My husband cooks well,  his culinary skill is far better than mine.  Well,   I can cook but only simple and no fancy dishes.  In fact, I can survive with sandwiches alone.   But hubby won’t settle for fast foods because he loves to stay in the kitchen preparing and cooking dishes which are mostly from their region.  His favorite – combinations of vegetables simmered all together.  For true blooded Ilocanos or the G.I’s (Genuine Ilocanos), I know that this dish is their favorite too.    I would like to share the pinakbet recipe of my husband by posting it here for your reference.  For those who are not Ilocanos but would like to sample cooking this popular dish, read on:

How to cook Pinakbet Ilocano Style

Ingredients:

Vegetables like:

1/2 cup squash, cubed
5 pcs string beans, cut 3 inches long
5 pcs okra, sliced lengthwise
3 bitter melon (ampalaya) halved
5 pcs eggplant, cut half
3 pcs tomatoes, quartered
1 tbsp. ginger strips
3 cloves garlic, crushed
2 pcs onions, quartered
1 tbsp. fish bagoong
1/4 kilo bagnet or pork belly, fried until crispy
1 cup water

• Arrange all the vegetables in a saucepan.
• On top place the bagoong (shrimp or fish paste) and the pork belly then add water
• Add 1 cup of water. Cover the saucepan and bring it to a boil.
• Lower heart and simmer while stirring it slowly with a ladle
• Make sure that all vegetables are cooked and simmer until almost done.

My husband loves this dish and I also came to like it.   It is mostly vegetables but go slow with the bagoong or shrimp paste since it is salty.   You can do the dish without the pork belly and you may substitute it with chicken or shrimp.   However, if you do and made revisions, this will not be anymore considered as an authentic Ilocano dish.

Try it and you will like it.

I had two home made birthday cakes ordered from a friend which we feasted on two separate days that we were in the company of friends. Actually, my celebration was nothing grand… Let me say- it was simple but meaningful!   I am already way past the age of partying and socializing and I am maintaining close circle of very good friends and I just love being with people of positive values and outlook in life.   Those “nega” (negative) people are out of my list… although we were taught to love our neighbors and even our enemies.   Oh well….

Lol… this is my birthday cupcakes… Actually, I tried this set up of cake (cupcakes) and it was something different.   The number candles actually gave away my age (but I don’t mind).   I brought it in the office to share with my colleagues.

This is my second cake which I shared during a Leader’s forum.

Indeed, if we learn how to give and to share our blessings, it will come back to us a hundredfold!

Until I met Ana M. this morning that I was really convinced about the “miracle coffee diet” that they have been talking about.  She was holding her little insulated thermos which according to her, she carry  with her  anywhere she goes.  This diet craze (or a fad) is very popular among her co-teachers because she is the perfect example of one who lost so much weight by just drinking coffee.  Yes, I was really amazed how she did that!    She swore that the diet is very effective  (I think so too!).  As she recounted , she only changed her eating habits and she only take coffee as often and as much as possible and sometimes she only take an apple or orange to go with the caffeine.

Though I was impressed, still I believe that what she is doing is unhealthy!  So, even when she mentioned the coffee brand, I showed no interest at all.   Now that I am trying to recall the brand name, really it did not registered on my mind.   When I got home, because I was intrigued, I browsed the web to check if there is really a coffee diet.  True enough, there are articles posted about it.   However, I  need to find out  the coffee brand she is using.

I don’t know why I am beginning to visualize a new me (lol…in case I will try the diet!)

The famous Jollibee mascot

The Filipino version of Mc Donalds opened in Riyadh today!  After long months of anticipation, the famous Filipino fast food chain that is Jollibee finally saw the light of day… momentous day today, Sunday, 06 February 2011.  While in the office, our email in boxes were swarmed with joyous announcements sent by friends that Jollibee already opened!   Well, no doubt,  it is a Filipino thing.  It is our trademark!  So, we don’t want to be left behind and out of excitement, right after office, we headed to the store to be a part of those fellowmen “kababayans” who like us were too proud to see the shiny Jollibee mascot at the facade of the store and sample the  famous meals we loved so much back home.  Oh! It was a delight to see  the kids and their parents posed and inconspicuously took snapshots with the well loved mascot frontliner.  The store is manned by  almost 100% Filipinos and we can all feel the warmth in their service and for sure the store can be a help for those who are homesick even through their meals.

I ordered my favorite chicken joy with gravy and Jolly burger for hubby.  I was not surprised if the taste abroad is a bit different considering the difference in ingredients used here.  Since it is Jollibee afterall, we can tolerate the difference and appreciate the taste.  The chicken joy’s gravy comes close with the Philippine whip.

This weekend, expect that all roads will lead to Jollibee store and parking space will not be available.  So, better for us to stay away from the Batha area if we don’t want to get caught in the festive chaos..  Every Filipino especially the kids are excited over this good news….

Yehey!!!

Office  is not all paperwork, we also have occasional  ”table topics” that is … food … food.. food galore.   Pictures posted here are  our favorite food that we commonly serve in office get together.  Last time, to honor a colleague who will be leaving us for good, we prepared wide choices of food for lunch.   You bet, we all enjoyed it!

Our office “party” (done during 1 hour break time) is a welcome respite from the monotonous work of typing, file, request memos, regular meetings, conferences and dealing most of all with toxic staff and colleagues.  Such a stressful  office life!.

I think food really comforts us,  so our running joke in the office holds true… we are all on SEE FOOD DIET… because whenever we SEE FOOD , WE EAT!

Biryani

Homous

Beef

chicken

Chinese rice noodles

spring rolls

siomai

These are some of our favorite dishes… Yummy!

Sweets!!!   A favorite cake house near our workplace is the best place where we order sweets.   Be it a staff birthday celebration, a send off party or any office get together, you will find it served on the dessert table. It’s hassle free!  Ordered by phone and delivered free.

The last time we had this sweet treat was during our Christmas get together and it became favorite desserts for any gathering we have.  It may looked very rich with sugar and syrup but the taste is just fine and easy for diabetics.    For the sweet toothed, I know that these will suit them fine.   Actually, as long as we know how to regulate our consumption of  sugar, we don’t have anything to worry about acquiring diabetes.  The disease developed due to a lot of factors!

So let us always be in control and  to indulge once in a while.  There should be no excessive sugar intake!

How can one resist these sweet temptation???

Overindulgence !  … to food and drinks during the past Holiday season… It was the  season when most of those  who were on diet , threw their cares away and indulge in merry making, endless food and drinking.  And I was one  of them… actually I broke my “no rice diet” which I have painstainkingly withstood for more than 11 months and on the 12th month that is December, I started to care less.   Bad.. very bad me……

Who would not gain with generous servings of these food?

So I believe, now  that the New Year has started… I will start to go back to my diet because when I stepped on my new scale yesterday, I  was not at all  surprised if I am 1 kilo heavier.  I don’t have any misgivings because it was to my own doing and it such a waste of time of feeling sorry that I overindulged.    That is the result of depriving one’s body of food you love so much to eat and once you started to eat what you had avoided, you can’t help but get more than enough of servings.

For over 5 days now, I have started detoxification… Actually it is not the rigid detoxification my friend recommended.  I have started to psyche myself and I am now on the  initial phase of slowly cutting back of calories intake.  Initially, I am experimenting with drinking a glass of water mixed with  2 teaspoon of apple cider vinegar to a glass every meal.  I am aware that there is no miracle diet really but it is better this way, at least I am doing something to arrest my cravings.  I am just hopeful and I wanted to belive that this might work for me.  Of course, self discipline, cutting back on calories plus exercise  are proven means to shed pounds.

So, after the gain… there should be pain…

We’ve been to a Rheumatologist  who checked on my husband’s chief complaint of persistent neck pain.  The pain has been crippling him no end to the point that he can’t even drive well and if he does, there should be someone to assist him in giving him the go signal whenever he wants to turn either left or right.  His limited neck and head movement is really deterrent to his activities.  Moreover, he is obviously irritated and it is a lot harder for me to deal with a grumpy husband!

Prior to his check up he had undergone fasting for his scheduled early laboratory test.  The test  yielded high triglycerides and uric acid.  So, it’s clear now, the cause of his discomfort is  the high level of uric acid of 11 mg/dL. compared to the normal values  between 3.0 -7.0 mg/dL.  Dr. Lina advised him to take easy on foods that usually trigger the increase of urics in the blood.  The assisting  nurse pulled out a  ready copy of  Low Uric Diet  and I believe,  it  is worth sharing here.  Please read on. 

Foods to avoid:

1. organ meat like liver, heart, brain, kidneys
2. meat that contains high amount of fats like red meat, camel, duck, rabbit meat
3. luncheon meat
4. hotdog and sausages
5. seafood like shrimps, tuna, sardines, anchovies
6. lentils, lentil soups
7. mushroom, cauliflower, oatmeal
8. hummus
9. spinach
10. bean and peas (dry)
11. chocolates
12. Yeasts, and yeast extracts (such as beer, and alcoholic beverages)

As soon as we got home, I’ve done my reseach about Uric Acid so I can understand it better.   I found the following answers:

“Uric acid is a chemical created when the body breaks down substances called purines. Purines are found in some foods and drinks, such as liver, anchovies, mackerel, dried beans and peas, beer, and wine. Most uric acid dissolves in blood and travels to the kidneys, where it passes out in urine. If your body produces too much uric acid or doesn’t remove enough if it, you can get sick. High levels of uric acid in the body is called hyperuricemia.

Hope that hubby will follow what was advised.  It is hard to see a loved one in pain.  However, if he will still continue with his poor eating habits and lifestyle and will be in pain again… hmp.. I will ignore him so he will realize that he is misbehavin…..

…. words from a Shakira song…. It hits me bullseye for I won’t deny it, my hips expanded much to my dismay. Admittedly, I have totally blown out my self control
and for the past weeks now, I have done terrible on my diet. Yes, I succumbed to my moment of weakness and temptation, I gave in to eating without let up.

Now (oh no not again) I am thinking of challenging myself to lose weight. I have self declared last night (after my weigh-in ) that I will start my weight reduction program but my family is already used to hear my self pronouncements so I know it fell on deaf ears. The past months were very good for I had successfully got back on focus and was able to maintain my ideal weight. I even rewarded myself with a nice gold bangle for I was a good girl but the diet was ruined totally when my children came for vacation, I ate without any regret. Of course, we were very happy and ecstatic when they came so in celebration, we had successive eating and dining out.

I am very much aware, this yo-yo syndrome is not really doing me any good. I’ve been there, done that way too many times. A dietician friend whom I have consulted told me that starvation is not the way to lose weight. She said it simply, it is output vs. input. We should be burning more calories than what we eat everyday and it should be in combination with exercise and good balanced diet. True, it is really easier said than done but we really have to assess our life style if we are really bent in changing our outlook towards fitness. Further, she said that if we want to lose weight, we don’t need to starve ourselves in guise of dieting.

The other day, I casually asked one of physician staff on how I can lose weight fast. Simply she said “zip your mouth” Hmmm… true and I will take her word! I will give it a try and this time, I will make a realistic set of goals for losing weight.

Weight loss challenge? My hips won’t lie!

We grew up with our maternal grandfather who was strict.  Strict in the sense that he would not let us leave our dining table unless our  plate is clean.  He was teaching us the value of conserving  every grain of rice and not to waste food.  Because being a farmer himself, he knows the hardships of toiling in the farm.  So, we were taught to only put on our plate what we can consume.  He used to remind us that millions of people are getting hungry and dying and that food crisis is inevitable so we should be thankful that we have food to eat.  So why waste them?

Almost empty plate

We have carried on with us this kind of rules in the house that we should empty our plates and never to waste food ever.

I miss our grandfather… We’ve learned so much wisdom from him and empty plates always remind me of how frugal he was.