and it's now quite tall, so ai thought I could easily make some salted egg chicken.
It took us two hours, haha. I made the sauce and prepared the chicken. Miggy fried the chicken and then we both coated the chicken with the sauce. It turned out well. I'll post the video how we made it soon.
Aside from cooking, I checked the plants I re-potted. I was also happy to see how much the tea tree grew since I transplanted it six months ago. It has grown new branches and I'm thinking how best to shape it.
The plants I re-potted are doing well. I didn't water them since they are succulents. I'll check in a day or two if the soil is dry.
TBH, we always make ready to cook mac and cheese. I never tried making it with real cheese. A friend brought several pieces of cheese. Another friend explained what they were good for. One was gyuyere cheese which I learned was good for pasta.
I watched a couple of videos to learn how to make mac and cheese. I chose to adapt Chef Tatung's Mac and cheese recipe. He used regular boxed cheese and mentioned you can add other cheeses. I used the food processor to grate the gyuyere cheese and found some leftover mozzarella cheese in the fridge.
It was fairly easy to make and my boys absolutely loved it. Miggy said it tasted like mac and cheese from a restaurant we ate in once. I was so used to regular boxed mac and cheese and Kenny Rogers mac and cheese, it never occurred to me to try making it with real cheese. It mega leveled-up! Now I don't think I'll buy boxed mac and cheese anymore, LOL.
Here's how we made it at home:
Full recipe at: https://recipesformyson.blogspot.com/2024/09/recipes-for-my-son-mac-and-cheese-with.html
"I don't know how I'm going to stop," is what Sweetie said when we started eating the chorizo pasta for lunch. My answer to him was, "Me too!"
I've been making chorizo pasta using Dayrit's chorizo Macau for a few years now. I just randomly tried making it when we were still living in the condo. I bought some chorizo from Dayrit's and had no idea what to do with it. There were 3 huge sausages and you can only have so much if you fry it, haha. So I got curious and looked up pasta recipes. Randomly mixed up the ingredients and came up with my version of chorizo pasta.
I originally used Molinera crushed tomatoes and that's what I've been using ever since. We recently discovered La Fiammante cherry tomatoes, so I thought maybe I would try using cherry tomatoes instead of the usual crushed tomatoes. Oh my, it turned out much, much better!
And that's how Sweetie and I finished the whole batch of chorizo pasta in two meals. It usually stretches to three to four meals, but this time we finished it in two meals, haha. It's a very simple dish to make, here's how I made it:
I'm delayed at everything, including making baked sushi at home! I've been meaning to make baked sushi since the lockdown! We've just been ordering via Grab, but we always end up bitin, plus it's expensive! I always have trouble also since most baked sushi being sold has kani in it. My allergies get triggered, so I thought it's time we learn to make it at home.
I watched several videos. For this recipe I combined Chef RV and Panlasang Pinoy's way of making baked sushi. I couldn't find Kikkoman when we made it, so I used Lee Kum Kee first draw soy sauce. I discovered this soy sauce when we ordered North Park once. They give out free Lee Kum Kee soy sauce, so I thought I'd try it out. I think I'm hooked because it's very smooth. I'll try it on adobo next time.
Anyway, baked to the baked sushi. I got some smoked salmon from Landers and thought I'd use the whole thing for the baked sushi. It was a lot and that meant bottomless baked sushi for us! What we forgot though was to get more nori packets! Doing grocery shopping during Christmas is hard!
Yes, we finished both pans, hahaha.
So, to remind us how to make it, I filmed it! Here's how we made it (first time!) -
Next time, we'll try tuna baked sushi. I'm excited!
How I wish Purefoods can make their fiesta ham available all year. It's one of our favorite dishes especially during Christmas. We always had it for noche buena. I learned to eat macaroni salad because of pineapple glazed ham. It matches perfectly!
I learned how to magically turned the ball of ham into a sweet one through Mom. She told me to just add 1/4 cup of brown sugar. Of course, I had to figure out what she meant. My Mom doesn't cook, but she knows all the processes and just directs whoever is cooking, hehe.
I experiment every year on what to do with the ham. What's important for us though is to have a lot of sauce. My boys like adding some of the sauce to their rice whenever we have this. This year I added two cans of pineapple juice (the one you drink) and a can of pineapple chunks plus brown sugar to the ham. The ham drowned when it was plated. So just use 1 can of pineapple juice. It turned out alright for us though since we still had extra sauce until we finished the whole ball of ham.
You can also add cloves. Just add it sparingly to the ham while cooking or baking. It adds flavor. We couldn't find any cloves, so we'll just do that next year. Oh, and you can also opt to bake it instead of simmering it in a pot. I find it easier to simmer since baking takes sooo long, haha. Purefoods also now pre-slices the ham, so it's much easier to serve. It was hard to slice in the past when it was one whole ball.
Plated by Sweetie :)
I'm keeping one more fiesta ham for Valentine's day, haha. That or maybe for the Lunar New Year. Or maybe a random weekend when we're off our meal plan, LOL. I'm actually thinking of getting one more since I could keep it in the freezer for a special occasion. I'll get one if it's still available in the grocery, hehe.
I was looking through "Recipes for My Son" and realized I never shared how I cook my beef and mushroom with black olives spaghetti recipe. I never had the chance to film it because I've been cooking more pink pasta. I also shifted to cooking tuna pasta (using the same recipe) than beef since it's just Sweetie and I who usually eats red pasta.
Anyway, since it was Christmas I thought it would be nice to make my first spaghetti recipe. It was my seatmate, Maica, who taught me how to make it. I had to wing the measurements since she didn't give me any. I'm not ouido when it comes to cooking (that's Daddy), so it was hard at first. I eventually found the right mixture and don't really measure anymore when I cook this recipe.
Well, those who have tried it said it's really good, so I thought it would be useful to share the recipe. It's not sweet pasta and I honestly don't know how to cook Filipino spaghetti (that's Kuya's expertise). Anyway, here's how I make my spaghetti -
For ingredients and more info, visit: https://recipesformyson.blogspot.com/2023/12/recipes-for-my-son-moms-special-beef.html
I really like having more sauce than noodles whenever I make spaghetti :)
I cook a lot of pasta dishes. Most are far from what is served in restos. My boys and friends say they like my pasta dishes. What piqued my interest in learning a few more pasta dishes is Miggy. He doesn't like red pasta. He prefers white or pink pasta. So the past few months I've been experimenting on pink pasta recipes.
When I found out pasta al telefono uses tomato and cream I've been trying to find the best way to prepare it like how restos do. I finally found the secret to resto-style pasta. We randomly bought some canned tomato from a gourmet shop. Sweetie pointed out to me when I cooked pasta al telefono last week that I should use the cans we bought.
Next time I'll use penne pasta
I honestly had no idea that it would turn out well. A friend pointed out to me that I could use another brand. The brand though was 10x more expensive than the canned tomatoes I used. Since my boys liked the one I used, I think I'm going to stick to it (will try the expensive one if I'm able to justify buying it hahaha).
So, what's the secret? Well, it's in our latest video on the "Recipes for My Son" channel. You can watch it here:
I wrote down the recipe here: https://recipesformyson.blogspot.com/2023/11/the-secret-to-resto-style-pasta-al.html
I think I'm gonna buy more of those canned tomatoes, hahaha.
When we were stuck in Singapore during the pandemic, one of the things we craved for was Maya pancakes! Tried other imported mixes, but only really liked the one by Maya. It's what I grew up with and we had it for breakfast often at home.
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Researched and found this recipe. Unfortunately, I don't remember anymore if I found it online or in one of my recipe books. If I like something, I usually write it down with my adjustments on an index card. Then I mark it with stars so I remember it's the recipe I should re-use. Here's how we make it at home -
The secret to cooking it nicely? I let Sweetie take over the cooking part, haha. One thing I'd like to try is to use healthier ingredients. Maybe wheat? Or I saw some prepare them with banana. We'll get there, in time.
More info and complete recipe at https://recipesformyson.blogspot.com/2023/10/recipes-for-my-son-homemade-pancakes.html
I'm so glad Shirni taught me how to cook gyoza. I tried making it on my own, but her mixture is so much better so I gave up making my own. I just normally buy ready to cook from the supermarket. It tastes so much better than what I make. Maybe someday I'll try making it from scratch again, haha.
Anyway, we got some ready to cook chicken gyoza made by Tokyo Tokyo. We just chanced upon it at the grocery and thought we'd try it. Buying ready to cook stuff is a hit and miss, but we were willing to try since it's tedious to make gyoza from scratch.
The package didn't come with instructions and I couldn't find any online. I decided to use the technique Shirni taught me many years ago when we lived in Singapore. Shirni is a Malaysian friend and she makes the most amazing gyoza (and gyoza sauce) on earth. She taught me how to cook and how to make the mixture. I never managed to get the mixture correctly, so I just wait whenever she sends me a tupperware of prepared meat. It will probably take a long time before I could sample her gyoza again, so have to make do for now with ready to cook ones available in the supermarket.
Since I couldn't find any instructions on how to cook the Tokyo Tokyo pack, I decided to just use Shirni's technique. I asked Miggy to help document it since it might be useful for others who want to try. I don't remember if we were taught how to make dumplings in foods class and Daddy only made siomai at home. Gyoza isn't really a staple in our culture, so thought this video would be useful. Here ya go :)
The Tokyo Tokyo chicken gyoza was pretty tasty. We only realized later on that we should have halved the package. We finished all 24 pieces for dinner and we felt so full even after bedtime (hahaha). Also, probably need to find how to prepare the sauce. We just used black vinegar. Recos for other ready to cook gyoza is welcome!
