Foot and Fire

              I am a fan of one casserole cooking. Easy and no-fail, casserole cooking involves beginner's technique and just a normal palate. Imagine putting all ingredients all at once and then let it cook and then tasting it  before removing from fire. No frills. No drills. And this rice topper is one of my favorites. You can use tofu, or beef tenderloin or chicken breast for this recipe. Labog is the leaves used here to give a subtle sourness but it can also be substituted with tamarind, batuan or lemon. But I love the leafy touch of labog and I eat it with relish.   Ingredients Slices of fish garlic onions turmeric ginger chili peppers salt and pepper labog or  roselle leaves salt and pepper to taste coconut milk (2nd press) coconut milk (1st press) How to: Extract cocomilk from the ground coconut flesh by adding 2 T of hot water. Reserve the milk. It is what we call the first press. Add 2 cups of water on the coconut f...

When I searched for Linabog in th web, I can see entries on Linabog but using a different souring agent and usually the fish called "pagi" is used. Also, they attribute Linabog to the Cebuanos and there is one video which explained that the word means "throw away" because the parts used in the dish are parts which are usually to be thrown away, like the bony "pagi." Meanwhile, there is also a "kinunot" way of cooking which means "hinimay" or flaked for the Luzon. The name was also coined for leftover parts of fish or chicken. In Hiligaynon, the word "labog" means forcefully thrown away.  This surprised me because when I was small, I heard from my father and his friends about this linabog and they used the leaves of labog plant. So I grew up having some idea of what linabog cooking means and definitely, the Cebuanos' definition of Linabog dish is far from my Ilonggo definition. And yes, Ilonggos ...