February 10, 2008

Food and iPod

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a Filipino breakfast of chicken tocino, garlic fried rice and fried egg

My regular readers may have noticed that I have been cooking food that I have seen in movies or songs I recently played from my iPod list. I have written about The Beatles' Savoy Truffle and Cibo Matto's Le Pain Perdu and very recently Puerco Pibil and Crepes. Some bloggers include the songs they were listening to while preparing the food for their posts which gave me the idea of associating my song list with food. The songs should not necessarily be about food but have the potential to be associated with food. My daughter suggested that I set my iPod to shuffle for the surprise aspect, then choose one of the songs out of the first 5 or 10 songs and prepare a dish for that song. To my utter surprise the 5 songs have food or at least subjects that can easily be related to food.
  1. Umaga (morning), Susie Ibarra - breakfast
  2. Big Eater, The Bad Plus - a dinner of T-bone steak, mashed or baked potato, Elaine's The Big Salad, and a slice of apple pie a la mode fit for a king, i.e. David King of TBP
  3. Criss Cross, Thelonius Monk - hot cross buns or chocolate pretzels
  4. Beef Jerky, Cibo Matto - beef jerky
  5. Midnight, Jimi Hendrix - a light snack or a nightcap
Choosing which song was sooo easy, of course it's Umaga by Susie Ibarra, a Filipino-American avant/free jazz drummer and percussionist. The song is from The Susie Ibarra Trio album FOLKLORIKO which is a tribute to Filipino migrant workers. To hear samples of her songs click on the album title. On this CD she plays the kulintang in one song and in the second part of the CD titled Lakbay (journey) the drums and percussions accompanied by piano and violin.

Umaga (morning) of course starts with a substantial breakfast and for Filipino workers it means fried rice and meat or fried dried fish such as danggit from the Visayas. I myself did not eat fried rice for breakfast while growing up, we ate pandesal and sliced bread and up to the present only eat it on weekends, sort of a special treat when we are more relaxed and do not have to hurry for school or work. I decided to make chicken tocino because I wanted to try the homemade anise liqueur I recently made and because someone asked for the recipe.

Chicken Tocino
2 pounds boneless skinless chicken thighs, sliced thin
¼ teaspoons pink salt (Instacure #1)
1 tablespoon sea salt
2 - 4 tablespoons sugar
2 tablespoon anise liqueur or red wine
1 tanlespoon vinegar
1 teaspoon ground white pepperMix seasoning ingredients. Rub chicken pieces well with the mixture. Place in a ziploc gallon freezer bag and refrigerate for 3 days.
  • To cook: in a non-stick skillet arrange a few pieces of the cured meat with 2 tablespoons each of water and vegetable oil. Turn heat on to medium low, cover, and cook until all the liquid has evaporated. Uncover and shallow fry until browned on both sides. Serve with garlic fried rice, fried eggs, diced tomatoes, and vinegar dipping sauce. Freshly brewed Barako coffee is optional.
Fried rice: In a non-stick wok, heat 2 tablespoons light olive oil, add 2 cups warm cooked rice, sprinkle with 1 - 2 teaspoons crumbled fried sliced garlic (available from Filipino/Asian stores), and 2 teaspoons sea salt. Stir fry for 2 minutes or until rice is heated through. You may also use fresh garlic. Fry it first in the oil until golden brown before adding rice. I prefer using the fried garlic from the Philippines for the convenience and stronger garlic flavor.

I think this would be an interesting food meme exercise. Go ahead and try it for yourself, food and music association will occupy your time and mind instead of agonizing on whether your favorite candidate will lose to the opposition.:D

13 comments:

Chibog in Chief said...

this is what i have been longing for such a long time now:-) tocino with fried rice :-) since i met my hubby our kitchen smelled more bread and croissant in the morning :-)

ps i need to think about this music and food thing

Oggi said...

dhanggit I don't mind having bread specially croissants for breakfast everyday.:)

Sidney said...

I am for Obama... so I think it is good you cook instead of convincing people to vote for Hillary ! ;-)

Anyway, this is delicious stuff but I would only recommend it for construction workers who will do hard physical work.
It is a no no for couch potatoes like me...

Chibog in Chief said...

if you are eating croissant everyday you will surely miss pandesal and fried rice from time to time :-) thats why this post is really comforting one :-)

Oggi said...

Oooh nooooooo Sidney! Obama is the spawn of the devil!:D
Yes, all the SILOGS make you eat lots of rice. Some old folks used to comment to people who put a mountain of rice on their plates "Are you a construction worker or do you work at the docks?":)

Dhanggit you really miss Filipino food.:)

Anonymous said...

Thanks for that link to Susie Ibarra. I used to train in escrima and my instructor had a CD of kulintang music that he would play as we trained. It's such an unusual instrument.

also, i wouldn't mind either hillary or obama. but i admit, i'm leaning towards obama.

Oggi said...

You're welcome Marvin. Susie Ibarra's music is an acquired taste, her sound is a little bit minimalist.

Wow you trained in escrima, that's great! Now I believe you can kick a bull in the groin and kill it, hahaha.

My gut instinct is telling me not to vote for Obama. I see him as having the dreaded qualities of the Philippine dictator Ferdinand Marcos. I'd rather vote for a Republican *gasp!* than cast my vote for him. But then, I don't like McCain either so I will probably not vote at all, sayang. But I'm still hoping Hillary will pull an Eli Manning and eventually win the nomination.:)

 gmirage said...

Your tocino looks yummy, I don't like tocino much if the color looks so artificial...I mean they have those flavors that gives them the color but this really looks nice!

I get lost sometimes looking for your blog, if you dont mind I'd hook you up to mine ha?

It would be here: http://diekuecheundich.blogspot.com

Good day! Thanks for the wonderful recipes and photos!

Oggi said...

g_mirage go ahead and hook away. I will also link your blog to mine under the images category, I love looking at beautiful photos.:)

The tocino recipe is very good, you can also use pork which will have a deeper pink color which comes from the prague powder.

 gmirage said...

Thanks for the tip, I like chicken better than pork and we actually almost don't eat pork =D I'll try this with chicken real soon! Good day!

Anonymous said...

ill stack all of that and make a sandwich or cup of overloaded garlic rice...

Oggi said...

gizelle, eating less pork is so much healthier.:)

sakai, sandwich is a great idea, I'll have that for breakfast tomorrow!:)

Anonymous said...

Just discovered your wonderful blogsite! You're awesome. The pictures are simply beautiful; I could almost reach over the monitor and taste your food.
Thank you for sharing your passion of cooking, your quirky thoughts and recipes.

Where can I buy the prague powder to fix the chicken tocino? This is the first time I've heard of it!

Million thanks.

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