A meal to die for Chicken Supreme ala Dr. Jose Rizal: 21st Edition Lasang Pinoy Food Blogging Event

One of the most fascinating part of Dr. Jose Rizal's short live life was during his exile in Dapitan. Far from the political limelight he lived an ordinary but a meaningful life. Quoting from his letter to Ferdinand Blumentritt describing how simple it was:

"I shall tell you how we lived here. I have three houses - one square, another hexagonal, and the third octagonal. All these houses are made of bamboo, wood, and nipa. I live in the square house, together with my mother, my sister, Trinidad, and my nephew. In the octagonal house live some young boys who are my pupils. The hexagonal house is my barn where I keep my chickens...."

The life he shared with the last woman of his life Josephine Bracken in Dapitan was also worth noting though most often been discretely discussed. How he praised her for being an ideal and loving housewife. In his letter for her sister he quoted:

"She cooks, washes, takes care of the chickens and the house. In the absence of miki for making pancit, she made some long macaroni noodles out of flour and eggs, which serves the purpose. If you could send me a little angkak, I should be grateful to you, for she makes bagoong. She makes also chili miso, but it seems to me that what we have will last for 10 years....."

And if I were to rewrite a part of our Philippine history for this food blogging event, Dr. Jose Rizal at the eve of his deportation to Manila (for his trial) improvised this last romantic tete a tete dinner for her wife.



A dinner of Chicken Supreme a la Dr. Jose Rizal calls for: A young native chicken marinated in herbes and roasted to perfection inside a palayok. And for the white sauce his ingenuity calls for sauteing young onions on chicken drip and deglacing it afterwards with half a cup of lambanog and thickening it with 5 spoonful of coconut cream. The chicken is then served over a bed of pan-fried mushrooms, accompanied by carrots and Josephine Bracken's homemade fresh pasta.


And for the dessert a simple but mouthwatering "pugon" baked sublime chocolate tart done with beaten eggs, freshly grinded bitter sweet cacao and coconut cream over a crumbly pastry tart with a hint of pili nuts and melting caramel of panotsa inside.

As I put it, only a Dr. Jose Rizal could pull a romantic dinner like this. Bon Appetit!

Heroes!!!!!

I've heard that for this 21st edition of Lasang Pinoy Food Blogging event the theme will revolve around philippine heroes and heroines. This edition calls for choosing a hero and imagining for him what food will he or she cook before engaging in a battle or writing a novel. This 21st edition food blogging event is entitled: Cooking for heroes.

Sinful Apple, Muesli cake of caramelised apple-pastis

So the popping question is what do i do with 5 kilos of free apple (remember i collected them on the road in Massif Central with my mother in-law)? Considering that my husband is not really an apple person (neither me). I just couldn't make a simple compote with them and tarte tatin is too simple for him... So i concocted this recipe inspired with a oatmeal cake recipe i read in an inflight magazine when we went to New york. Luckily I discovered that I have a box of muesli cereals that's near it's expiration. I thought it would be a perfect ingredient to go with my cake. The result is an amazing delicious cake. It's a bit crunchy outside and creamy inside. The caramelized apple blended well too with the pastis liquor that I used (it is basically a liquor popular in Marseille made of anis and reglisse).

Ingredients: 125 g of butter
110 g of brown sugar
150 g of flour
60 g of muesli cereals with dried fruits
1 egg
1 tbsp of baking powder
1 tsp of cinnamon
2 tsps of pastis
25 g of butter
6 apples

Peel and slice the apples (remove the middle part). On a bowl marinate the apple with pastis and cinnamon powder for thirty minutes. Caramelise them on a pan with 25 g of butter and set them aside. Beat the egg and mix the sugar. Add into the mixutre the dry ingredients; flour, bakign powder and muesli cereals. Melt the butter and add into the mixture. Grease a baking pan and put half of the cake mixture , and layer them after wards with the caramelised apples. Cover it with the rest of the cake mixture. Cook at 370 F for 20-25 minutes on a pre-heated oven.

For my french readers, you can find the french version of this cake recipe here:
http://www.lesfoodies.com/hilda/recette/gateau-au-muesli-et-pommes-caramelisees-au-pastis

How about, duo of choco mousse and creme of chestnut for dessert ?

Last week we were invited to attend my husband's cousin's wedding in the massif central (it's about 600 kilometers or 6 hours drive without stopover). Since it is a long drive (with a baby on board) we opted to do a carpooling with my in-laws and they all took turns in driving. We did a stop over in St. Etienne as it is more practical to cut the long drive. As It is my first time to see these region of France were the dormant volcanoes demeure (popularized by the bottled mineral water Volvic) I was so amazed the beauty of this region totally different from the Cote d'Azur where we live.

The view was splendid as we enter the small roads we thought leads to wilderness of immense forest of chestnuts, apples, almonds and giant ferns . The architecture of houses in this region was also different from the brick tuiles of Provence. Nonetheless, what was really memorable for me was the little stopover we did to gather all the fallen chestnuts, hazelnuts, apples and walnuts on the road. We went back home with about 5 kilos of apples and 4 kilos of chesnuts and a kilo of walnuts. And so for our dessert last night I concocted this dessert of crushed oreo cookies topped with layers of choco mousse and creme of chesnut.

Ingredients: 1 cup of crushed oreo biscuits, 25 g of melted butter,5 tbsp of creme of chestnut, 4 egg yolks, 3 tbsp of sugar, 20 cl of fresh cream, gelatine powder, 65 g of melted black chocolate

Combine the crushed biscuits with the melted butter and put at the bottom of wine glasses (any time of glass or ramequin will do). Beat the eggyolks, sugar until it becomes creamy white. Warm up the fresh cream and mix slowly while beating to the mixture of eggyolks. Warm up in the casserole the new mixture and add up the gelatine powder. Divide this mixture into two: one for the creme of chestnut and the other for the melted chocolate. Put these mixtures alternately in the glasses and chilled for 4 hours. You can decorate it with cream chantilly and grated chocolate on the top.

For my french readers, you can find the french version of this verrine recipe here:

http://www.lesfoodies.com/hilda/recette/duo-cremes-chocolat-et-marron

Ratatouille on the plate: me, my hubby on a lazy Sunday night

On Sunday night like this, my fridge is often exhausted from a week's culinary experimentation. Preparing a decent dinner always ends up to be the "mix and match" of what's rest and what needs to be eaten before their expiration date. Sometimes the menu ends up to be terriffic and delicious but most of the time it is such a disaster we needed a very good dessert to wash our palate.

And in order to avoid such misadventures I made a strategy of cooking dishes in bulk and freezing them for emergency cases like tonight (fridge and energy level both zero). So searching in my freezer I found the ratatouille that I made 2 weeks ago. Lucky me! I decided I will serve this over a hot pasta and grated emmental cheese.

Well the secret of making and preparing the authentic ratatouille according to my husband's grandmother (who is an authentic Provencal lass) is in using the right amount of "herbes de provences" (basically thymes and rosemary) and virgin olive oil. Of all the French Provencal dishes this is one of my favorite:simply because it is easy to make, it blends with any other dishes easily and most of all this was the dish served by my husband on our first romantic dinner, a defrozen ratatouille.

Ingredients: 2 big eggplants, 2 medium sized zucchini, 1 big onion, 3 gloves of garlic, 5 big red tomatoes, 1 red bell pepper, 1 green pepper, some black and green olives, herbes de provence, olive oil, salt and pepper

Cut in cubes the eggplants, zucchini, onion and peppers. Fry them on the pan with olive oil until golden brown. Put all the fried vegetables in a casserole and topped it with cubed tomatoes and herbes de provence, cover and simmer over low heat for about an hour. Stir and add the olives and simmer for another hour. Season and add more olive oil if necessary. Bon Appetit!

My Best Recipe Ever!!!!

Welcome to Dhanggit's Kitchen!! A kitchen corner where I will share my culinary adventures and mis-adventures. And as for my first recipe, I would like to share with you my best recipe ever:

Ingredients:
1 romantic evening
9 months of love and care
12 hours of labor
15 minutes of pushing
and
4 minutes before the first cry