We usually have cooked rice in the refrigerator, ready to be heated as is or made into a fast and easy fried rice dish. Rice is the one dish that the Mama usually makes. I'd rather cook it because hers comes out too dry. But, I let her prepare the rice because I think it makes her feel that she's contributing to cooking the meals. When I warm up the rice in the microwave, I just add a bit of water. So no big deal. Twice a year, the Mama sees her eye doctor who always asks,"What's your secret for long life?" "I eat rice," she tells him. "Eat rice for a long life. You don't get so many wrinkles." I don't know about that.  But, hey, she is 93 years old. Click   here  to find other A to Z challenge participants.

Yesterday the Husband and I got together with friends and hiked in the Pinnacles National Park, one of the newest parks in the National Park Service system. It had been planned for awhile, but as usual, I didn't think about what to bring for trail snacks until Saturday. We had no idea how far or how long we would hike. "What do you think about getting energy bars for the hike?" I asked the Husband. "Great idea," he said. "We can bring apples." "Okay. How about some nuts?" "Yeah." "We have carrots." "That'll be good, too." Done. Quick and easy meal planning. I always like that. Click   here  to find other A to Z challenge participants.

Going to the beach was always an all-of-a-sudden decision that the Mama and the Daddy made at some point between the moment they woke up and finished breakfast on a Sunday morning. Then, they would wake up the Older Brother and me. The Mama and Daddy got everything together. The Mama cooked a pot of rice and gathered plates, napkins, utensils, cups, cutting board, knives, blankets, towels, and so forth. The Daddy collected firewood (and later charcoal), grills, and buckets. The older I got, the more tasks I did, from gathering my own change of clothes to getting the picnic basket together and helping haul everything out to the car. We usually made two stops before we got to our favorite picnic spot on the rocky shoreline in Monterey. The first was at a mom-and-pop store on the way out of town to buy the Daddy's bottle of whiskey, Seven-Up, soda, and hot dogs. The second was at the Fisherman's Wharf where the parents bought American mackerel, squid, and other fish for lun

Whenever I visited the parents, and then later only the Mama, I was sent home with a care package. Lots of fresh vegetables and fruit from the garden, as well as freezer bags full of cooked rice, lumpia, pork adobo, fried chicken, and bibingka. Whether I was single or married, living alone or with roommates, food always came home with me. Much of the vegetables and fruits were given away to neighbors and friends. The cooked food went into the freezer and eventually most were eaten by friends, spouse, and myself. In my 20s, I said to the Mama, "No, no, that's too much."  In my 30s, I sighed and just accepted the food. In my 40s, I appreciated everything that she picked in her garden and cooked in her kitchen. In my 50s, the Husband and I were living with the Mama. If we had not, I'm very sure that when we visited the Mama, she would've given us lots of food to take home. And, now that I'm in my 60s, I realize that the Mama was sending her love ho

"Maybe Molly needs a table," said the Mama, eying the barely touched breakfast plate of food on the floor. "She wouldn't be able to reach her food," I said, envisioning Molly the Cat sitting at a little kid's table. "She has too bend so low to eat," Mama said. Molly the Cat circled her plate, sniffed it, and walked away. Molly had to have been hungry. She tried to climb on my calves (yeah, I have big calves) while I was spooning her food onto her plate, which was her sign of saying "Hurry up, Human!" I set the plate down. She took a few bites and walked away. She'd been doing that for a couple of days. Maybe the Mama was onto something. I went into the hallway where a whole bunch of nothing rested and found a cardboard carton to hold take-out coffee. It was the perfect size for the plate to rest on. So, I tried it. "Come here, Molly." Molly approached her breakfast. She sniffed her makeshift table. She sat dow

Ice cream is one of my comfort foods. I'm tired, I want ice cream. I'm depressed, ice cream. Happy, ice cream! I eat ice cream on a very hot summer day as well as on a freezing cold winter night. I've even eaten ice cream for breakfast. That was after I walked more than five miles pushing Tilda-Hilda (my pink bike cruiser, for those who don't know) with a flat tire home. Well, four miles. The Husband walked up to meet me and pushed Tilda-Hilda the last mile. He's such a sweetheart. Lemon chiffon, chocolate, coffee, French vanilla, and pineapple-coconut are my top five ice creams. What are yours? Click   here  to find other A to Z challenge participants.

If I could only have three ingredients in my pantry, they would be onions, garlic, and tomatoes. The onions could be yellow, red, or white, in that order of preference. The garlic could be bulbs or shoots. The tomatoes could be fresh, frozen, or canned.  Onions, garlic, and tomatoes are my holy trinity when it comes to making sautes, stir fries, soups, and stews. Casseroles, pastas, and rice dishes, too. If I had to do without one of the holy trinity, I could go without the tomatoes. Onions, garlic, and tomatoes. It's the way I learned to cook, which was by watching the Mama. Smash the garlic with a smooth granite rock brought back from the beach, or with the side of the knife with a satisfying whack as demonstrated by Martin Yan on Yan Can Cook .  Cut the onion in half, then cut thin slices out of each half. Repeat with the tomatoes, except the slices don't have to be so skinny. The above photo is pancit, a Filipino noodle dish made out of mung bean noodles. If you&

Garlic.  Yummmmmmmm. Can you tell that I like garlic? I eat so much garlic I can no longer taste the garlic. So, it's possible I have what people call awful garlic breath. I don't know.  But, I must not eat that much garlic since mosquitoes still love to bite me. About 15 miles from where we live is a garlic factory. Lots of people dislike the smell that comes out of the factory. Not me. I love driving by it and getting in that sweet spot on the road where you drive right through the aroma. Yummmmmmmmmmm. Too bad a tomato cannery doesn't stand right next to the factory. I was about 30 years old when I realized that not everyone cooks with a lot of garlic. At a dinner in which we, guests, helped prepare the meal, the hostess asked me to make the garlic bread. She set out a loaf of French bread, a cube of butter, and a bulb of garlic. So, I smashed, cleaned and minced the garlic, then cut the bread in two, slathered butter over the two halves, and sprinkled the garl

The Daddy bought several live chickens at a time from a local chicken farmer, and he and the Mama would slaughter them in the backyard.  I was 11 or 12 when the parents decided it was time for me to help with the slaughtering. Like I really wanted the experience. I suppose they figured a day would come when I would need to slaughter a chicken for survival. Yes, it would definitely be an asset if I were to be chosen for Survivor , the reality show. But, that's if I didn't get kicked off before my team won a challenge that rewarded us with chickens. I digress. My part in the slaughter was simple.  I only needed to hold a chicken firmly down on a block of wood while the Daddy slit its neck. On the day of my rite of passage, I watched the parents do the process a couple of times. Then it was my turn. I kneeled behind the wood, and the Daddy put a chicken beneath my hands, face towards him. He did not let go of the chicken until he was sure the bird could not get away from

I used to think that the Mama was a rigid, but, awesome, cook. Everything she cooked was perfect. Her cutting of meats and vegetables always came out precisely small and neat. Her dishes always tasted consistently the same—yummily delicious. When it came to Filipino cuisine, nobody, including Filipino restaurant chefs, came close to her food. The Daddy came very close. The one dish of his that surpassed hers by a tiny bit was his fried chicken. His was a subtle melt-in-your-mouth delicious, while the Mama's was more a pow! wow! in-your-face delicious. My perception of the Mama-the-cook changed when I was in my late 30s. Suddenly the food she put on the table when I came to visit was different. Her pork adobo no longer was the consistently same delicious taste. It was still delicious, but the taste slightly differed each time she cooked it. At first, I thought she was being forgetful when she cooked. And, perhaps, there was a bit of that. During one visit, the Mama served f

Today, I'm going to describe my fantasy day of dining out. Six small meals. A graze pig out. My full day of dining out would be in San Francisco. With the dear Husband, of course.  We would be doing a lot of wandering around the city to get our appetites up for the next meal. Breakfast: A chocolate croissant, from a real French patisserie, with a big cup of organic coffee. Snack: Half a fresh organic papaya. The Husband gets the other half. Lunch: Dim sum. Yummm. Stuffed eggplant. Taro cake. Sticky rice in lotus leaf. Chinese broccoli smothered in lots of garlic. Snack: One old-fashioned doughnut hole. Okay, maybe two. Dinner: Without doubt, a Korean dinner where we grill kalbi, tender short ribs, at the table. And, that isn't even the best part of the meal. That belongs to the banchan, the several small dishes of vegetables that are served on the side. Some spicy such as kimchi cabbage,  kimchi radish, and spicy beans. Some kinda sweet or mild to balance the s

I bet that title caught your attention. Maybe you shivered and thought I must be a vampire. Of course not!  Or, maybe you went, " Ewwwwwwww! " Well, turning blood, pork blood, to be precise, into pudding is definitely not for the squeamish. I was ten years old when the Daddy gave me the task of turning pork blood into pudding. (If I could, I'd put in a sound effect like Dum da da dummmm! ) Okay, let me give you some context. Back then, every now and then, the Daddy and his friends would purchase a pig from a local pig farmer, bring it back to our house, and slaughter it in the backyard. We lived in a small neighborhood two miles out of city limits so that was okay, and, as far as I know, the neighbors did not care.We lived in a rural area after all. This usually happened on a Saturday morning. The men would be out in the backyard partying it up with a bottle of whiskey as they butchered the meat. The pig's blood would be brought into the house to turn into a th

Click here to find other A to Z challenge participants. The clatter of metal against metal and heady aroma of frying pork, garlic, and onions lured me to the dark, cool kitchen that hot summer morning. At the stove was the Daddy's young cousin who was staying with us while on leave from the Navy. One hand shook a large grey soup pot on a burner, and the other hand stirred the ingredients rapidly with a large silver spoon that made a rhythmic clang against the inside of the pot. His body swayed and seemingly danced. The sizzle of the meat and vegetables was his music. I was maybe four or five years old. I don't recall the Mama being home, otherwise why would the handsome, dark-haired man with a sweet smile be at the Mama's stove. But, maybe that day the Daddy's cousin said to the Mama, "Let me cook." So that she could care for Baby Sister who Died too Early. Now that I think of it, that was more likely what happened. The Daddy's cousin smi

Who thinks Sunday is the start of the week? Who sees it as the end of the week? And, who shrugs and asks, "Is today Sunday?" "Wake up you sleepy heads!" Molly the Cat meowed rather insistently outside our bedroom door. I was ready to float back to sleep. So much for being lazy this morning. Today, I hope to get the Husband and me out the door to stretch our legs on a nearby trail. I'd like to see the green slopes and wildflowers before they are no longer. All signs say that we'll be going through another year of severe drought. A few weeks back, the newspapers were carrying stories that stated our reservoirs hold only one year's worth of water. In our county, the powers-that-be has decided to continue with educating us about water conservation rather than fining us for excessive use. Unfortunately, the stubborn folks, who don't believe that the drought is horribly bad, will continue to make sure their lawns are green.  For the past two years

When the Mama bought her lemon tree, she lucked out big time. Not only does it bear Meyer lemons, but it also gives forth citrons. Someone had grafted a couple of citron branches to the lemon tree, unbeknownst to her and possibly the nursery from which she bought the tree.  Some of the citron are Buddah's hands. They're the ones that are oddly shaped, generally looking like fingers. Buddah's hands can get truly creepy looking. Today I'm hooking up with Monday Mellow Yellows , hosted by Gemma Wiseman. Click here to see other yellow-colored interpretations of the world.

Did you know that you can buy tofu already cubed?  Seriously. I must quote the Mama now. "These businessmen are very smart. They know how to make money." The other night I opened what I thought was a container of a block of extra-firm tofu. As I was about to drain the now opened container, I noticed loose pieces of tofu. What the heck? Then, I saw that the container was full of small pieces of tofu. I looked at the wrapper. Extra-firm CUBED tofu!  Again: What the heck?   So much for having fried slices of tofu with roasted Brussels sprouts for dinner. It was time to get creative.  As the Brussels sprouts roasted in the toaster oven, I diced a fragment of orange bell pepper, a handful of browning chives, cilantro, and a bunch of garlic cloves. I also chopped salami slices, which I found in the freezer.  I heated a big glob of bacon fat. Yes, bacon fat. The bell pepper was thrown in first. Two minutes later, the cubed tofu. Stir. Stir. Stir . In went the res

I don't know what got into me. The Husband and I went to the supermarket yesterday afternoon to purchase fixings for split-pea soup for dinner. That meant grab a slice of ham from the meat department and fill a bag with about 2 pounds of split peas from the bin in the produce section. But, then we walked by the fish display. Wild, but previously frozen, Rex sole was on sale for $4.99 per pound. Neither of us ever had it before. Its name intrigued me. About a pound, please, sweet butcher lady. Then I saw the squid. Ooooh. And, the octopus. Double ooooooh . The squid would be a treat for the Mama and for me. The octopus, too, if cooked correctly so it wasn't all rubbery. The Husband doesn't care for either, but he can have 2 pieces of the Rex sole. So, I asked for about a half pound of the squid and a quarter pound of the octopus. As the butcher lady wrapped the items, I spied the locally made sausages. I turned to the Husband. "Shall we get some sausage?"

Today's letter is E . For more E posts, please click here . I've just only settled into a writing groove when it's time to go to the kitchen again. About eight years ago, the Mama's health was failing because of poor nutrition. All she wanted to eat was cereal or frozen waffles and 2% lactose-free milk. Thank goodness for milk. Maybe if she didn't work so hard and long in her flower and vegetable gardens, she could've made do. But, the Mama can't stand still. And, as we all know, when we live alone, we pretty much eat what we want to eat and when we want to eat it. So, about eight years ago, it was quite obvious that her high-carbo, minuscule protein diet had taken its toll on her body. The decision wasn't easy for everyone involved, but it was made. The mama, the husband, and I became roomies. Today, the husband and I seem to spend a lot of time in the kitchen every day. Me cooking; him washing dishes; and me, him, and the mama eating. Most days, three

I'm supposed to be downstairs finishing up what I started over a couple hours ago: . . .washing the fresh veggies we bought at the local farmstand  . . .turning the cut unripe mango into a sauce or something . . .combining the ripe avocado and quarter-cube of tofu into mashed avocado and tofu with garlic, green onion, tomato, cilantro, and (shhhh!) kimchee juice . . .creating some kind of casserole with the leftover BBQ chicken from last Sunday's Filipino Community BBQ fundraiser. Oh, and don't forget, self,  wash the lunch dishes.  The husband is normally the dishwasher but because I needed to hog the kitchen sink and counter I said I'd wash them. That is, I will after I'm done with everything else I need to complete. Maybe I shouldn't have let the husband off the hook. Lunch was a concoction of mashed banana, tofu, peanut butter, and fig jam on toasted blueberry bagel. When the husband took a bite, he asked, " What the heck is this?" "What? You

Today's letter is P . Pinakbet.   What a chicken says when it wants to gamble? Nope. Pinakbet. An Ilocano dish with eggplant, bittermelon, tomatoes, and long beans? Yep, that's it. If I happen to have kabocha squash and/or okra, I'll throw some into the mix, too. Depending on my mood, I'll make it with or without pork. On rare occasions, I'll go classic and add a bit of bagoong (fermented, finely ground fish or shrimp). I say rare because that stuff is very salty. Click here for a photo of what pinakbet looks like. How do you pronounce pinakbet? I say pin-auk-bit .  But, you must realize that I don't have an Ilocano accent. Never had. Pinakbet is one of my favorite dishes. When I was growing up, the mama cooked it often during the summer. Except for the onions and garlic, all the vegetables for the dish were freshly picked out of the daddy's garden. I have yet to eat a version that has topped or even come close to the mama's.  And, now, the mama's