Create Pinoy Blog
Not only am I a Cebuana In America, I’m also a Cuisine- nera In America.
Cooking is my passion, therefore, I live to eat. But I’m very picky at what I eat.
1) No blood. My husband always orders his steak, rare and
the blood that comes out when he slices it, cringes me. I like steaks
that are dry aged which simply means that fresh meat
is left hanging to dry in specially controlled environment as against
those that are newly cut then packed and sold in the supermarkets. My lamb chops
should also be perfectly seared on the outside and pink on the inside,
no thick meaty red flesh, please. The only blood I eat is when it’s cook and
made into blutwurst, boudin noir or morcilla. I am even picky when I
eat our own dinuguan or blood stew. I have to know what’s in it, and
who made it. Innards and entrails in dinuguan are not for me.
2) The smell of what I eat should synchronize with the taste I‘m expecting. I know that durian tastes like heaven but smells like hell or that blue cheese stinks like old socks but is divine to the palate. Normally when it
smells rotten and tastes spoiled, then it probably is. Unless I know
the food’s characteristics and how it should taste, I refrain from
indulging myself.
3) Anything that moves is
a no-no for me. We used to have a fisherman vendor come to our house to
sell his morning catch. There would be slimy eels or jumping shrimps,
and my husband would take the smallest of the shrimps, smother it with
‘pinakurat’ vinegar and eat it. I flinch at the site of maggots in
cheese which Italians call Casu Marzu and I don’t care how expensive
they are, I‘m not eating them that way. I just don’t want sucking the
life of living creatures. Don’t get me wrong, I like raw food, like
sashimi, seviche, kinilaw or even carpacio which is raw meat pounded
paper thin. But they have to lay still.
I love food, anything I don’t like I don’t swallow. I love those
tiny little baby eels which the Spaniards call angulas. I cook it with evoo
and lots of garlic for a sumptuous appetizer. Or I fry then bake pieces
of bone marrow, scoop out the buttery center and spread it on a slice
of toast. The taste is just divine.
I don’t have to travel many miles around the world to taste different kinds of food, although I would love to if my pockets permit. Here in America I join food shows, exhibits and festivals where the world congregate and show off what they have back in their home country.
I still have to try Kopi Luwak which is considered the most expensive coffee in the world. They come from excrements (sh*t) of a civet feline found in Indonesia,
and in the Philippines it is sometimes called Coffee Alamid. I’ve
ordered some and can’t wait to try it. I still have to try the
‘almas’caviar or the roe (eggs) of the Beluga sturgeon, a kind of fish only found in the Caspian sea.
This is not the black caviar as commonly known but is lighter in shade
due to the age of the fish. Can’t wait to try that as well.
In totality, my taste is simple. I just like the best.
