A very green lunch

While at Elliott's play date yesterday, our organizer of the day brought zucchini and chocolate chip muffins. My kid basically devoured the whole thing. I still have some zucchini left in our fridge since it is a staple now, so just to use it up, I decided to make some for him today too but with a more cupcake batter rather than muffin so that it's a bit lighter.


By the time I was done with the cupcakes, it was already time for lunch. I just went grocery shopping yesterday and bought these beautiful Chinese long beans, or string beans and decided to make adobo with them. Adobo doesn't just apply to chicken or pork, at least for the region of the Philippines where I grew up, it's basically cooking in garlic, onion, soy sauce and vinegar.

This is what it looks like after I added it to my sweated onion and garlic. It's a little tough when not cooked through, so it does take a bit of patience before the right texture is reached. I like mine almost mushy but with a bit of crunch to it. I guess it can be easily said 'al dente' string beans. Once cooked, the green color of the beans is of course gone because of the soy sauce.

Once done, it looks like this. I always eat it with rice, my son has also developed a love for it. It's just one of those quick less than 6 ingredient one pot meals. It's simple, there really isn't much to it but it's comfort food. This is probably one of those few dishes that my Mom made that was pure vegetable that I was absolutely in love with. Alright, I'm off to my lunch date with Elliott and we're gonna go eat our very green food.

Cupcakes, cupcakes!!!

I made some cupcakes today for my husband's commander's going away picnic. They were just the regular chocolate cupcakes with buttercream and stout cupcakes with salted caramel buttercream. But since I'm having a total addiction lately for chocolate fondant, I couldn't help myself but stick some on all of them.

Sampaguita (jasmine) cupcakes with Swiss meringue Buttercream

The scent of a Jasmine, or Sampaguita as we call it in Tagalog, reminds me fondly of the Wednesdays that my mother and I would go to the church in Baclaran very early in the morning. There would always be kids selling strands of Sampaguita strung together. The air was filled with the sweet scent of it mixed with the smell of fresh baked bread in the bakeries nearby. I never really thought of baking with it, even though vanilla is from an orchid, the thought shouldn't really be too far off. I was reading my cupcake book "500 cupcakes" and got the idea to make my own version of a floral cupcake. The one they had on the book was one made out of lavender and honey, and another one with rose as a variation. I went to my local FIlipino grocery and got myself sampaguita essence. I had to pair my cupcakes with roses since I don't exactly have Jasmine nearby. It ended up tasting really great, a bit perfumy, but the lemon zest that I mixed in with the batter added freshness to them. I'd definitely make them again, maybe lessen the Sampaguita essence a bit. It's definitely a lot stronger in flavor as opposed to vanilla.

Heirloom tomato tart

During a recent trip to whole foods, I found these super gorgeous heirloom tomatoes. I planned on making chicken with it, an heirloom tomato sauce perhaps. I got some in green, orange and yellow. On a day while cleaning my kitchen, my son wanted to join me and begged profusely to stay in the kitchen as well. I gave him a pot and a wooden spoon to play with. I turned around to see him stirring something in the pot and to my horror, it was one of the heirloom tomatoes, thank goodness it barely had any damage to it, just a little hole. I washed and thought, great, now I have to use it and the chicken hasn't been defrosted. A tomato tart would be the fastest way to deal with it because between chicken breasts and puff pastry, puff pastry would be faster. Yes, I did think about making my own crust but between a pie crust and a puff pastry crust that comes in a box, convenience was of the essence that day. That itch to cook just had to be, well, scratched.

Fussilli with Pancetta and Zucchini

I guess I'm just really blessed to have a kid that's totally in love with vegetables. We always have to hit farmers' markets on a weekly basis and if we miss the chance, we'd have to go whole foods. I had a bit of need to have some Marsala chicken today but, to my demise, I find out that my fridge was not stocked with Marsala anymore. Looking around in the fridge, I found pancetta and zucchini so I made lunch out of that and the fussili that my little boy seems to love so much. Lunch date with the Elliott, sharing a bowl of pasta is such the perfect way to spend the afternoon before nap time. On another note, adding lemon zest to everything during the summer gets really, really addicting.