Caldo de Res

Ingredients: 2 servings

• 8 oz. Beef Shank or Chuck
• 2 red skin potatoes
• 1 carrot, peeled, whole
• 1 onion, whole
• 1 qt. water, cold
• 1 corn on the cob, 1-inch slices
• ¼ t. thyme
• 1 bay leaf
• ½ c. parsley sprig
• ¼ c. green cabbage, 1” dice
• ¼ c. zucchini Squash -- 1" cubes
• ½ T. Lime Juice
• TT. Salt and Pepper
• 1 T. cilantro chopped
• Sachet d'epice

Procedure:

1. Wash and rinse beef and all whole vegetables. Place in a large pot with cold water. Add sachet d'epice. Add the corn and cabbage, salt and pepper

2. Bring to a simmer over low heat, simmer until all ingredients are cooked and tender.

3. As ingredients become tender, remove them from the pot, place them on a half sheet pan and let them cool.

4. After all ingredients have been removed, strain the beef stock, season and reduce until very flavorful.

5. Remove fat and cartilage from beef, dice the meat in to 1/2" cubes and reserve.

6. Cut all vegetables in to 1" cubes and reserve.

7. Place cubed zucchini squash, all reserved vegetables and meat, back into the stock, bring to a simmer. Taste adjust seasoning if necessary.

8. Add lime juice and cilantro just before serving.

Apple and Beef Stew

Whenever I make slow roast beef, apple is always a special ingredient. The sweetness of apple makes wonder to any dish. So, when I started cooking stew, apple was one of the main ingredients. Apple and Beef stew is a comfort food for my family. It is so easy to make and always a hit with my picky husband and kids.

Ingredients:

• 1 lbs. beef chuck, dice
• 1 red apple, peeled, seeded, dice
• 1 ½ c. potato, peeled, dice
• 1 c. carrot, peeled, dice
• 1 bell pepper, seeded, dice
• ½ c. canned garbanzos
• 2 T. tomato paste
• 1 can Progresso Vegetable Classic Hearty Tomato Soup
• 1 T. lemon juice
• 2 bay leaves
• 2 sprigs fresh thyme
• 1 T. fresh parsley chopped
• Salt and pepper to taste
• ¼ c grated cheddar cheese

Preparation:

1. In a pot or Dutch oven, heat oil. Sauté onion and garlic. Add beef, let brown. 
2. Add the Progresso tomato soup. Let boil. Stirring constantly.
3. Add tomato paste, bay leaves, thyme. Stir, cook, cover and simmer for about 1 ½ hours or until the beef is tender.
4. When the beef is tender. Add the potatoes, carrots, lemon juice, parsley. Let boil. Simmer for another 30 minutes or until all the vegetables are done.
5. When the vegetables are done, add the bell pepper and grated cheese. Season to taste with salt and pepper.
6. Serve hot top with parsley.

Morcon

This recipe is one of my mother's best dish. I grew up watching her cooking food from scratch. Morcon is a meal usually served during special occassion like Christmas.  It is a meat roll stuffed with  hot dogs, carrots, pickles, cheese, and boiled egg and cooked slowly in tomato sauce.


Ingredients:

• 2 lbs beef eye of round or flank steak, ¾ inch thick in one piece
• 1  beef cubes dissolved in 
• 3 cups water or beef stock
• 1 piece lemon
• ½ cup soy sauce
• 1 can (15 oz.) tomato sauce
• 1 piece medium sized carrot, cut into long strips
• 3 pieces hot dogs, cut into 4 long strip
• 2 pieces dill pickle, cut into 4 long strips or 1/4 cup sweet pickle relish
• 3 pieces hard boiled eggs, sliced
• 3 ounces cheddar cheese, cut in strips (about ½ inch thick)
• 1/4 cup cooking oil
• 1/2 cup flour
• salt and pepper to taste

Instructions:

1. Marinate the beef in soy sauce and lemon juice for at least 1 hour.
2. Place the beef in a flat surface and arrange the hot dogs, pickle, carrot, cheese, and egg.
3. Roll the beef enclosing the fillings.
4. Tie with a cooking string to ensure that the meat will not open-up.
5. Dredge the rolled beef into flour to coat. Remove excess flour.
6. In a saucepan, heat cooking oil and brown the surface of the rolled beef quickly. Set aside.
7. Saute onion and garlic in the same saucepan. Add the browned beef, beef stock, tomato sauce,  soy sauce-lemon juice marinade, salt and pepper. Let boil.
8. Simmer until the beef is tender and the sauce thickens (about 2 hours using). Add more water or stock if needed.
9. Add salt and pepper to taste.
10. When done, remove the strings and slice into serving pieces. Pour sauce on top.

Easy Spring Roll Recipe

While the kids are away, I made to kind of spring roll today and they are ready for freezing: chicken vegetable and lumpiang shanghai (meat) spring roll.

Check the recipes here:

Lumpiang Shanghai

Spring Roll ( Lumpiang Gulay) 

Vegetable and Chicken Spring Rolls
How to Wrap Egg Rolls

Easy Meat balls Recipe

Meat balls can be serve alone or with a sauce, or for spaghetti sauce. For easy meatballs, use a food processor to chop and mix all the ingredients. It saves me time from chopping all the vegetables very finely.

Ingredients:

• 500 grms ground beef
• 1 medium size potato –cut into small sizes
• 1/2 small carrot –cut into small sizes
• 1 stalk green onion – cut
• 1/4 cup mushroom
• 2-3 cloves garlic
• Salt and pepper to taste .

Directions: 

1. Throw all the vegetables in the food processor ( potato, carrots, green onion, garlic, mushroom). 
2. In a big bowl, place the burger meat. Pour in the chopped veggies. Mix well. Add 1 tsp salt and pepper or according to taste. 
3. Form into balls and bake at 350 degrees F for 30 minutes.

How to Wrap Egg Rolls

Proper wrapping is important to make a firm and nice egg roll. Too loose egg roll will make the filling fall and the oil will get in.

Beef in Oyster Sauce with Celery

Do you have limited time to cook? Well, if yes, beef in oyster sauce is the solution for your problem. It is quick and easy to prepare. If you don't have a tender cut beef, you can use any cut of beef  just slice thinly as possible. You can serve it for lunch or dinner with any side dish. Being a Filipino, we  serve it with rice but my American husband loves it with mashed potato and white bread.

Lumpiang Shanghai

Lumpiang shanghai or egg roll is basically meatball recipe formed into a log and wrapped. If you know how to make meatballs then you can make the Filipino egg roll too. Lumpiang shanghai or egg-roll filled with meat is one of the famous Filipino dish found in every gatherings. My husband is a big fan of my lumpiang shanghai, he prefers meat over vegetable lumpia.  The recipe is simply a mixture of all the ingredients wrapped in an eggroll (lumpia) wrapper and deep fried. You can use ground pork, chicken, beef or a combination. This is my mother's recipe. She uses jicama /singkamas but it is optional, you can use your favorite vegetables like cabbage, water chestnut or even potato. Lumpiang shanghai is best served with sweet and sour sauce, catsup or vinegar dip.

Beef Pares Recipe

Beef  Pares is one of the favorite dish at the  side-street eateries in the Philippines.It is a  juicy tender stewed beef in sweet brown sauce. I used to cook it the Filipino way but the spices gives my husband a heart burn so I made it a little bit according to his taste and sensitive stomach. There are many ways to cook this dish just like the famous Adobo. Beef pares is serve paired with garlic fried rice and hot soup. Here is my version of Beef Pares recipe.

Best Meatloaf Recipe

Meat Loaf is one of our family's comfort food. It is so easy to prepare and can be eaten with any side dish or as a meatloaf sandwich with the leftovers. My husband loves it with lots of onion but my kids are not so fun of big chunky onion or any herbs, so I make sure to finely chopped all the ingredients and not to put too much. Meatloaf can be make in different ways so don't settle  for only what is written in the recipe. You can add ingredients of your choice too.  Here is one of my quick and easy meatloaf recipe. I made this one, not so complicated by using few ingredients only.

Mexican Meatball Soup

I saw the rice-filled meatballs Mexican soup in one of the television show one day and tried it the following weekends while hubby was home. The soup is so yummy and hubby said it is pretty good. Albondigas or Mexican meatball soup is one of the most popular Mexican soup.

Quick and Easy Cheese Enchiladas

Enchilada is a Mexican cuisine made primarily of a corn tortilla rolled around a filling and covered with a chili pepper sauce. You can fill the Enchiladas with whatever ingredients you like like meat, cheese, vegetables, beans, or even seafood. The corn tortillas must be softened before they are rolled and baked by dipping them in the chili sauce or frying them gently in a little oil.

Taco Salad

Taco Salad is a family favorite comfort food. It is so easy to prepare that anybody will enjoy to munch. I like how easy it is to make on a busy day. All you have to do is cook the ground beef together with the taco seasoning while all the other ingredients comes from the pack and anybody can fix it anyway they want it to.

Slow Cooker Roast Beef

Saturday is always a family day for us. This is the time for me to cook a hearty meal for the whole family, there is nothing better than homemade cooking. It  is cheaper, healthier and taste much better than does serves in the restaurant.

Tips for Safe Grilling

Grilling is one of the chores that my husband loves to do. He do the grilling while I do the marinating. When it is grilling time, he makes sure that the grill is clean by handing it to me for cleaning.  Then he starts to light the charcoal, and let it burn until all coals are white on the surface. The charcoal should be ashy enough before before placing the food on the grill.

How to Order a Subway Sandwich

I am a big fan of Subway Sandwich, whenever me and hubby are on the road without the kids, we either have a Sonic or a Subway to munch with. And because of our cravings for the sandwich, hubby decided to make our own Subway sandwich home. We got all the ingredients from the grocery. I got wheat bread while hubby had white bread. hubby called mine "Tessway Sandwich".

Sauteed Green Beans

Filipinos usually sauteed vegetables with pork or shrimp or a combination of both.I like mine with a lot of ground beef . Vegetarians even cooks green beans or any veggies without any meats and still tastes good .It all depends on how well season the cooking is.

Ingredients
1 lbs green beans, cut in 1 inch long
1/4 to 1/2 cup ground beef
1 onion, chopped
3 cloves garlic,minced
1 tomato, chopped
salt and pepper to taste
cooking oil
1/2 cup water
1 tbsp soy sauce for color (optional)

Instructions

• In a sauce pan, heat cooking oil, add onion and garlic.Put salt and pepper to build the flavor right away. Cook over low fire until the onion caramelized, add tomato. Continue cooking  until the tomato released all the juices.
• Turn fire to medium heat, add the ground beef. Continue cooking and stirring frequently until the beef is turned brown.
• Add water and let boil.
• Add the green beans. Season with soy sauce, salt and pepper.Cover. Cook until crisp tender and not overcook.
• Transfer to a serving bowl .Serve with mashed potato or rice.

Breakfast Burrito

Burrito is a  Mexican food consist of a soft tortilla wrapped or folded .It is filled with a combination of different ingredients like meat,refried beans,rice,salsa ,sour cream and any other variations.

I made a breakfast burrito,A variety of American breakfast composed of sausage,scrambled eggs,refried beans,cheese ,mushrooms,pepper and any other ingredients depending on what you have in your kitchen.

Ingredients

1/2 package of  Jimmy Dean Sausage(hot or regular).Slice the other half and Keep in the freezer for  the next breakfast.

4 eggs

1 tbsp oil 

1/4 cup milk

shredded cheddar cheese

Sour Cream

refried beans(optional)

flour tortillas 

Salt and pepper to taste

Salsa/Hot Sauce.

Directions:

• Fry the sausage in a skillet. Drain off fat.Set aside
• Beat egg, milk in a bowl .Add salt and pepper just a little to taste.Heat oil ,add egg,cook while stirring.Remove from fire .Mix with sausage.Set aside.
• Heat Flour Tortillas in a pan or in a microwave on a plate covered with a paper towel.
• Fill each tortilla with cheese,egg/sausage mixture,refried beans,sour cream.Roll .
• Serve warm with salsa or hot sauce.

..

Beef Liver with Spinach

Beef liver , it is either you hate it or you love it.Though it is loaded with nutirents and often recommended for its iron content .it's not a popular meal for most of us.  Beef liver can be healthy for most individuals as long as you eat it only in moderation and make sure it is thoroughly cooked.In my home, nobody likes it  except me  so I eat  what I cook ,they don't know what they are missing.I like it  fry seasoned with lemon pepper seasoning salt ,steak ,sauteed added with some vegetables like spinach  just like my recipe above.So simple but loaded with nutrients.

Beef Humba

My husband is a picky eater.As an american, he used to eat instant food from the box or in can. When I introduced him to Filipino way of cooking from scratch he was amazed and couldn't believe it. For us it is normal but for him or for the Americans it is a  big deal. To cook like a chef or as he was always saying "a gourmet chef" is something. His tongue is not familiar with our food so I tried so much to cook  it according to his taste but in a Filipino way. Humba is one  of  his favorite dish. I used beef instead of pork for this recipe.

Ingredients:

• 1 kilo beef - cut into small pieces or slice.
• 1/2 cup vinegar
• 1 cup water
• 3 tbsp soy sauce
• 3 tbsp brown sugar
• 3 cloves minced garlic
• 1 sprig oregano
• 2 bay leaf
• 2 tbsp black beans or tausi ( adjust the salt if you used salted black beans)
• 2 tbsp fat or cooking oil.
• salt and pepper to taste.
• 2 tbsp white wine(optional)

Mix all the ingredients except  black beans and cook until beef is tender. Add more water if needed. Lastly, add the tausi/black beans.Season to taste. Serve hot.