We are so lucky to have these ladies bringing us fresh produce 6 days a week at our place. They come all the way from another province about an hour’s drive from where we live. They have a bicycle cart with a large colorful umbrella strapped onto it and peddle vegetables, meats, fish and seafood – actually anything you want that can be found at a wet market. But they don’t just peddle, they have their regulars and unless you’re a regular, they won’t bother to ring your bell or even pass your street.

My mother has been a regular and very loyal customer for years now so they obliged her and started dropping by at our place. Well, not at first. For all my food needs until a couple of months ago, I would still have to go to the SM Mall about a 10-minute snail’s pace drive from our house. But when they did stop by and I started ordering pork, beef, native sausages and even batik dresses for the summer from them, they came by more often – almost everyday in fact.

They are sisters-in-law and live in the same family compound in Nueva Ecija. They invited Spouse and I to come visit them at fiesta time at the end of May. They have a compound outside the main town they said, with a little brook at the back of the property with plenty of mango trees. I think there’s no turning that invitation down, especially since I’ve never been to that province before. Spouse and I are really looking forward to do that.
They have been serving our neighborhood for about 6-7 years now and have gotten to know a lot of the neighbors. They are also a great source of news – nothing nasty of course, they are always nice. But you do get the skinny on what house in the neighborhood is for sale and all that. In the Philippines, very few people seem to be willing to put out a sign on their yard when a house is for sale.

Apart from the convenience of having goods delivered to your doorstep the day after you order it, they also offer produce which you may have never tried before. There was this one shiny, silvery oddly-shaped fish called “sapatero” which I couldn’t remember ever having (mom said we’ve had it before though) and so I tried it and will order another batch for grilling. I’ll write about it another time and hopefully not forget to take photos.

One of my favorite things to order, aside from the garlic sausages are the cooked Rellenong Bangus (stuffed milkfish) they order from another lady in Nueva Ecija. It is just delicious and Spouse absolutely loves it. In fact, there was one time when I was away and the ladies came calling and Spouse took 2 large Rellenos – which I never would have taken! Between the two of us, we can finish up a whole medium-sized relleno in one sitting. So the two large stuffed fish was just too much for the two of us. I took it to my mom’s and she confirmed it tasted great. It also keeps very well in the freezer. As a matter of fact, I have one medium-sized relleno waiting to be eaten as I type this.

Ooops, gotta go…my doorbell’s ringing. That must be my ladies calling!

These squash parts consisting of the fruit, the leaves and flowers were fresh from the vendor who traveled all the way from Nueva Ecija, about an hour’s drive to our place. I ordered it the day before and they come and bring it to my doorstep the very next day. There is nothing more convenient in the world I can think of.

I had a hankering for the Ilocano dish dinengdeng and remembered how my mother would make it completely out of squash parts. Soon as I got my delivery, I laid it all out on the kitchen counter for the photo shoot. Then I looked at the leaves and flowers….and for the life of me – I didn’t know how to start preparing it for the pot!

I decided then and there the best thing would be for me to put it all back in a bag and trot over to mother who can show me how to do it. Thank God for mothers!

Soon as I got to her house, we sat down around the dining room table and she brought out her little paring knife she’s had for years and showed me how to do it. I started to help but she got a little impatient with me and did it all herself. It was ready in just a few minutes too. My mother only used the very top of the squash branches and took out the hairy outer skin. The flowers were more complicated to prepare though. She opened up each flower and removed the sepal and the pistil. She then tore off the petal from the stem and cleaned the stem by peeling off the hairy outer skin. This was all washed over running water in a strainer.
There was a whole bunch of leaves and flowers so we decided to divide that in two. One part we used with the squash to make dinengdeng for dinner that night and the rest I took home with me. I used that for a pork sinigang the next day and was absolutely the best I’ve ever made.

I’m afraid I didn’t take any pictures of the finished dish. But it did make a lovely and light dinengdeng.

Dinengdeng is a dish of vegetables flavored with fish bagoong. The common Ilocano dinengdeng also uses a grilled fish. Mudfish is great for this. You start with a few cups of water in your pot, add the grilled fish and set on a stove. When this boils, take out your bamboo strainer and add a few tablespoons of the fish bagoong, immersing the strainer in the boiling liquid to get all the goodness of the bagoong. There should be just tiny slivers of fish bones left in your strainer if you are using the Ilocano bagoong of old. A little foam will float to the top which you have to remove with a spoon and throw away. Then you add the veggies, one by one, in order of the length of time it takes to cook them. For this dinengdeng, I put in the leaves and squash slices in at the same time and threw in the flowers at the last minute.
You can put all sorts of vegetables together. There are several perfect combinations of vegetables, another favorite is fresh bamboo shoots, saluyot and young gabi root. Dinengdeng is perfect with the Ilocano longganisa, a garlic-flavored pork sausage also from the Ilocos region. It’s great served with adobo too.

I looked around for the English translation of this commonly used vegetable in the Philippines which we call “upo” and  almost identified it as winter melon.  Apparently, the winter melon is  “kundol” back home.  This vegetable pictured above is a bottle gourd.  It’s a light and delicately flavored vegetable we often use sauted with pork and shrimps or dried fish. 

A Chinese friend of mine said that a winter melon is a good vegetable to “…keep you cool when you’re heaty” and I found that description to be so accurate.  Just like the winter melon, which is actually a gourd and not a melon, ”upo” makes a great soup in the summer or the tropics and perhaps does lower your body temperature, though I have no proof of that.

This time, I thought I’d try cooking it using a Chinese-style recipe that commonly uses winter melon.  It turned out really good for something I just came up with based on what I’ve had in the past.  I will have to do more research on a written recipe and then make improvements.  Perhaps I could add more vegetables for aesthetics and improve the color and texture of the dish. 

My soup was also milky which is a big no-no in  winter melon soups.  I will have to make changes in my cooking method.  That same Chinese friend I mentioned showed me how particular they were with making sure the broth was clear by parboiling the meat (it was pork in that particular case) prior to cooking.  The froth that came up to the top was not just thrown away, all the liquid was thrown out.  So he used only a small amount of water to parboil the meat.  Accoridng to him, the blood and impurities from the meat is removed in the parboiling stage leaving you with a clear broth in the final dish.  Those impurities he said were not good for your health.  I’ve always thought it was a waste to throw out that good stock and probably tried it only once.  But yes, doing it the Chinese way does leave you with a cleaner-tasting broth that’s clear and pleasing.

For now, this is a good and easy recipe when you’re in the mood for a Chinese soup that satisfies.

Chicken and Bottle Gourd Soup

2 skinless, boneless chicken breasts, sliced thin in 1-inch strips

1 small bottle gourd, peeled and sliced about 1 x 1/4 in. strips (seeded if they are more mature)

1 2-in. piece of ginger, sliced thin (more if you want the soup hotter)

6 pieces dried Chinese mushrooms. rehydrated and sliced in strips

4 c. water

about 2 tbsps. chicken bouillon

salt to taste

Put all ingredients in a stock pot and bring to a boil.  Simmer and cook until the gourd is translucent, about 20 minutes in high altitude.  Correct for seasoning.

Serve immediately.

This is what we call a melon in the Philippines. We know other people call it a cantaloupe, but we still call it a melon.

This particular one is from somewhere in California, like most fruits we get in Colorado grocery stores.  It was VERY sweet.  Cantaloupes and any kind of melon needs warm, dry weather because sugars in the fruit are concentrated in this kind of weather.  It’s certainly been dry and hot on the West Coast.  I think the little town of Rocky Ford in Colorado grows the sweetest I’ve ever tasted in my life – bar none….not even this one.

The Rocky Ford cantaloupes and melons are?not found on?grocery shelves here yet, soon though.  Rocky Ford is well-known all over the state and hordes of people from all over will drive hours just to get to the farmer’s markets in the Southeast portion of Colorado.

This has been the wettest summer I’ve ever experienced in Colorado.  I’m hoping the melons from Rocky Ford aren’t going to suffer because of that…

At last, Daing na Bangus in Colorado!  But of course it has to be Daing na Bangus, the milkfish did come from the Philippines after all….it’s that special a milkfish!

The milkfish is known as the Philippine national fish.  I’ve tasted milkfish from Indonesia, Malaysia and Taiwan and none of those compare to the Philippine milkfish from Bonoan town in Pangasinan province.  My mother specially ordered bangus from Bonoan when my sisters and I were there for a short visit in April this year.

She had it waiting for us when we got home.  It was Inihaw na Bangus, grilled over coals.  It was all stuffed with local tomatoes and onions, wrapped in banana leaves before grilling.  I arrived in the morning but was too tired from the trip to eat.  I also got started on a talking jag and promptly let out all the “kwentos” and you could say my mouth just got to busy to eat.

My two other sisters arrived later that night.  It was only then, when one sister partook of the bangus, did I realize how hungry I had become after the long trip and day.  I sat down beside her and started eating kamayan-style with a relish I haven’t experienced in years….

I’ve never had a dish have such an effect on me.  Please pardon the drama…my sisters did  call me Vic Pacia when I was a kid after all.  (BTW, does anyone remember Vic Pacia, always overacting (OA) comedian of Philippine television during the 60′s and 70′s?)

Anyway, as I was saying…It totally surprised me how delicious Bonoan bangus could be. I had totally forgotten how sweet and tender the flesh is.  I totally forgot how heavenly a combination grilling your fish wrapped in banana leaves and over charcoal, with those tomatoes and onions inside that heavenly fish could be.  I had totally forgotten and each bite I took of that meal was pure and total pleasure wrapped in disbelief, nostalgia and who knows what else…or maybe it was the jetlag…

So now I’ve written too much  for just one post….more on the daing na bangus tomorrow!

It’s summer again soon and the strawberries are getting sweeter.  I’ve been buying a pint every week to go with the breakfast cereal, yoghurt and even oatmeal.

This morning, I was preparing to slice some up when I noticed how oddly shaped some of them are.  Here’s a plateful of some pretty, but odd-shaped ones.  I put in a couple of  regular-lookers for contrast.  Can you tell which ones they are?

Cherry time again! I was planning to bring home a big bag of cherries back with me to the Philippines last April but it wasn’t available then. There’s just nothing like fresh cherries…not maraschino, not canned or frozen cherries…