Lechón in La Loma
I grew up in La Loma, an urban residential neighborhood in the city of Manila. My parents, who are both originally from Laguna, a rural province south of Manila, raised my five sisters and me in a tiny...
View ArticleHow to Make Lechón Kawali (Deep Fried Pork Belly)
Roasting a whole suckling pig, lechón, is a huge feat and I’m not even going to try. A simpler variation can be easily done at home. Lechón kawali is pork belly deep fried in a kawali, which is...
View ArticleTrekking Mount Pinatubo and Enjoying Sweet Zambales Mangoes
It was dark out still. Very dark, in fact. It was 3 in the morning and my brothers and I were on our way to Tarlac, a 2-hour-with-no-traffic drive from Manila. I measure road trips back home using...
View ArticleFive Favorite Filipino Street Eats
All this buzz around Saturday’s huge La Cocina San Francisco Street Food Festival is making me crave for street eats I grew up with back home. They aren’t plates of chicken adobo and sisig tacos but...
View ArticleHow to Make Grilled Chicken Inasal
I am torn. I cannot quite figure out why I fancy this piece of grilled chicken so much. Mind you, it isn’t just any grilled chicken. It is chicken inasal [ih-nah-sal], Amy Besa and Romy Dorotan’s...
View ArticleMy First Thanksgiving and How to Make Sweet Potato Casserole
My eyes were too heavy but I couldn’t drift off to sleep. In a few hours, the bus would reach Coalinga and the half-hour stop in the middle of nowhere would surely ruin it. I was on a Greyhound back...
View ArticleV is for Visayas and How to Make Humba (Visayan-Style Pork Adobo)
Vinegar, garlic, bay leaves, salt, and black peppercorns. This is how I cook adobo. I marinate pork, chicken, or a combination of the two in vinegar and spices and let the flavors steep overnight. Then...
View ArticleHow to Make Pork Ribs Nilaga
A montage of old, black and white photographs of immigrant families arriving on Ellis Island is playing on the screen. I’m sitting in the Paramount Theater in downtown Oakland on a Wednesday morning in...
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