Meatless meals

Easter is soon upon us, but in the meantime, let’s extend our meatless meals and serve fish on our table. There are lots of delicious seafood recipes that can be enhanced, using what you already have in your cupboard such as spices, lemon juice and even mango jam. Certainly seafood is much lighter and healthier than pork, beef and chicken. The problem could be cost because during the Lenten Season, vendors normally hike their prices. Buy your seafood before the Holy Week, clean and store in the freezer. Concentrate on the less expensive ones such as tilapia, bisugo, galunggong, sapsap or alumahan, normally priced from P65 to P100 a kilo.

Here are two fish recipes with a new taste. For Spiced Tilapia Fillet, you will need four pieces of the fillet, 1/4 cup catsup, 2 tbsp balsamic vinegar, 5-1/2 tsp honey, 1/4 tsp dried sage, 1/4 tsp hot pepper sauce, 1/8 tsp ground all spice, 2 cups frozen/thawed corn kernels, 3 native onions, sliced, 1/4 cup roasted red peppers (cubed), 2 tbsp lemon juice and 1 dash of salt. Combine the second to the sixth ingredients and brush the fish with half of this. Set aside. Combine the rest (adding another 2 tsp honey). Set aside. Grill, brushing the fish once again with the remaining sauce. When ready to serve, pour the lemon juice mixture.

For the Mango Jam on Fillet, prepare four pieces of sole fillet (you can also use loro for this). Mix juice of one lemon, 2 tbsp honey, 1 tsp olive oil, 2 tsp cumin, a small bunch of coriander (chopped) and salt. Brush the fish with half of this mixture and broil. Add to the remaining lemon mix, 1 tbsp mango jam, 1 roasted red bell pepper (cubed), chopped onions and finely chopped chili. When done, serve the fish topped with the second mixture.

If your family likes pasta, use tuna, mussels and even salmon instead of beef in your spaghetti dishes. The simplest thing to do is sauté crushed garlic in olive oil, add onions, pesto sauce and flaked fish and bathe the noodles with this. Season with salt and pepper

Large, puno ng tiyan bangus was selling at P91.65 a kilo at Price Smart in Muntinlupa. This outlet is actually a good source of fresh catch , often tagged a few pesos less than in some other wet markets. May we remind you not to go shopping for fresh food on Mondays? We made that mistake again and got over-ripe caimitos, surely part of the past week’s stock. The store, however, immediately replaced them the day after. Good customer relations.

We recently came across DVF Dairy Farms’ Gatas ng Kalabaw and we remember how our late mother drove from Laguna all the way to the Alabang Stock Farms to get carabao milk for us. With the advent of other milk variants, this milk somehow got sidelined. Anyway, the DVF gatas is now produced in Talavera, Nueva Ecija, providing livelihood to farmers. Sourced from Indian murrah buffalos, this is pasteurized and homogenized to retain its rich taste and nutritional elements. There are many ways of enjoying gatas ng kalabaw–made into leche flan, pastillas de leche and kesong puti. Some people always seek pastillas made of carabao’s milk. We made hot cocoa from the milk and it was super. Then we made fried, breaded sticks from the kesong puti and they were an instant hit with our brood. The ready-to-drink milk comes in three other flavors, orange, chocolate and pandan.

We were referred to Soliben Bibingka at South Supermarket by a reader. For P60 a piece (saucer-size), two people can share a light snack. But remember to insist on the freshly made ones; otherwise, it will not be as good.

There is a new restaurant called Sofah at the corner of Malvar and Bocobo Streets in Malate. This is a Chinese restaurant with a difference. It has a Western ambiance and serves both traditional and innovative dishes like crispy chicken mango roll, mustard rice with fried peanuts and fillet of fish with toasted taoso (yellow beans) and crushed garlic. Prices are good as well.

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Lydia D. Castillo’s e-mail address: [email protected]