Jina Yoo's Asian Bistro owner chosen for South Korean 'MasterChef'

Jina Yoo's Asian Bistro owner chosen for South Korean 'MasterChef' Columbia Missourian She knew cooking was her passion at an early age, when her mother would sell Tupperware ... but she thinks she can easily prove her talent with her recipes.

---

Machang or Zongzi

Wrapped Machang

Hopia products of Polland

Machang Unwrapped

A complete meal of sticky rice with meat (pork & chicken), salted egg, mushroom and chestnut.

Rather than just steaming it, much better to have it boiled in water so the aroma and taste

comes out of the pack.

From Wikipedia - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zongzi

Zongzi (or simply zong) (Chinese: 粽子) is a traditional Chinese food, made of glutinous rice stuffed with different fillings and wrapped in bamboo or reed leaves. They are cooked by steaming or boiling. Laotians, Thais, and Cambodians (known as nom asom) also have similar traditional dishes. In the Western world, they are also known as rice dumplings. In Indonesia and Malaysia, they are known as bakcang, bacang, or zang (Chinese: 肉粽; Pe̍h-ōe-jī: bah-chàng), a loanword from Hokkien, a Chinese dialect commonly used among Indonesian-Chinese, rather than Mandarin. Along the same lines, zongzi are more popularly known as machang among Chinese Filipinos in the Philippines.

Similar read here - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lo_mai_gai

Mantou at Sardinas

We used to buy mantou at the Sunday Market or supplied by our Chinese friend.

I recently discovered it the supermarket while scouring through their chiller. They have different flavors unlike what we get bigger and plain. But I find this mantou which is pandan flavor a bit thicker and not fluffy. I will switch back to the one with from our Chinese friend.

For this meal steam the mantou and open a can of bistek flavor sardine.

Kainan@Handaan. More fun in the Philippines! 

From wikipedia - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mantou

Mantou, often referred to as Chinese steamed bun/bread, is a kind of steamed bun originating inChina. They are typically eaten as a staple in northern parts of China where wheat, rather than rice, is grown. They are made with milled wheat flour, water and leavening agents. In size and texture, they range from 4 cm, soft and fluffy in the most elegant restaurants, to over 15 cm, firm and dense for the working man's lunch. (As white flour, being more heavily processed, was once more expensive, whitemantou were somewhat of a luxury in preindustrial China.)

Traditionally, mantou, bing, and wheat noodles were the staple carbohydrates of the northern Chinese diet, analogous to the rice, which forms the mainstay of the southern Chinese diet. They are also known in the south, but are often served as street food or a restaurant dish, rather than as a staple or home cooking. Restaurant mantou are often smaller and more delicate and can be further manipulated, for example, by deep-frying and dipping in sweetened condensed milk.

They are often sold precooked in the frozen section of Asian supermarkets, ready for preparation bysteaming or heating in the microwave oven.

TA similar food, but with a filling inside, is baozi. In some regions, mainly in Shanghai, mantou can be used to indicate both the filled and unfilled buns.

Ilocano Pinakbet

This is the real version of Ilocano pinakbet cooked in Paoay, Ilocos Norte 

this was served in a party. Since there were other meat and fish dishes, it was cooked without the sagpaw (add-on meat). For Ilocanos they never used squash when cooking pinakbet.

It is very easy to prepare and cook. The traditional way of cooking is to put all the

cut veggies inside a clay pot, then with the most important seasoning - bagoong  or buggoong (fish paste), diluted in water serves as the broth to boil the veggies.

Pinakbraw - a literal watered down version of pinakbet with too much water akin to inabraw (vegetable stew), another famous and simple Ilocano dish.

The best pinakbet is when it is cooked well done with little water remaining in the dish, the bagoong should be absorbed mostly by the veggies. And specially when it is cooked and made greasy by slivers of bagnet.

Pinakbet or pakbet is a popular Ilokano dish, from the northern regions of the Philippines, although it has become popular throughout the archipelago. The word is the contracted form of the Ilokano wordpinakebbet, meaning "shrunk" or "shriveled"^[1]. The original Ilokano pinakbet uses bagoong, of fermentedmonamon or other fish, while further south, bagoong alamang is used. The basic vegetables used in this dish include native bitter melon, eggplant, tomato, okra, string beans, chili peppers, parda, winged beans, and others. Root crops and some beans like camote, patani, kadios are also optionally added. The young pod of marunggay is also added. It is usually spiced with ginger, onions, or garlic.

A Tagalog version usually includes calabaza. Most of these vegetables are easily accessible, and are grown in backyards and gardens of most Ilokano households. As its name suggests, it is usually cooked until almost dry and shriveled; the flavors of the vegetables are accentuated with shrimp paste. In some cases, lechon,chicharon, or other meats (most commonly pork) are added. It is considered a very healthy dish, and convenient in relation to the harsh and rugged, yet fruitful Ilocos region of the Philippines.

The vegetable dish pinakbet is more than a regional cuisine. It is an enduring symbol of the Ilokano palate and a lucid display of the Ilokanos’ history of contestations and struggles with the physical and social environment. The recipe weaves intimations of the cultural productions of the Ilokanos' transaction to their arid and less productive land. (Caday, 2009)

Pinakbet is similar to the Provençal (French) vegetable stew ratatouille except for its sauce.

Source - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pinakbet

Adobong Kangkong

Heat pan and sautee a good amount of garlic in olive oil. \

When garlic begins to brown add the kangkong leaves. Simmer and then

season with fish sauce and soy sauce. You can serve it topped with bagoong na alamang.