Pinoy Crab Cakes
Since I promised to spend time with my parents at least one night a week, we drove down from Tagaytay City for an overnighter in Muntinlupa City before heading home after a long workweek. I had to get up at 6am to ensure that breakfast was to be ready by 630am. My parents' maid was just starting to fidget in the Asian kitchen (FYI, Asian kitchens are were maids/cooks make meals for the Master of the House, rather than the main kitchen). Naturally, I took over the cooking chore. Overnight cold rice, check. Garlic, check. GARLIC FRIED RICE. The fried Tawilis (a delicacy from the Taal Volcano Lake) was a great local find in Maharlika Market, Tagaytay City, It was not too salty and was just perfectly crunchy. Left-over roasted eggplants became eggplant torta. Some hot chocolate mixed with coffee and I was ready for the day.
Looking inside the freezer and refrigerator for lunch ideas, I noticed left over river crabs from the week before. There was also a bundle of fresh dill. Woohoo! All I needed now was a binding agent. Breadcrumbs (from a leftover breadstick and two eggs), some paprika and seasalt and fresh ground black pepper made for 8 crabcakes served on pandesal. Garnished with lettuce seasoned with just a tiny hint of vineagrette sealed the deal. It was such a gorgeous plate, too bad I am not able to share the picture as the crab cakes were gone on the first round. LOL.
In hindsight, I've always loved this type of challenge. Having to work for AA all these years allowed me to travel incognito to visit friends from all over where I would barge into their kitchen and serve them gorgeous meals from treasures found within.
Try it sometime, not only is it fun, it's a good way to introduce your friends into their kitchen. And, if their kitchen is just like my Dad's, it would be stocked well with century old ingredients that I had to throw away. He was so proud of the collection (old powdered clumps of garlic powder, moldy parsley flakes, etc), which were utterly unusable. He loves to cook, however, he seems stuck at pinakbet and dinengdeng.
Till next time, I'll be knocking at your door.
Looking inside the freezer and refrigerator for lunch ideas, I noticed left over river crabs from the week before. There was also a bundle of fresh dill. Woohoo! All I needed now was a binding agent. Breadcrumbs (from a leftover breadstick and two eggs), some paprika and seasalt and fresh ground black pepper made for 8 crabcakes served on pandesal. Garnished with lettuce seasoned with just a tiny hint of vineagrette sealed the deal. It was such a gorgeous plate, too bad I am not able to share the picture as the crab cakes were gone on the first round. LOL.
In hindsight, I've always loved this type of challenge. Having to work for AA all these years allowed me to travel incognito to visit friends from all over where I would barge into their kitchen and serve them gorgeous meals from treasures found within.
Try it sometime, not only is it fun, it's a good way to introduce your friends into their kitchen. And, if their kitchen is just like my Dad's, it would be stocked well with century old ingredients that I had to throw away. He was so proud of the collection (old powdered clumps of garlic powder, moldy parsley flakes, etc), which were utterly unusable. He loves to cook, however, he seems stuck at pinakbet and dinengdeng.
Till next time, I'll be knocking at your door.