Lasang Pinoy Food

So…I have this blog entry dedicated to Filipino food in honor of Sen. Benigno Ninoy Aquino, Jr. Stefoodie.net came up with the idea and e-mailed me to join in on the blogging event. I’ll give it a shot….

My parents worked full-time. They needed to put together simple and straight-forward meals. They were both skilled at whipping together some pancit and whatever happened to be in the fridge – celery, carrots, pork, shrimp, whatever. I grew up in America. I was surprised that pancit would pretty much taste the same, on either side of the Pacific. Or maybe my family in the Philippines had access to the ingredients as we did in the States.

OK – I can barely remember 1983. But I do remember when Ninoy’s wife, Corazon Aquino, ran against Marcos. She ran in 1986 and became the first female president of the country. Over dinners of pancit, fish and rice, my parents talked about People Power. I remember how excited they sounded about the protestors taking the streets, clad in yellow and chanting against the dictatorship of Marcos. In 1983 – sadness at Ninoy’s murder. In 1986 – hope.

There was a girl in my elementary school who was one of Marcos’ granddaughters. On the playground, I remember asking her what she thought about the revolution that was going on the PI. “They’re not going to elect a housewife to run the country,” she informed me snidely. Well…the Filipino people proved her wrong. She didn’t talk to me after the elections. Not for a while, at least.

It is true you cannot eat freedom and you cannot power machinery with democracy. But then neither can political prisoners turn on the light in the cells of a dictatorship. – Corazon Aquino

And this site has a decent recipe for pancit. This first time I tried making the noodles, I made the mistake of using water. Don’t do that. Just let the heat steam up the dry noodles – that’s going to be enough to loosen them up. Then fry the loose noodles with the veggies. Good stuff.