Holiday Dishes

Do you or your family make any special dishes for the holidays?

Yes we do. Back when we were still living in the province, every Christmas eve, mom and my aunts would prepare kakanin (sweets). We call them suman and bibingka.  Those are rice cakes which we loved to partake along with rice coffee. In those days, instant coffee was unheard of in our household. Nowadays, there are stores which specialize in them. Our place here in Cainta is known as the bibingka capital of the Philippines. It is our town fiesta on December 1 and every year, we celebrate this Sumbingtik Festival in honor of Our Lady of Light. Sumbingtik means suman, bibingka and latik. It is a week-long celebration.

Since I started my own family, I made it a point to cook something special. Embutido (sausage in Spanish) but in a Filipino household, we call it meatloaf. I usually prepare it days ahead before Christmas and it usually lasts till New Year. Siomai (dumplings) is another menu that I cook.   The rest of our Christmas and New Year meals are usually ordered online.

Read Full Post »

CONGRATULATIONS Nate.

Nissa sent me this promotion test video of Nate done yesterday. He is now a blue belter effective yesterday but the awarding for belt was not done yet. So happy for you big boy Nate. He is the one in blue.

I think the awarding of the Blue Belt is next week. Another morale booster – he just won in English Quiz Bee championship. Way to go Nate.👏❤️🎊

Read Full Post »

Cristo Rey And Advent

Sunday, November 24 marks the end of the Catholic liturgical calendar. Next Sunday December 1 is the beginning of Advent.

The solemnity of Cristo Rey which means Christ the King is the end of the liturgical calendar. Then comes Advent season next Sunday which is observed in most Christian denominations as a time of waiting and preparations for Jesus Christ’s birth  and the return of Christ at the second coming. Advent means ‘arrival’. It is a four-week season of remembering and celebrating the arrival of Jesus on earth.

Woke up early again and trimmed our Canna plants outside and swept the front and side of the house. There was a cold breeze blooming while I was sweeping the street. How lovely to greet the morning with  the cold wind touching my cheeks.

I started reading Larry McMurtry’s  Lonesome Dove the other night but  I haven’t made a dent yet. It is a Western novel, think about cowboys herding cattle on a great trail-drive, the friendship bonded between these people. I simply love the story and it is my first time to read a McMurtry book. Based on the synopsis of the book, it won the 1986 Pulitzer Prize for fiction.

Good morning everyone.🏜🎉🎈

Read Full Post »

Going Back To My Hematologist

I had my check-up with my hematologist yesterday. I just took a Grab ride to the hospital for easier transport.

As I have told you in another post, my platelet count is now normal. While waiting for the doctor, I had a nice conversation with a  couple from Antipolo. The wife  asked me about my platelet and I said for the first time in a year it is down to 414, it used to be around 500 and that is high enough for me. I was surprised when she told me, hers reached 800. She had a mild stroke and was hospitalized for four days.

I was fourth in line but there was this patient who was accommodated by the doctor before us although she came in late, an 84-year-old woman who has a very low platelet count. She looked so pale and can hardly walk. She was accompanied  by her son inside the clinic. Their companion though shared something to us. The patient doesn’t want to  be confined. So  low and high platelet are both detrimental to one’s health.

When it was my turn, I showed the doctor the result of my previous laboratory tests and told her my urinary tract infection has returned. She didn’t prescribed any medication for my platelet and UTI but she told me to come back next month for another CBC and urine test. She wants to make sure that my platelet is already normal now. InTagalog, we say “she is segurista”. Taking Sambong in the meantime as an alternative cure for my UTI. I’ve been a chronic sufferer of it since I gave birth to Nissa forty two years ago.

The things we do to stay healthy. Praying for another normal platelet result next month.🤲🤲🤲

Read Full Post »

It’s Nate’s 12th Year

HAPPY AND BLESSED 12th BIRTHDAY Nate. How you have grown, from a tiny baby to a young man now. I remember those days when you would make ‘kwento’ starting it with ‘One day….’I remember the times we used to pick kalamansi together and you called the passing airplanes big birds. And those times that you told me about what you saw in Legoland Malaysia where you spent your 7th birthday. And those times you sang and danced with gusto. I loved them all.

At twelve, you are a young man now. I am proud that you have another activity that you are focused on. Imagine earning 8 medals in a span of four months in Taekwondo. I admire your diligence in your studies always with honors every school year.

You are now taller than most kids for a twelve-year-old. A year ago, you were almost as tall as I am. Time flies. I am confident that you would succeed in every challenge that comes into your life. Nonna is so proud of you.
Birthday blessing on your 12th year.🥰❤️🌹🎂🎉🎈🎊🤲🙏🏻.I love you Nate. Stay well, healthy and happy.

(Photos posted at Our Precious Bundle of Joy)

https://nonnaarlene.wordpress.com

Read Full Post »

Early Morning

3am

That’s how early I wake up nowadays. Jovy and Josef went to the market this early to buy food for our dogs. They usually buy chicken breasts and chicken liver and a variety of vegetables which they mix with the diced chicken and a little of dog pellets.

5am

Oh to smell the intoxicating scents of our blooming  Kamuning and Camia, with our Aspin dogs following around and Max needing a belly rub.

6am

The sun has shown its face. What a blue, blue sky with not a cloud to mar it. It’s like summer days  but the wind bites.

7am

Time to prepare breakfast. I simply love this season of Amihan with nothing to worry about rains, typhoons and storm. The day is something to look forward to.🌝☀️🌞

Read Full Post »

Our Top Three Favorite Meals

What are your family’s top 3 favorite meals?

These three are all culled from my earlier posts here at WordPress. I call them our comfort food  and they occasionally appear on the dining table and always present during birthdays and some special occasions.

ADOBO is a very popular Filipino dish and cooking process in Philippine cuisine. It is usually made with chicken, pork or a combination of both. It is marinated in vinegar, soy sauce, garlic and other spices. It is slowly cooked until it becomes tender and flavourful. I like it a little dry like this with lots of fried garlic.

LUMPIANG SHANGHAI or what we usually call spring rolls. The filling maybe of ground pork or ground chicken  breast mixed with onion, carrots, seasonings, eggs and other spices then wrapped in a thin crepe called lumpia wrapper. I also make lumpia veggies out of thin strips of cabbage, diced sweet potato, carrots and a can of tuna or ground pork. Same procedure as that of lumpiang shanghai.

PANCIT BATO – one of the various traditional noodle dishes in Filipino cuisine. We have pancit canton, miki, pancit Malabon and  pancit bihon the most popular of which is the pancit bihon which I cook at least once or twice a month. It is mixed with pork, diced chicken meat and veggies like cabbage, carrots, chickpeas, Baguio beans and red bell pepper.

Read Full Post »

More On Books

I was looking at the new editions of books at Goodreads. They have plenty there, both fiction and non-fiction. Yearly, they have this ‘books of the year award’ in different categories. It’s fun knowing that of those mentioned by other readers, I have read myself.

Nice to discover a new Filipina-American author in Goodreads. Mia Manansala writes about kitchen mystery stories. She uses humor and murder to explore aspects of the Filipino diaspora, queerness and her millennial love for pop culture. Nice to see all these Pilipino words and cuisine incorporated in her books. Adobo, halo-halo, mamon, bibingka, guinatan. They are familiar dishes that I personally love and we usually have them in some occasions with the family. I am excited to read one of her books I found online called Arsenic and Adobo. She has this glossary of Tagalog words for those readers around the globe. It was nominated as one of the Goodreads  Choice Awards in 2022. Curious how she writes with some words in the vernacular too.

Done reading a mystery story called The Body in the Ice House by Kate Hardy which I recently rated four ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️. It took me a long time to read it though. She is another author on my list. There are books that I love to read with the theme about Christmas  for a change. We will be celebrating Advent on Sunday December 1 and ends on Christmas eve December 24. It is a four-week season which is the beginning of the Catholic Church’s liturgical calendar. I love reading books about how other people and nationalities celebrate Christmas.

Read Full Post »

Amihan

Finally, it’s here. Been waiting for it since October but we were inundated with six typhoons in a month.

I blogged about Hanging Amihan yesterday. Yeay for cold winds and longer nights.

Read Full Post »

Goodbye

I guess it is the most welcome word at the moment especially for those people in Bicol and in the North. Again, properties  were heavily damaged by the wrath of the Category 5 super typhoon Pepito. It left the Philippine Area of Responsibility (PAR) around 12 noon today.  We were at first under signal #3 then lowered to signal #2.

We were blessed and lucky that Metro Manila and Rizal just experienced continuous rain but not that strong. I am hoping it’s the last weather disturbance we had in our neck of the woods. Hanging Amihan or northeast monsoon is just around the corner. It’s rather late though in coming. Amihan is characterized by cool northeast wind, moderate temperatures and little or no rainfall. It usually occurs from October to late March and is caused by a cold, dry air mass that originates in Siberia. Amihan is the Tagalog term for wind or winter storm.

“Goodbye Pepito, may you be blown away as you approach the sea.”

This enhanced northeast wind surge is actually not favorable to the typhoon which has weakened as it left PAR.

Read Full Post »