Garlic Bread
Topic: Snacks
Why pay more for a very simple garlic bread when you can do it at home? Here's the basic recipe, you can adjust it depending upon your taste. You can add some herbs like parsley or oregano to add more taste, but I always prefer the plain one. This is what we always cook at home when we ate spaghetti or some noodles.

Ingredients:
1 baguette bread, sliced diagonally 1/2 inch thick
1/2 cup butter, melted
2 cloves garlic, minced
1/2 tsp. garlic powder
1/2 tsp. sugar
1/4 tsp. salt
grated mozzarella cheese

Directions:
1. Combine butter, sugar, salt, garlic powder and fresh garlic.
2. Brush each side of the bread with the butter mixture.
3. Arranged the bread in an oven dish and bake in a preheated oven for 3 minutes.
4. Take out from oven, flip the bread and put some grated cheese on it.
5. Return to the oven and bake for 1 minute or until the cheese melts.

Serve with Spaghetti or Pancit Canton

Pancit Canton
Topic: Noodles
Pancit canton or sauteed egg noodles is a Chinese dish which is very popular in the Philippines. It is usually cook with meat, chicken or shrimps and varieties of vegetables. Here in Kuwait, it is very hard to find good fresh egg noodles, some are very oily and salty that's why I preferred to buy the dried one. It taste almost the same, it depends upon how you cook it. It usually served with toasted bread, siopao, etc. but we usually ate it with Garlic Bread.

Ingredients:
200 g Cantonese Noodles
2/3 cup beef, sliced into strips
2/3 cup chicken breast,sliced into strips
2 chicken franks, sliced
1 small head brocolli, cut into flowerets
1 medium carrots, slice into strips
1 cup snow peas
2 cups cabbage slice into strips
1 large onion, chopped
3 cloves garlic, chopped
1/3 cup black fungus, soaked in water and sliced
1 tbsp. fish sauce
3 tbsp. soy sauce
2 tbsp. oyster sauce
1 tsp. black pepper powder
3 cups water
3 tbsp. olive oil
1 tbsp. sesame seed oil
chopped green onions for garnish

Directions:
1. Boil beef and chicken in 3 cups water until done. Remove from the pot and reserve the broth.
2. Heat oil in a pan, saute garlic and onion.
3. Add in beef, chicken and chicken franks, stir. Stir in the black fungus, fish sauce and black pepper. Simmer for 5 minutes.
4. Add the reserved broth, carrots, brocolli and soy sauce. Bring to a boil.
5. Add noodles, snow peas and cabbage and cook until done.
6. Season with oyster sauce, sesame seed oil and pepper. Garnish with the chopped onions.

Fish Flakes Pinakbet
Topic: Vegetables
Pinakbet is a Filipino traditional dish and popular among the Ilocanos. Basically, it is a combination of vegetables like, squash, bitter melon, string beans, okra, eggplant, and tomato. Shrimp paste or bagoong is usually included but I never include it whenever I cook one, I'd rather used pounded dried shrimp instead of it. As usual, there are many cooking variations like sauteing the spices first in hot oil or others are boiling the vegetables first, etc. and additional ingredients like carrots, squash flower, chicken, meat or seafoods and sauces.

In this recipe, fish flakes are used, bitter melon was also omitted since my hubby sometimes don't eat that bitter vegetable.

Ingredients:
1 eggplant (big/round variety), sliced
2 cups sliced squash
10 pcs. young okra
1 cup sliced string beans
1/2 cup fried fish flakes
1 cup chicken broth or more
1 medium ripe tomato
1 onion, sliced
1 thumb size ginger, sliced
3 cloves garlic, crushed
1 tbsp. fish sauce
2 tbsp. soy sauce
1 tsp. sugar
2 tbsp. cooking

Directions:
1. Heat oil in a skillet and saute garlic, onions, tomatoes and ginger until the ginger is aromatic.
2. Add the fish flakes, stir. Add in the squash and broth and simmer until the squash is tender but not soggy of course.
3. Add the remaining vegetables, soy sauce, fish sauce and sugar. Simmer until the vegetables are cooked. Season with black pepper powder if you like.

Serve.

Citrus Chicken Adobo
Topic: Chicken
Adobo is a common Filipino dish typically made from meat or chicken, the basic ingredients added are soy sauce, vinegar, crushed garlic, bay leaf, and black peppercorns. It is very simple and requires just a handful of ingredients. A good tasting adobo depends upon the delicate balance of all the ingredients, like other dishes there are many variations in the combination of ingredients as well as the cooking process. If you are adventurous, you can add some ingredients to add more taste to the basic.

Ingredients:
500 g chicken, sliced
juice of 2 lemons
1 small can pineapple sliced with syrup
4 tbsp. soy sauce
1 tbsp. oyster sauce
1 tsp. white sugar
1 bay leaf
1 tsp. whole peppercorns
3 cloves garlic, minced
3 tbsp. melted butter
1/2 cup chicken broth
8 pcs. quail eggs, boiled and peeled

Directions:
1. Heat butter in a skillet, stir fry the chicken until brown then add garlic, stir.
2. Add pineapple syrup and chicken broth. Simmer for 5 minutes then add peppercorns, bay leaf, soy sauce and lemon juice. Allow to boil.
3. Add the white sugar, oyster sauce, pineapple sliced and the quail eggs. Simmer for 2 minutes. Turn off heat and serve.

Shrimp with Soy Bean Sprouts
Topic: Shrimps
This is a Thai dish which requires very short time to prepare and cook, better to cook it during meal time. When I made it last night, I prepared all the ingredients first, put it all inside the fridge and did some other things since we were not going to take dinner yet, my hubby was out, he's processing the car's insurance.
When it's already time for dinner, when other foods and everything were placed in the dining table, then that's the best time to cook this recipe.

Ingredients:
400 g shrimps, peeled
300 g soy bean sprouts
300 g mushrooms, sliced
4 cloves garlic, chopped
2 tbsp. soy sauce
2 tbsp. oyster sauce
1 tbsp. fish sauce
1 tsp. sugar
2 tbsp. cooking oil.

Directions:
1. Combine shrimps and garlic.
2. Heat oil in pan and stir fry the soy bean, add soy sauce. Take out of the pan, set aside.
3. In the same pan, stir fry the shrimps and mushroom over a high heat until the shrimps are cooked.
4. Add fish sauce, oyster sauce and sugar. Stir in the soy bean sprouts, cook for 10 seconds. Serve immediately.