Good things come to those who wait. I mouthed these words over and over like a mantra while I slowly stirred the milk and sugar together in the pot, while I awaited their magical transformation into my beloved buttery confection. Letting coconut milk simmer sounds simple enough but, truth is, making matamis na bao [...]
The summer sun burned my face. It burned my small nose and my big cheeks. Its heat clung onto the concrete curb and burned my bare feet. I stepped outside hoping for a respite, however fleeting, from the heat that swam around the house. I was a bored kid with nothing to do. No school [...]
“It’s just the two of us,” I told him.
Next to me, Stanford stood stumped. Puzzled at what I meant. He tilted his head charmingly and gave me the look — the “I-don’t-know-what-you’re-talking-about-but-that-carrot-you’re-holding-looks-pretty-darn-tasty” look. The chap loves his carrots. Stanford’s a smart snacker that way. I wish I could say the same about myself. I [...]
On the northeast corner of our lot sits our kitchen garden. A big fig tree, twice as tall as I, spreads out like a long espalier on its west side. The garden, roomier than a modest but nevertheless pricey one-bedroom apartment in the city, has two raised beds made of cinder blocks, strawberry troughs, and [...]
My deft fingers combed through its spiny flesh, picking its bones with a skill I learned when I was little, with a precision I painstakingly mastered through the years.
The smell of vinegar, crushed garlic, and cracked black peppercorns thrilled me. I know, it sounds like a tired cliché but it brings back so many [...]
Sprigs of wansoy [wahn-soi]. Slivers of green onions.
Garlic crushed and browned. Eggs hard boiled and halved.
I arranged the garnishes neatly on the kitchen counter, next to the bowls of egg noodles. The garnishes replaced the mise en place I prepared the day before: a large yellow onion quartered, carrots, celery, and a [...]
My dad was far from romantic. I can count with the fingers of my hand the number of times I remember him showing affection to my mom in front of me and my sisters. My mom would tell stories about how he wooed her back in the day with occasional carry-outs of mami [mah-mee] noodles [...]
This may sound foolish but it is true. I am very fond of shrimp tails. I eat shrimp from its head down to its tail. I leave nothing untouched, nothing unappreciated.
I cook shrimp almost always with shells on — deveined and cleaned, of course. With a pair of kitchen shears, I cut through the [...]
Oh, whisk me away from this winter, please!
I was cold. I was miserably cold. I was bundled up in layers but I was still cold.
There was frost on our rooftop. There was frost on the ground, on the grass where the girls graze. There was even ice in our pond in our [...]
At last, the sky cleared up. The rain trickled to a stop and a bow beamed from end to end over Waimea Canyon. We pulled over somewhere along Highway 550 to savor the scene. Fog continued to roll down the red, jagged slopes of the Na Pali mountains while the sea to the south surged [...]
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Jun Belen is the voice behind Jun-blog, a mouthwatering and heart-warming journal of Filipino home cooking nominated for Best Culinary Blog by the IACP. Subscribe to Jun-Blog and receive new posts by email.
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