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Tag: Filipino

  • My Father & Food: My Filipino American Story

    My Father & Food: My Filipino American Story

    When I think of my father, the only good thoughts appear around food. It’s often how we remember people, how we ate with them at a dinner table or cooked beside them. It’s not how we wish they were, but as they were. In a time when immigration has yet again become so politicized and misunderstood, I think about my father, whose name was Primo. He was a complicated man, an immigrant, an enlisted Navy veteran of 40-plus years and a man I never truly knew. I knew that he walked to school on pristine beaches and white sand. His parents — my grandparents — were killed by U.S World War II pilots, flushing out enemies that hid in the dense jungles of the archipelago. Casualties of friendly bombings, if you will. He, along with three siblings, was adopted by family members. Tropical Cindafella — only hard work, cleaning the relative’s home for his keep, but grieving his childhood and loss. He was never quite taught how to be a father because he didn’t have one, nor were those around him capable. They, too, were mourning the deaths of their children and others. War, ultimately, guarantees that generations will suffer.

    Because of his loss, what I received from him wasn’t warmth or fatherly advice, barely even love — although, my stepmother might argue that. However, when I lived with him briefly in my teen years, I was given his childhood memories of growing up and eating in the Philippines.

    My dad's family and me.
    My father’s family and me.

    But Primo enlisted in the U.S. Navy and served a country that didn’t always see him. He stood watch on ships, served abroad, and carried that discipline into every corner of his life. It wasn’t gentle. But it was service and took him away from what he knew. You might even say joining the armed forces gave him a father. He learned about combat and racial discrimination. He learned infidelity and deceptiveness — to lie when he was caught. He did that quite often.

    But he loved seafood.

    If it came from the ocean, it was on his plate. Prawns, squid, bangus, and crab legs soaked in garlic butter and eaten with his hands. He would suck loudly suck the juice out of the shrimp’s head. “Mmmm, that’s good,” he would say to us around the table: my half-siblings, his second wife, her mother and me.

    The sea reminded him of something he had left behind: it was full of free and accessible food. It was easy for him to catch fish with a handmade net and cook the nightly meal he had to make as an indentured child servant. When my stepmother or her mother didn’t cook adobo or pancit, he would make a bowl of halabos na hipon—Filipino-style buttered shrimp and rice—always rice.

    When I cook this dish today, I can focus on his trials as an immigrant and his service in the Navy. Not as a father or someone I knew well, but as a figure in my history, a uniformed man who battled on iron ships and his demons. While I toss the garlic and shrimp, with splashes of carbonated lemon soda, and simmer to a tasty syrup, I imagine his life’s grueling and uphill battle. I never fully understood him dismissing me as his son until I wound up on his doorstep, thinking he could save me.

    My dad's family.

    Today, we wrestle, yet again, needlessly, around immigration. As if that’s the problem. My father wasn’t perfect, but his journey — from the Philippines to military service in the U.S. — helped build this country. It’s easy to forget how many of our most valued dishes — tacos, pizza, hamburgers, French fries, dumplings — were brought here in the bags and bellies of people like him. Immigrants have never taken anything from the United States and this country, they bring flavor, resilience, and stories.

    This isn’t a tribute to Primo on Father’s Day. Although he was my blood, he was many things: a loving father to his other kids, a daughter and a son, a veteran, a man who loved seafood and a proud settler to the United States. He loved this country as so many immigrants do.

    Garlic Butter Shrimp (Halabos na Hipon)

    Serves 2–3

    Ingredients:

    • 1 lb head-on shrimp, shell on (I used shelled shrimp. Since I live in Indiana, it’s hard to find whole shrimp).
    • 2 tablespoons unsalted butter
    • 1 tablespoon neutral oil (canola or vegetable)
    • 6 cloves garlic, finely chopped
    • 1/4 cup Sprite or 7-Up
    • 1 tablespoon fish sauce (optional, or substitute with a pinch of salt or a splash of soy sauce)
    • Freshly ground black pepper
    • Cut lemon for serving
    • Steamed white rice

    Directions:

    1. In a large skillet, heat the butter and oil over medium heat. Add the garlic and sauté until golden and fragrant, about 1–2 minutes.
    2. Add the shrimp and toss to coat in the garlic butter.
    3. Pour in the soda and fish sauce (if using). Let it bubble and reduce slightly, then cook the shrimp until pink and curled—3 to 5 minutes.
    4. Season with black pepper. Serve hot with calamansi or lemon wedges and plenty of steamed rice to soak up the sauce.
  • My Stepmother’s Filipino Chicken Adobo

    My Stepmother’s Filipino Chicken Adobo

    My Stepmother’s Filipino Chicken was a popular post. I’m sort of rethinking how often I write these as I’m finding three times a week is a bit much.  Tell me your thoughts. 

    I called my father to wish him a happy birthday. He’s hard of hearing now, so I’m screaming into the phone. He still doesn’t understand English very well. As a Filipino, who was in the U.S. Navy, he never quite assimilated. He did try, though. He married a Caucasian woman and then that went belly up. (I was a by-product of that first union.)

    On his second try at marriage, he gave up attempting to be “white” and married a former Filipino beauty queen, Myrna. They had two sons. I lived with them in their Virginia Beach ranch home for a short while in my teens. It was the first time that I ate well. One of the great memories I have of being with him and his family, Myrna or her mother, Grandma, was cooking Filipino food: chicken adobo, pancit, lumpia, or guisantes (simmered pork and peas) for a family dinner. My father never used utensils when eating. He ate only with his hands and fingers; somehow, food never dropped onto on his clothes.

    There was to be a party at the house. I think it was a birthday party, but I don’t recall. The morning before, about a dozen of my Dad’s friends, my tios or uncles – depending on whom you ask — all speaking Tagalog (the native dialect of the Philippines), came over and began digging a hole into the backyard. Into that pit, about four feet deep and eight feet wide, lined with banana leaves, a bonfire was started. By early afternoon the next day, and about three or four cases of Pabst Blue Ribbon later, the men were cooking up a whole pig over blistering coals.  Between slugs of beer, a discussion of basketball and smoking cigarettes, they took turns slowly rotating the carcass; occasionally, throwing water onto the pig, creating a delicious billow of white smoke. Its purpose was to create a crispy skin and succulent roasted meat.

    Their wives – my stepmother along with aunts and tias, about a dozen women in all — gathered in the kitchen and dining room, rinsed vegetables in pots of cold water. Two ladies to a pot.  Carrots cut into matchsticks, tomatoes diced, and onions chopped. The smell of pig’s blood simmering with Thai chilies was perfuming the house. Sweet. Spicy. Earthy. It mingled with cigarettes and constant chattering.

    Sometime around 2 in the afternoon, more friends showed up. No one knocked or rang the bell; they just greeted with hugs and kisses. The elders met on bended knees, and heads bowed. Their folded hands kissed in blessings.

    Adobo

    Chicken Adobo (Myrna’s recipe)
    Quartered chicken, using only legs and thighs. (I used about 3 lbs of chicken thighs)

    For every cup of soy sauce, use a half cup of white vinegar. ( I used two cups of soy sauce and a cup of vinegar. You might want to do a cup and a half of soy sauce.)

    Bay leaves. About three of four. (I used four fresh bay leaves but dried is good too.)

    Garlic. “…as much as you want,” she says. (I used a whole head).

    A quarter teaspoon of whole peppercorns. (Myrna’s instructions, “Throw in peppercorns.”)

    Place everything in large pot and bring to boil, about 20 minutes. Cover slightly with the lid not all the way on the pot. When it gets to boil, turn to low heat to simmer, cooking for another 20 minutes but check the chicken and baste with the sauce. Cook until chicken is cooked through, with juices running clear. Serve over rice. Make it fancy with chopped scallions.

    Note: I do not know of a Filipino who uses sugar or fries the chicken after it’s been braised.

    The End. Go Eat.