Jollibee's Plus Meals

I have to say, Jollibee's Corned Beef is pretty good. Comparable to even Purefoods and Delimondo. Sometimes, I even prefer it. But the problem with Jollibee's corned beef is that often times it doesn't seem like it's enough. I've finished the whole thing and I'm still hungry. Of course, I can order another one, but I really don't need additional rice, drink and egg. In fact, I really don't like the way they do eggs because they often overcook it.

Ilyn recently discovered that you can actually order extra corned beef. Just the corned beef. An additional order (Plus One) is P44. Two additional orders (Plus TWO) is P88. I'm like WOAAAH. All of a sudden, I'm ordering this A LOT for breakfast. A regular order of Corned Beef (around P100), and Plus Two Corned Beef and you get this huge pile of corned beef for only P188. And I no longer walk away hungry. If I can walk at all.

This is applicable to their other breakfast items like Tapa and Hotdog.

Thanks Jollibee!!

(THIS IS NOT A SPONSORED POST haha!)

Lucky Finds: Ox & Palm Corned Beef, Landana Cheese

I love going to the grocery. I always say it's kind of therapeutic, but it's more than that. I really enjoy going and seeing all the colorful and interesting things in it. There's something bountifully optimistic about them. That said, if I don't have money it's deeply depressing stepping into one. But when me and Ilyn have a bit of extra cash, we indulge in one of our very few guilty pleasures, and that is food.

A couple of weeks ago we went to Rustan's in Makati to see what new and interesting things we can take home. I love going to Rustan's because it has so much more than what your regular grocery usually offers.

For one, they have an absolutely awesome deli with incredible selections of cheeses and meat. In the old days we would buy things like Roquefort and Brie because they're the famous ones. Roquefort is notorious, being a blue cheese, for it's dark greenish mold all over it. Sounds disgusting? It smells weird and tastes weird, but strangely awesome. Check out this video of me eating Roquefort. To me Brie smells even weirder. Ilyn likes it. I like it too but not often. Because these cheeses are so er... unique and well, rather intense to eat, we don't get to eat it often so it just sits in the ref until it expires. And it's just too bad.

So anyway, when we went to Rustan's we decided to check out other cheeses. There were so many to choose from. Randomly I chose two: Gruyere and Landana Gouda Olives and Tomatoes. I don't know why I chose them, I just did.

That's not the actual cheese package I bought (that's just some random photo I saw online). The one in the deli was a big block and I asked to get just 200 grams, sliced thinly. The gruyere we got as a block because it's a hard cheese and it's usually grated.

Wow, did we luck into these cheeses! We love them both! First the gruyere. It's actually a melting cheese that's put in pasta and soups and can be eaten as a snack. I love eating it as is because it tastes really mild and not overwhelmingly salty. It also works really really well with pasta. It melted right on the pasta without any additional heating and added a really nice taste.  But the Gouda. Oh my God. It smells very slightly weird, but you forget about it as soon as you put it in your mouth. It's mild, and the olives and tomato are just in the perfect proportion to give a slight herby taste. We couldn't get enough of it. We finished all 200 grams in just a few days.

I also did a grilled cheese sandwich combining both gruyere and gouda and Ilyn really enjoyed it!

We loved it so much that when we went to a different Rustan's the past weekend (Marketplace at BGC), we got another 300 grams! At around P170 per 100 grams, I think it's very worth it!

Earlier in this blog I wrote about my favorite Corned Beef. My favorites included brands like Delimondo and Purefoods, both local Philippine brands. I really, REALLY hate to say it, but I found a new favorite in Ox & Palm. I only heard about this brand from a few, well, older people on Facebook, asking if we of the younger generation even heard of this brand. I do vaguely remember it, but I haven't been seeing it on the shelves at all lately.

So when I saw it at Rustan's I knew I had to get one. It was actually kind of expensive at P145 for a 200g can. I think that's twice as expensive as Purefoods. Would it be worth it? You see I love to try different canned corned beef brands. And more often than not I come away disappointed. I don't like brands like Libby's or Target because the meat is shredded a little too fine. I like my corned beef to have some body and heft and still looks like it did come from beef.

When the first spoon of Ox & Palm entered my mouth it was like holy crap this is awesome. It has a slightly intense smoky beefy flavor that was seasoned perfectly right. The beef still had some body to it like the beef had just fallen apart (and not mechanically shredded).  It was amazing. At P145 it's absolutely worth it. Sorry Purefoods and Delimondo! I still love you guys (and will still hang out with you once in a while), but for now Ox & Palm is my beef buddy!

EXTRA!  I'm always on the lookout for new and interesting sodas, or different iterations of common brands. So when I saw this Coca-Cola Life, I just had to try it. They say Coke tastes better when cane sugar is used. I actually couldn't tell the difference taste wise, but drinking this, which is sweetened by both cane sugar and stevia (the new hipster sweetener), it felt softer in the mouth, a bit more subtle.

Anyway, that's it for now. If ever we visit the not so usual grocery again like Rustan's or Makati Supermarket (which is curiously in Alabang), or South Super Market (in Los Baños), I'll make sure to post some of the unique and interesting things we might find.

Corned Beef From Scratch: Sinigang

If you're visiting this site for the first time, this is PART II of my Corned Beef From Scratch series. It's probably best if you read PART I first where I talked about creating corned beef from scratch in full detail.

I took half of the corned beef I cooked yesterday, put in on the ref with the stock and kept it there overnight.

Today, I made sinigang out of it.

Ok, now here's where I admit that I did not make the sinigang out of scratch. I used a combination of instant mixes of Sinigang sa Bayabas and Sinigang sa Sampalok. I know... I KNOW. If I had bothered to make corned beef out of scratch, then I should have taken the trouble to make sinigang out of scratch as well.

Well, I throw up my hands and say that you're right. But being only 60% happy with my corned beef, I wanted to know right away how it would do with sinigang and I really couldn't be bothered to go through the trouble. Perhaps when I'm completely happy with my corned beef, I'll be happy enough to do sinigang from scratch as well.

With perhaps around a liter of water from the wash water of rice, I threw in some crushed garlic and quartered tomatoes. I put the mixes in (I want really sour soup so I put more than what is usually indicated in the package), brought everything to a boil, added my vegetables which are okra, labanos, sitaw and the beef. I had cut the beef into smaller cubes, being very careful not to break it apart because by now it's so soft it's really falling apart. After boiling for some 5 minutes (you don't need to boil longer than that because the beef is already cooked, and the vegetables cook quickly), I added kang kong leaves on top, boiled for a minute more, and turned off the heat.

How was it? I was definitely happier with this, than I was with the Corned Beef Hash I made yesterday!

Corned Beef From Scratch

After tasting some awesome home made corned beef at Cafe Juanita, it pretty much inspired me and challenged me to create some of my own corned beef, from scratch of course!

Looking through recipes online, at first it seemed rather complicated, but after reading up some more, it really wasn't. It would just take a long time to do. Which is perfectly OK.

I ended up buying half a kilo of kalitiran, which is actually Blade Chuck if we're going by cow terms. I'm not sure if it's the best cut of beef for Corned Beef (it isn't, it's actually Brisket).

BRINING

Brining pretty much means submerging meat in water with a variety of spices. For this stage, these are the ingredients I used:

A container to brine the meat in.
Half a kilo blade chuck
2/3 cup rock salt
1 teaspoon pink curing salt
1 tablespoon pickling spices*
2 tablespoons brown sugar
1 liter water

*Pickling spice is a combination of equal parts the following spices:

all spice
mustard seeds
coriander seeds
cardamom (crushed)
a bit of cinammon stick (crushed)
bay leaf
ground ginger
whole black pepper corns
whole cloves
pepper flakes

You would need at least 2 tablespoons of pickling spice. You will use one now for brining, and one for later.

I sealed the container well and placed it inside the refrigerator.

SIMMERING

After 7 days I removed the beef from the brine and discarded the liquid. I washed the beef a little bit to remove remaining brine and spices that stuck to it.

I placed the beef  in a deep pot or dutch oven with around 2 liters of water. Turn the heat to high and bring it to a boil. Remove any scum that rises to the top. Once the scum is removed, I added 1 tablespoon of the remaining pickling spice. I brought the heat down as low as it goes, until the liquid is almost barely bubbling. I covered it and let it simmer like that for 3 and a half hours, or until beef is fork tender, but not disintegrating.

I then cut the beef and half, reserving one half for Corned Beef Sinigang (for tomorrow!) and the other half for Corned Beef Hash (for tonight!).

CORNED BEEF HASH

I sauteed some chopped garlic and onion and oil for a few minutes, added one finely chopped small potato.  and fried it for several minutes until the potato was just about soft and sticking to the pan. I then added half the beef and pulled the beef apart in the pan itself with a couple of forks which was easily accomplished since the beef was extremely tender. I added 1 large pinch of salt, some ground black pepper, and sauteed everything for a few more minutes.

I garnished the dish with a few sliced onions.

What's the verdict?

Well, it could have put more curing salt (I only used one teaspoon) to make the meat more red. The camera somewhat enhanced the color of the meat in the photo above. But I was wary of using too much of it.

I was also kind of puzzled that the meat didn't come out salty from the brining that I had to add additional salt in the cooking. Perhaps I should have just left the beef in the refrigerator after simmering it and used it a few days later to allow the taste to develop? I don't know.

Also, I probably used too much cardamom or some other spice.... because it seemed to be too noticeable in the finished dish.

As an experiment, I would say this was around 60% successful. I will try again!

Tomorrow the Corned Beef Sinigang!

Cafe Juanita: I Died and went to Food Heaven

Yesteray Ilyn and I went to Manila and finding ourselves in the Barangay Capitol Hills area, we decided to eat at Cafe Juanita. It's a restaurant I've heard so much about. In fact, it's been voted many times as the best that serves traditional Filipino food.

Oh yeah? We went ahead to try it out.

The first thing you notice upon entering the place is the visual assault of the many things that decorate the interior. I can't even begin to describe it. Here's a photo, showing just a small segment of the dining area.

Ok, that didn't even begin to show how crazy the decor is so I'll just leave it at that. The food is the important thing anyway. So how was it?

Ilyn and I ordered two things: Corned Beef Sinigang and Laing.

Seemed simple enough. I tasted the Laing first (pictured above). The Laing was presented in quite an ordered way, unlike the usual mush of leaves stirred endlessly together. They rolled the leaves over a meat of some kind and sliced it. I took a bite of one of the slices and oh my God, it was so awesome. I've eaten laing so many times before from so many different places. I don't understand how they can make it taste even better, even spectacular. My eyes were literally rolling in their sockets. I tend to do that when I taste something awesome.

I was eager to try the Corned Beef Sinigang next.

Ok, so they didn't just open a can of corned beef and made sinigang out of that. Apparently, they made their own corned beef but it still looked like whole pieces of beef, cut into thin slices. And once again, oh my God, the beef was probably the softest that's ever passed my lips (softer than that Donovan's steak). It's so soft that the mere pressure from a fork crumbles the beef into shreds. The soup itself is perfectly tart for sinigang, but it has something else in there that makes the taste so soft to the taste. Perhaps bayabas? I'm guessing it is.  Whatever it is, it's brought this dish right to the edge. Once again, I can't believe I'm saying this... I've tasted corned beef before, I've tasted sinigang before, but I'm not kidding when I say this is the best damned corned beef and sinigang I've tasted. It's kind of insane.

The nice thing about their sinigang is, they actually give you a small cup with some of the soup for you to preview its tartness and saltiness. The would ask you if it was all right or if they need to turn it up a little bit or lessen it. I've never seen anyone do that before.

Cafe Juanita, I love you, dammit! I'm coming back and next time I'm bringing my mom and dad.

Cafe Juanita is at 2 United Street, Barangay Kapitolyo, Pasig. Be sure to call to reserve a table at peak hours because apparently, we were lucky to find a free table when we came in. All the tables had "Reserved" on them! (02) 632-0357

Delimondo Corned Beef

At first I didn't pay attention to this brand of canned corned beef. No wait. Actually, I did notice it because well, it looked unusual. It looked like a generic product with a simple generic label. Actually, I thought it looked cheap. But the thing is, it wasn't cheap. In fact, this 380g can is more expensive than my usual favorite 380g can of Purefoods corned beef.

I left it alone because I was dubious about it and forgot all about it. Sometime later, I saw two of my acquaintances on Facebook post about Delimondo. I asked them if it was OK because to me it looked kind of dubious. Both of them told me, rather enthusiastically, that it was really very good and even competitive, taste-wise, to Purefoods.

Really? I thought well, OK. The next time I was at Rustan's I will try it out. Yes, unfortunately, none of our local groceries here in San Pablo carry it. I've had to wait until we had reason to to go Manila so I can pass by Rustan's so I can check this out.

I was still skeptical because Purefoods is probably the best canned corned beef I've tasted so far. And I've tasted a lot. A lot of the other local brands doesn't taste as well. They would either be a little too salty, or a little too flavorful. Or both! They are also colored rather abnormally red. I know all canned corned beef are colored, but still... the others really go over the top with it.

And I'm not just even talking about local brands. I've had imported brands as well, and the problem I have with imported canned corned beef is that they're too finely shredded. I like my corned beef to still look like very soft long shreddy beef.

The only one to come close to Purefoods before now was  Highlands corned beef, which I thought was also pretty good.

Ok so I finally got one of these Delimondo corned beef cans. They had a variety of different flavors like this Chili and Garlic as well as Ranch. I was hoping I could find one that didn't have any special flavors because I just wanted to taste the corned beef itself without any enhancements. Finding none, I settled on this Garlic and Chili flavored one.

I didn't do anything special with it. In fact, I didn't even use oil to saute the onion with. I just poured the canned meat directly on the pan and added chopped onion to that. Nothing more. I allowed it to simmer for a few minutes to reduce the liquid and that was it.

And so what did I think?

I think it was excellent! The beef was perfectly soft and shredded to my liking. And the taste was just right and not too salty and not too flavorful. Just exactly right. I loved it. And the one thing it had over Purefoods was it seemed less fatty. Usually when cooking Purefoods I would have to deal with quite a bit of fat that I have to pass the meat through a strainer to drain all the fat before I served it. No strainer required here.

Pretty safe to say Delimondo is now my favorite local canned corned beef!

I wouldn't say I would be switching completely. There is still the matter of accessibility and price. If it was available at local groceries I might buy more of it. Although I think it's expensive, I really wouldn't want them to lower their price and then lower the quality as well. I'd still buy this once in a while whenever I can afford it, but I'll still have my Purefoods from time to time.