Killer Chicken

Although the recipe I'm sharing today is my husband's own, I'm sure he's with me in dedicating this great dish to the one who loves it the most -- my nephew Oyel.

Allow me to share a little story about Oyel. (bawal mag-skip)

He had an unusual upbringing in the sense that he was never baby-talked. Never. Having been born to young parents, he was surrounded with fun-loving adults who talked to him like he was grown up. Pretty soon we had ourselves a toddler who himself talked like an adult. Like one time, he was standing in line behind a nursery classmate whose hair he happened to smell. He told the poor kid, "Sabihin mo sa mommy mo, shampoohin ka nang maige ha." And he'd justify that to us on his adult tone, that the girl needed that, and that someone had to tell her. Haay.

Every so often we'd find ourselves unmindful of his age and would be sharing our thoughts with this little boy. Once when he was barely three, we got engaged on this talk about me being bullied when I was in college. He listened intently, and when I was done, he uttered calmly but with conviction, "Paglaki ko Tita Ai, papatayin ko sila". Juskupooo, binaby-talk na lang dapat ito.

Mabuti na lang, the killer instinct in him did not progress (thank you Lord), and he has since grown up to be a fine young college boy; his thoughts replaced with fondness for pretty girls and good food. Having said that, this chicken dish is one of his super favorites.

Oo na, eto na, 'to na!

THE KILLER CHICKEN

(dubbed as Peppered Chicken too)

Prepare your griller; some uling of course. Then you'd be needing:

• Chicken thighs

Make a few slits on your chicken. The skin shrinks evenly; thus prettier that way, when grilled.
Now make the mixture for the rub:

• rock salt
• cracked peppercorn
• MSG

Mix 2 parts of salt to 1 part of pepper in a bowl and taktak some vetsin =). Rub on the chicken thighs. Be careful not to add too much, baka umalat.

Now prepare the mixture for basting. You're going to need the following:

• Star margarine
• Achuete oil

To make achuete oil, cook on low heat 2 cups of vegetable oil and a cup of achuete (annatto) seeds for about 5 minutes or until you get that dark yellow color. Discard the seeds and there you have your achuete oil.

Back to the basting mixture, put the margarine to 2 parts achuete oil. So for 2 cups of achuete oil, you need to put about a cup of the margarine. Please do your math. You may not be needing this much but it won't hurt to keep the excess.

There goes your basting mixture. Just brush generously on the chicken while grilling, walang hindi masasarapan =).

Oh. For the sawsawan we put soy sauce, calamansi, salt and pepper on vinegar.

It goes very well too with what Oyel named "Margarine Rice".

To make that, just heat on pan 2 tbsp. of that basting mixture, add another tbsp. of margarine, saute about 1 tbsp. of garlic then add about 3 tbsp. of green onions. After a few seconds add about 8 cups of rice. (naparami yata yung about) Put 1 pack of Maggi Magic Sarap and konting salt pa.

There! That's for you, Yel! =)

Ribbon Tutorial Part One

As promised here.

Watch and learn!

Buffalo Wings

Here is what we had for dinner last night, Buffalo Wings.

Certain foods remind us of certain events. Yes, I can hear you say "WTF just give us the goddamn recipe!" but no, everything comes with a price, so I'm moving on..

I may have had Buffalo Wings on a date with Totoy... I may have had it in a meeting with Queenie. But Buffalo Wings will always remind me of Choychoy's 3rd month birthday.





Eeeeee!!! Ain't he cute?



Yes, we had Buffalo Wings that day,  

pasta and Banoffee pie, among others.

Nanay, Ninie, Joel, Oyel and Miggy were there. Joni was there too, inside Mommy's tummy.

At one point Nanay and I were left on the table. She asked, "Ba't ba Buffalo Wings tawag d'yan?" You see she trusts me on a lot of things (especially on keeping conversations to ourselves) and I try my best not to fail her so I quipped, "E syempre ang lalaki o". Naniwala. 

"Ang lalaki nga 'no?" Ga-buffalo nga naman, kombinsing.

Whew. I couldn't wait to ask my walking encyclopedia, when they left. "Toy hulaan mo, ba't Buffalo Chicken tawag dyan?" 

"... e kung sabihin from Buffalo, New York kasi."

"Tama!" Chineck ko sa internet, tama nga.

And now, ladies and gentlemen, from the City of Buffalo, New Yooooork...............

The Buffalo Chicken Recipe  

• 1 kg. chicken wings (any part will do actually)
• vegetable oil for frying

1. Rub the chicken with a mixture of:

• garlic powder
• salt
• cayenne pepper
• MSG (sorry na, konti lang naman e)

2. Fry evenly. Drain on paper towels.

3. For the sauce, cook the following in a pan under low heat:

• half brick of butter (125g)
• 1 small bottle of hot sauce (100g)
• 2 tbsp. tomato catsup
• 1 tbsp. lemon juice
• 1/2 tsp. garlic powder
• 1/2 tsp. onion powder or 1 1/2 tbsp. chopped green onions
• 1/2 tsp. worstercershire sauce
• 1 tsp. Knorr liquid seasoning (adjust amount to taste)

4. Put the chicken in a lid container and pour the sauce.

5. Shake it well until the chicken are evenly coated with the sauce.

6. Serve with blue cheese dressing.

Blue Cheese Dressing 

• 1 cup sour cream
• 3 tbsp. mayonaisse
• 1 finely chopped parsley
• 3 cloves finely minced garlic
• 1 tbsp. green onions (choose the white part, near the roots)
• 1 tsp. lemon juice
• 1/4 cup crumbled blue cheese
• salt and pepper to taste

     * You can skip the blue cheese and you get yourself a Ranch dressing. Works well with the chicken just as great.
          Enjoy!

I Heart You

I enjoy making heart-shaped baon for Totoy. I especially like it when he doesn't know what his baon is... it tests my E.Q. By 12:15pm I'd find myself calling him on the cel, "Nakita mo na? Maganda?" 

Tortang talong

Spam®

So on Valentine's day, I made something more special than usual: heart-shaped of course, and red.

Strawberry Cheese Cake!  

 

Maganda?

Here's how to make it. New Yohk style, baby.

For the crust, prepare: 

• 2 cups crushed graham crackers
• 1/2 cup melted unsalted butter
• 4 tbsp. white sugar 

And for the filling, these:

• 4 packs Philadelphia cream cheese (at room temperature)
• 3/4 cup white sugar
• 2 tbsp. all purpose flour
• 1 tbsp. vanilla extract
• 3 tbsp. lemon zest
• 1/2 cup sour cream
• 1/2 cup Nestle' cream in can
• 4 eggs 

1. Preheat your oven to 325°F or 170°C.

2. Mix the crust ingredients and press on the pan.

3. Beat the cream cheese and sugar in a bowl. Add the flour, vanilla, lemon zest, the cream and sour cream. Then the eggs, one at a time. Pour the mixture in your prepared pan with the crust.

4. Bake for 70 to 90 minutes, or until you get the color similar to this one:



5. Cool completely, then remove from pan. Put the toppings just before serving. Try n'yo!

Ano'ng Gusto mo sa Itlog?

Scrambled, sunny side up, boiled o poached?

Honestly, there was a time when I didn't know what 'poached' was. Kaya naman nang malaman ko na kung ano yon at nagka boyfriend ako ng gwapo, tinanong ko na agad para ma-impress, "Ano'ng gusto mo sa itlog?" Sasagot pa lang s'ya ng "Kinakam---", sinundan ko kaagad ng, "Poached?" Naaaks! Kasal na kami ngayon. Kaya kung gusto mong magka-asawa ng gwapo, learn how to poach an egg perfectly.

Here's how:

1. Put one egg in a small bowl like that of the photo above.

2. Boil about 3 cups of water in a pan o mga 2-3 inches na taas ng tubig.

3. While the water is briskly boiling, add a pinch of salt in the water and a few drops of vinegar in the middle of the pan.

4. Then carefully drop the egg in the middle of the water.

5. Cook for around 2 minutes and scoop carefully with a slotted spoon. Add salt and pepper.

Done!

Tip: Don't rush it. It could appear already done in the pan after a minute but you don't want the yolk to come out too runny like what happened to mine. So, a little less than 2 minutes did it for me.

Good luck sa itlog mo. =)

Ribbons

I love tying ribbons. That's the first thing I teach my helpers when they're new here. Syempre para pagtatali ng kurtina, maganda. Kung yaya ka naman, para sa shoelace ni Choychoy. It will always come in handy. Undas ng 2009, nilagang saging ang na-assign saming dalhin sa sementeryo. Ni-ribbunan kong isa-isa. Napapailing na lang ang asawa ko. Soon I will make video tutorials on how to tie ribbons nicely. Meanwhile, look at how our world could be a better place to live in kung lahat ng ribbons ay maganda. Sayang lang, hindi ko nakunan ng pictures ang mga saging. Tsk!
 

Ate Girlie's Christmas giveaways, 2004

   

for Gerry & Millette's Despedida de Soltera, 2005

     

Tita's Christmas giveaways, 2010



Entourage Invitation Cards for our Wedding, 2006

 

our Wedding prizes for the games



our Unity Candle

our pa-cute Kissing Bells

Your gifts will definitely look mamahalin when you know how to make a good ribbon. Your girls' fancy dresses won't look unkempt kahit bago just because you can't tie them well. So just stick around, tuturuan ko kayo. (Mayabang! =D)

What's for Dinner?

Here are a few photos you can find on my my Facebook album entitled What's for Dinner? They're also the very reason why I'm resurrecting this blog. To share some recipes to you, my friends, and countrymen alike. I've been getting hundreds of PMs asking me for recipes and it's really frustrating to not be able to reply to each one. Hahaha! 11 lang sila. But still, instead of copy-pasting, this I think is a great idea that would benefit also those hundreds na nahihiyang magtanong. Hindi ba?

So let's start the (meat)ball rollin'!