Food

Another approach to the noble tilapia

| Khursten Santos

I’ve always been fond of Tilapia. It’s not exactly the poor man’s fish but it is a versatile fish for dishes.

You can fry it crisp, grill it, cook it in coconut milk, and in this case, steam it.

Steaming tilapia was something we do in case we get tired of eating our fish fried. It is a healthier alternative and the flavor of the fish is heightened by the ingredients in it. I for one love cooking it like this because it’s nice to suck the juices out of the tilapia head. And the beans add a bit of biting saltiness that matches quite well with the rice. More to that, prep time and cooking time takes less than 20 minutes. Beat that Rachel Ray! >w<)v

Anyway, on to the recipe!
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Re-make of Korean Beef Stew

| Khursten Santos


Hee hee hee!! I think the curiosity for cooking Korean Beef Stew at home was when a friend and I were driving home on a hungry night and I found myself drooling over the thought of eating a nice warm broth of Korean Beef Stew.

Now, I got one of these cookbooks compiled by Good Housekeeping and saw a recipe for Korean Beef Stew. I’m never a beef buyer because I can never seem to cook it right. I go as far as ground beef and sirloin or breakfast strips. More than that… nu. But today, the flavor of spicy broth on a sweltering afternoon compelled to get some beef shanks and cook at a nice slow pace while I read some Kundera.

See, there was this fast food stall in Landmark named Kimchi

Not exactly a ‘Clammy’ Afternoon

| Khursten Santos

When I was a kid, I used to hate our local clam, halaan, WITH A PASSION. I can never understand its taste. It’s slightly tart, gingery, salty, sometimes grainy (especially if it wasn’t cleaned well) and gummy. My folks always prepared it the same way, boiling it in hot water with some ginger. UGH! It was such a dreadful fare that I often excused myself from the table and went back to bed. No bland clams please, kthx.

It wasn’t until, again, one of my aunts who worked in Italy came home and showed me how to enjoy these clams with pasta. Known to them as Pasta con Vongole, this sweet yet briny dish completely changed my opinion of halaan/vongole forever.

Last weekend’s trip to the market brought me back to my aunt’s pasta. A little inspired by the freshness of clams, I thought I’d give it a shot in cooking one of my favorite pasta dishes. This is a very simple and easy dish, stripping the flavors to its barest essentials.

What I love about Pasta con Vongole is it’s a dish that doesn’t overcook the seafood nor do the other flavors compete with the taste of the clams. In fact, if your seafood is fresh, this is one of the best dishes to taste the freshness of the clams. If you can get your clams fresh, then this is the perfect dish for it!

One of the simplest and tastiest pasta dishes I’ve come across

In the Mood for Crabs

| Khursten Santos

Happy New Year, folks! I hope you guys had a great new year. Mine was relatively quiet, matched with a glass of champagne.

Anyway, I’m here to share with you one of the things that I love about the year that has passed, Emerald Garden’s Sesame crabs. The crabs was introduced to me by a friend a couple of years back and I’ve been longing to eat it ever since.

The crab is cooked simply, seasoned only with some salt and sesame oil. What I love about it is how the shell has this lingering saltiness that permeates to the flesh inside. I love how even my fingers taste like the crab when I give it a lick. My favorite part is the crab fat under the shell. It’s fried to a crisp and it’s strangely light to taste buds. So far, I haven’t felt my heart wrenching after eating the crab.

It’s such an amazing crab that I long to eat it every time I’m in Emerald Garden. It’s a little costly, costing around 800/crab, but the crab is big enough to feed a group of 4.

Next time you pop by Emerald Garden along Roxas Boulevard, make sure to order some Sesame Crabs!

Restaurant Tip

Emerald Garden
1170 Roxas Boulevard, Manila.
Just across the US Embassy.

7100 tastes at Bistro Filipino

| Khursten Santos

Lapulapu and prawns in coco-lambanog sauce

This season’s a great time to experiment with different kinds of cuisine, but a recent experience in Bistro Filipino taught me that if you have 7100 islands to get different flavors to get from, wouldn’t it be best to experiment with our local cuisine?

At Bistro Filipino, chefs Rolando Laudico, Myrna Segismundo, and Jill Sandique showed us the 7100 different flavors that we can taste.

See the 7100 flavors the chefs have prepared for us!

Pesto experiments!

| Khursten Santos

My experiments with pesto started when an aunt from Italy came home and started to make her pesto. The first thing she asked my mom was to buy some fresh basil, which 15 years ago was completely unheard of in our islands apart from its dried counterpart. So she decided to create a different kind of pesto, pounding a large bunch of Italian parsley (kinchay) along with some garlic. There were no pine nuts easily available nor did we have Parmesan cheese back then. With piping hot pasta, she tossed her green mashed concoction and called it pesto. It was one of the best things I’ve ever tasted.

For years, I really didn’t give myself a shot in making a batch of pesto like my aunt did. But a really expensive bottle of pesto compelled me to find a cheaper and probably better alternative to the ones bought from the groceries.

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A Hip Cordillera Evening at Mario’s

| Khursten Santos

Mario's Menu

Last Saturday, I was invited by Mr. Fil Benitez and Kaoko to a dinner at Mario’s Tomas Morato. I’d be honest that I know little about Mario’s. I think we’ve eaten once or twice at their Makati branch and when that was gone, so was our Mario’s experience. So last weekend’s expedition (for us southerners, going up north is an expedition), was the perfect time to reconnect not only with the food but the institution that is Mario’s.

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