Here at home, mashed potatoes are probably among the dishes my family enjoys the most. Here at home Wednesday is my assigned day to cook dinner. I’ve been serving grilled steaks and mashed potatoes and waiting for my family to complain about the repetition but, it hasn’t happened. As a matter of fact, they keep asking for it. 😁
Thankfully, mashed potatoes are straightforward to make. I don’t understand why there is even such a thing as instant mashed potatoes because, honestly, preparing it is so simple, that it may as well be instant. But I guess instant mashed potatoes are really geared more toward people who do not want to have to deal with peeling potatoes.
Over the years I have developed my own technique for making this yummy side dish. It may not be original (I’m sure someone else is doing it this way) but through experimentation, I’ve found this to be the most efficient way to make it. Traditional recipes will tell you to wash the potatoes, boil them with the skin on, then when they are cooked, you peel the potatoes before mashing them.
That does not work for me.
Hot potatoes are not easy to handle.
If you wait until the potatoes are cool enough to handle and peel easily, it makes them more challenging to mash properly and infuse with flavor.
This is why I like to do things differently. I like to peel and slice the potatoes BEFORE cooking them.
Mashed potatoes are a good side dish to anything fried or grilled.
Prep Time10 minutesmins
Cook Time15 minutesmins
Total Time30 minutesmins
Course: Side Dish
Keyword: potatoes
Author: Penny Angeles-Tan
Ingredients
1kilopotatoesI prefer using the big ones, as it means less potatoes to peel but, really, the size does not affect the taste so use whatever is available.
1tsp.salt
1cupmilkIf you want the mashed potatoes to be creamier, go ahead and add more!
2tbsps.salted butterA lot of recipes you will find online will tell you to use unsalted butter. I say, bring on the salt! It just means I have to add less (or not at all) at the final tasting.
Just after I made some Korean Corn Dogs at home, my family spotted some frozen Korean corndogs at Waltermart. At less than 300 pesos for 10 pieces, this is pretty cheap and very convenient.
Taste
It tasted okay. It’s an instant thing so nothing earth-shattering. As with all corn dogs, you can add your favorite condiments to suit your taste. A quick snack, and one that everyone in the family enjoyed.
The pack we got was for the basic corndog. They may have other varieties and we will try them all (when we find them).
Advantages:
Inexpensive. It comes up to about 30 pesos per corn dog. That’s less than the current price if you buy from most stalls/stores.
Quick to cook. This is a just fry product. Takes just a few minutes to enjoy this treat.
No prep, no mess. – Nothing to do but heat some oil and eat when done.
Disadvantages:
texture – the bread came out a bit dry. I prefer my corndog to have a slightly softer feel.
Overall, I still think it’s okay. it’s something you can keep on hand if you love Korean Corn dogs and have no time to make it from scratch and can’t have it delivered.
I have a confession to make. This was actually the first Purefoods Ready to Eat Viand I experimented with but it didn’t turn out well so I decided to redo it. Since I only eat rice once a week now, I could only wait until my cheat day to make pork binagoongan rice properly. 🙂
The first time I made it I made the rookie mistake of cooking this dish in a pot over direct flame instead of the way I would normally cook rice. It was a mistake because I was so worried about burning the rice at the bottom that I kept stirring it. The end result was the pork slices crumbled. It still tasted good but it wasn’t presentable. Usually, we steam our rice in a steamer but since it was being used I decided to bring out the rice cooker.
For this recipe, we will use the Purefoods Ready to Eat Viand: Pork Binagoongan. I loved making this dish because it really stretched out and fed our entire family with rice to spare!
1packPurefoods Ready to Eat Viand: Pork Binagoonganchopped while frozen
3cupswashed rice
3cupswater
2tbspsbutter
Instructions
In a wok, saute the garlic, onion, and mushrooms.
Add the pork binagoongan mix and simmer until it is melted.
Add the washed rice and mix properly. Be careful not to overmix or the meat will be shredded. You just want to make sure that all the rice is covered in the sauce.
Turn off the stove and transfer the content of the wok into the rice cooker and add the water. Cook.
Once the rice is cooked add the butter and fluff the rice.
Your pork binagoongan is ready to be served and eaten.
Notes
Pork binagoongan is usually served with eggplant. In this recipe, I did not include it as I happen to be allergic to eggplant but feel free to add it to your own. You can also add green onions at the end as a finishing touch.
It was delicious! There was so much that each of us had about 1 to 1.5 cups each. Since there was some leftover, my sister decided to jazz it up more by refrying it and adding light soy sauce and scrambled egg. The only thing missing was the sliced mangoes. 😀
I love eating spicy food. So do my daughter and sister. When I showed them the Purefoods Ready to Eat Bicol Express they were excited to try it.
Purefoods Ready to Eat Bicol Express
But that is just half the household. The other half has a low tolerance for spice but were still willing to try it. This gave me a challenge – how do I prepare this so that it is not so spicy but it will still be delicious?
Home Foodie PH suggestion
Home Foodie PH suggested Bicol Express Pizza so I looked over the recipe
Ingredients:
2 pieces store-bought pizza crust
1 (450g pack) Purefoods Ready to Eat Bicol Express thawed out in the chiller
2 cups mozzarella
1 (165 gms) Magnolia Quickmelt cheese
1 (100 g) red bell pepper, cut into strips
1 (100 g) green bell pepper, cut into strips
For chili honey
1 tbsp. chili flakes
1/4 cup honey
Procedure:
Preheat oven to 450o
Assemble pizza by spreading Bicol express sauce on each pizza crust surface.
Add mozzarella and Quickmelt cheese to each crust. Top with Bicol express meat and bell peppers.
Bake for 10 minutes or until crust is golden brown and cheese has melted.
Makes 16 slices
(Yield: 2 pc 12-inch pizza/1-2 slices per serving)
Sounds simple enough, right? And pizza is a great idea because that much cheese would partially neutralize the spiciness so that the rest of the family can enjoy the pizza, too. Unfortunately, not all the ingredients are readily available in my kitchen. One small piece of bell pepper costs ₱48. Mozzarella cheese is not only expensive but is not readily available in nearby groceries.
What I ended up doing
Substitution is key! 🙂
I did away with the mozzarella and used cheddar cheese all the way instead.
Goodbye, bell peppers, I can’t afford you.
chili honey – I didn’t need to make it or use it as the pizza was flavorful in itself.
pizza crust – seeing as how I used to work in Shakey’s many years ago, I actually do know how to make a pizza from scratch so I decided to make my own pizza crust.
This is a very simple, easy-to-follow recipe for making a pizza at home from scratch. The crust will turn out soft and pillowy and a pleasure to chew.
Prep Time15 minutesmins
Cook Time25 minutesmins
Course: Snack
Cuisine: American, Italian
Keyword: pizza
Servings: 16slices
Calories: 153kcal
Author: Penny Angeles-Tan
Equipment
measuring cups
measuring spoons
mixing bowl
rolling mat
baking tray
chopping board
knife
pot or pan of your choice
cheese grater
stove
oven
Ingredients
1cupwater
1tbspsugar
1tbspinstant yeast
1tbspmelted butter
1tspsalt
2cupsall-purpose flourplus a little extra for dusting later
1packPurefoods Ready to Eat Viands Bicol Expressfrozen
1tbspoilfor oiling the pan
165gramscheeseor enough to cover the pizza twice
Instructions
Mix the sugar and the warm water in a mixing bowl until the sugar is melted. Make sure that the water is not too hot then add the yeast. If your water is too hot the yeast will die. Tip: The water should be warm to the touch but won't burn you. Allow it to sit for 5 minutes to allow the yeast to ferment and form bubbles. If this does not happen that means that your water is too hot and your yeast died so you will have to start again.
Add the melted butter (make sure it isn't hot!) and mix.
Sift the flour and salt into the bowl. Make a well in the middle and add the wet ingredients and mix. Keep mixing, this will form into a sticky/tacky dough ball.
Take the dough out of the bowl and put it on the rolling mat and knead for a few minutes. Don't worry about your muscles getting sore because this recipe does not need a lot of kneading. You just need to look at the dough and knead until you see that all the ingredients are well incorporated. From my personal experience, it just takes 10 to 15 times to fold and knead and you are good. It is just like playing with Playdoh.
If you are making a round pizza crust then roll it into a circle with a rolling pin. Take note, though, this recipe makes either two standard size crusts or 1 big crust.
Oil your baking pan/tray on all sides and transfer the dough onto the pan/tray and let it rest. This will still expand. In the meantime, turn on the heat in the oven and wait until it hits around 400F.
While waiting, open your frozen package of Purefoods Ready to Eat Viands Bicol Express and cut it up into several strips. and put the strips in the pot (or pan) with 1 to 2 tbsps of water for thawing and simmering. I like to put it on low to medium heat and simmer it for 8 minutes. Turn off the stove after.
If you want to make a rectangular or square pizza you can use your roller to stretch it down and out more. Don't worry that it is too thin, like I said, it is still expanding. if you decide to make your crust into a rectangle then there is no need to make 2 small pieces as you already have one big one.
Once the oven has hit the desired temperature, place the baking tray on the lowest rack of your oven and bake for 5 minutes.
Take it out of the tray and use a fork to pop and bubbles that formed. Scoop the sauce of the Bicol express onto the crust and spread it. Sprinkle a thin layer of cheese on top of the sauce.
Put the Bicol express meat over the cheese and any other topping you want to put on the pizza such as mushrooms, bell pepper, onions, etc.(3)
Top everything with cheese(4) again then put the pizza back in the oven and bake for 10 minutes.
Turn the tray and bake for another 10 minutes.(5)
Your pizza is done and ready to eat.
Notes
See the notes after this recipe
Pizza Crust nutrition facts
One slice of the pizza crust is 68 calories.
Purefoods Ready to Eat Bicol Express nutrition facts
As per the packaging, the calories in one serving is 296 calories, but that is assuming 4 servings. Since this is a 16 slice pizza, each slice has 74 calories.165 grams of cheese divided by 16 = 11.25 calories.This means that each slice of Bicol Express Pizza = 153.25 calories
Notes:
This recipe makes a pizza that is FILLED with ingredients. You can make another crust and split the filling to make 2 pizzas.
Most cookbooks will tell you to preheat the oven before doing anything else. Personally, I find that a waste of gas so I would recommend not turning on the oven until you actually need it. After all, it doesn’t take too long to heat up.
Some prefer to thaw first and then cut up but personally, I’ve found that it is easier to cut up meat, especially those with sauces like these ready-to-eat meals when they are frozen. It helps, of course, that I use a cleaver. Since there are so many of us here at home this is my way of making cut-up meat stretch out so that everyone gets to eat.
Only 3 things are limiting you – budget, available ingredients, and imagination
I didn’t have any mozzarella so I used cheddar all the way
If you are using a gas oven this is one way of ensuring that the pizza is cooked evenly. We used to do this, too, at Shakey’s.
The amount of cheese to put is really up to you. I can’t recall the exact weight anymore after all these years but a handful of grated cheese is usually enough to cover a large pizza so for this recipe, you will need 2 handfuls. I think that it would approximately be 165 grams or a small block of cheese.
You can also use cheese squares if you like, but you will likely end up using more cheese if you do. But, as I said, the amount of cheese is completely up to you. 🙂
How did it turn out?
The crust is soft and chewy and delicious and the Bicol express made me very happy. The spice level was just right and the meat was soft and juicy and oh so delicious! My sister even tells me that I could reduce the Bicol express toppings when I add veggies so I could make two rectangular pizzas. Next time I do this I will cut the pieces smaller so that it will be easier to split into more pizzas. 🙂
Try this recipe or make your own. Or, just eat it the Bicol express as is! It is your choice. When I decide to eat this with rice you can be sure it will be over a bowlful of steaming hot rice and probably an egg on top. Breakfast rice toppings, yes! Now I’m hungry again, lol!
Purefoods Ready-to-Eat is available at all leading groceries and supermarkets nationwide. Follow Purefoods on Facebook and Instagram.
Welcome back to my kitchen. 🙂 For dinner today I took a look at my stash of Purefoods Ready to Eat Viands and after a lot of thought, I decided to do something different with the Purefoods Beef Pares.
Beef pares brings back a lot of memories for me. It is one of those dishes that late-night denizens are wont to enjoy – it is served quickly and every bite is flavorful and filling. For many years my husband and I would drop by the pares restaurant not too far from our house after a gig just to grab a bite before heading home. But while it is quick and easy for us, the patrons, preparing it takes a lot of time. This is one reason I am quite thankful that Purefoods decided to produce this line – for doing the slow cooking for me.
Quick and Easy
On its own, this ready to eat viand is simple itself to prepare. Whether you heat it up on the stovetop or the microwave, just put it in a container and heat up for 8 minutes and you’re done! All that is left is to serve it then scoop a serving over hot rice. This package is good enough for four people.
Extending the dish to feed more people
There are seven people in my household and if I served this dish as is then Not everyone will really get to eat (especially since half the family eats twice as much!) so, it was time to once again get creative in the kitchen. Aside from the beef pares I had garlic, onions, carrots, mushrooms, and dangmyeon (Korean glass noodles). I decided to make japchae. With the addition of the noodles, this dish can now feed twice as many people.
Some notes:
When slicing the Purefoods Ready to Eat Beef Pares I would recommend doing this frozen so that the meat is easier to slice into strips and none of the sauce is wasted.
I used onion, carrot, and mushrooms, but really you could add any vegetable you want. Some commonly used ingredients for japchae are leeks and broccoli, and some like using bell peppers.
Technically, I could have used any kind of noodles like canton, bihon, or sotanghon, but I like dangmyeon the best. Sotanghon and dangmyeon are both vermicelli noodles but sotanghon is made from mung bean flour while dangmyeon is made from sweet potato flour. Dangmyeon turns into glass noodles that are thick and kinda sticky, which is what I like about japchae.
The package I bought was 500 grams and for this recipe, I only used 300 grams but I cooked all of it anyway. From personal experience I’ve noticed that usually when there is just a little bit of the dish left there is usually a lot more meat than noodles so I just add the remaining 200 grams to the leftovers, heat them together, and I just add japchae sauce.
This is the japchae sauce I used. I think I bought this and the noodles from Landers but they might also be available at other grocery stores, I just never really looked. You could also add this sauce to the beef pares japchae to make it more flavorful, but I would recommend trying it without first.
As a finishing touch, you can sprinkle toasted sesame seeds on your noodles.
Purefoods beef pares is a savory-sweet dish which made it perfect for making japchae. It takes the guesswork out of having to make a japchae sauce and sourcing exotic ingredients … or buying a bottle of japchae sauce. 😀
Even though I am calling this a “level up” dish it is actually effortless to make! In less than 20 minutes I was able to feed my family! And, as my sister likes to say, it is a complete dish in itself. 🙂
Yum, yum! Prepare this yourself and enjoy! We did. 🙂
300gramsvermicelli noodlesI used Korean glass noodles aka dangmyeon
oil
salt and pepper to taste
Instructions
Preparation
Boil water in a pot. Once it is boiling place the noodles in and boil it for 5 minutes.
Rinse the noodles in cold water and set them aside.
While still frozen cut up the beef pares into strip-size and set aside. I would recommend putting it back in its original container so that none of the sauce is wasted.
Peel and chop the garlic, onion, and carrot. If you bought whole mushrooms just slice them thinly.
Cooking
On medium heat saute the garlic for about 30 seconds, add the onions. After a minute add the carrots and mushrooms and simmer.
Add the beef pares, mix, and simmer for another 8 minutes.
Add the noodles and mix until all the noodles are covered in the sauce of the pares. Add salt and pepper to taste.
Turn off the heat and serve. Your beef pares japchae is ready to eat!
Purefoods Ready to Eat Viands is available at all leading groceries and supermarkets. The price varies depending on the variant that you get.
For this recipe, we will use the Purefoods Ready to Eat Viand: Pork Binagoongan. I loved making this dish because it really stretched out and fed our entire family with rice to spare!
Technically, I could have used any kind of noodles like canton, bihon, or sotanghon, but I like dangmyeon the best. Sotanghon and dangmyeon are both vermicelli noodles but sotanghon is made from mung bean flour while dangmyeon is made from sweet potato flour. Dangmyeon turns into glass noodles that are thick and kinda sticky, which is what I like about japchae.
This is the japchae sauce I used. I think I bought this and the noodles from Landers but they might also be available at other grocery stores, I just never really looked. You could also add this sauce to the beef pares japchae to make it more flavorful, but I would recommend trying it without first.
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