Media Noche Recipes!

Inspired by Nanan, I'm posting some recipes (and later, picutres) of a couple of dishes I prepared for our little New Year's celebration. Consider it my New Year's gift to y'all.

New Year is always less hectic for me than Christmas–the preparation is more relaxed, less to worry about, no last-minute wrapping of gifts. So I was able to prep two dishes for tonight, pasta and dessert. So without further ado, I proudly present:

Easy-Peasy Puttanesca Sauce and Lola's Leche Flan

Easy-Peasy Puttanesca Sauce

Why call it easy-peasy? Well, my first memory of making puttanesca dates back to my second year of college, helping Peachy and Perp make puttanesca in Peachy's flat. Boy, was that difficult. We had to blanch tomatoes, peel them, etc. etc., while using Peachy's lone electric plate to cook everything. Whew. Thankfully, with this recipe, one need not slave over puttanesca. Using pre-sliced olives cuts down your prep time. The only thing that could possibly delay you? Crying while chopping the onions (which happens to me often). 

Prep Time: 10 minutes  Cooking Time: 15 minutes  Makes: 4-5 servings

• a scant 2 Tbsp extra-virgin olive oil (plus a little extra)
• 5 large cloves garlic, minced
• 1/2 of a medium onion, finely chopped
• 4 medium-sized kamatis tagalog (native tomatoes), cut into chunks and de-seeded
• a dash or two of dried parsley flakes (optional)
• 3-4 pieces bottled tuyo, flaked
• a 180g can of tuna flakes in oil or water, drained
• 1/2 of a 360g bottle of sliced black olives, drained
• 1/2 of a 100g bottle of capers in vinegar, drained
• a 250g foil pack of spaghetti sauce in your brand of choice (not the meat sauce, though!)

In a saucepan, heat the olive oil over medium heat. When a few wisps of smoke begin to rise, saute the garlic and onions. The oil shouldn't be too hot–we don't want these to be crisp garlic chips, thanks.

Once the onions start to turn translucent, add the tomatoes, saute a little, then let simmer for a bout a minute or two to let the juices run out of the tomatoes. You can add the dash or two of parsley at this point, as well. 

When tomatoes have softened (soft enough to cut with the edge of a spoon, but still firm enough to hold their shape) add the tuyo and the tuna, stirring well. Sometimes, I add a bit more olive oil and a teaspoon or so of the oil from the bottled tuyo to give it a bit more flavor.

After a minute or so of saute-ing, add the capers and olives. Mix well. Once the capers and olives look pretty well-distributed, add the spaghetti sauce. Lower the heat. Stir until combined well. Simmer for about 10-15 mins, stirring occasionally.

Lola's Leche Flan

I decided to try out my lola's recipe for leche flan. It was an adventure, to say the least. I misread one of the directions! Not to mention that the cooking instructions were as vague as: place the mold in a larger pan half-filled with water and bake until firm. Huwhaat?! What temperature should I set my oven at? How long will it take? Are you kidding me?

Of course, I grew up in a time where all recipes have exact baking temperatures and baking times. Her recipe came from a kinder era–a time when you could leisurely bake and cook without worrying about other things. I often think that recipes would be a good tool for anthropologists to tell what kind of lives people led.

One last note–I halved the amounts of the original recipe to come up with what I have here. Feel free to double it, if you want to make more. 

Prep time: 20-30 mins  Baking time: ~90 mins  Yeilds: 1 big llanera, or 2 4-in cake pans.

• 1 cup / 250 ml milk (I used Alasaka Evaporated Filled Milk. Read the labels carefully, guys! "Evaporada" is just glorified vegetable oil)
• 4 egg yolks (you can freeze the egg whites indefinitely, and just thaw when you need to use them)
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 1/2 tsp vanilla extract, or 1 tsp. grated dayap rind

for caramel

• 1/2 cup sugar
• 1/8 cup water (about 2 and 1/2 Tbsp)

Before anything else, preheat your oven to 200 degrees Celsius. (This is about 390 degrees Farenheit.) Prepare your llanera or mold and a big baking pan that can fit the llanera. (I used two cake pans, 4 inches in diameter.)

First, make the caramel. Place the water and sugar in a saucepan over medium heat. Let cook until all sugar has melted, and has turned brown. It may be boiling at this point. DO NOT STIR. Pour into molds or llanera. Give the mold or llanera a little swirl to coat the bottoms evenly.

In a metal bowl placed over a saucepan of boiling water (or a double boiler, if you have one), scald the milk for about 10-15 minutes. The milk should be hot, but not boiling. Transfer the milk to a heat-proof container with a spout.

In another bowl, whisk egg yolks with sugar. Do this briskly, until the egg yolks and sugar are well combined and have turned lighter in color.

Slowly pour the milk into the yolk mixture in a thin stream, stirring rapidly as you go. If you go slow–or if you put too much milk, too soon, the mixture might curdle. After combining the milk, add the vanilla or dayap. (Sadly, dayap has lately been so hard to find! Durn. I used vanilla.)

Pour the mixture into the llanera or the molds. Place the llanera or molds in the larger pan, and add water to the larger pan (NOT the leche flan mixture), until roughly halfway up the sides of the pan. This is called a bain marie, baño maria, or in English, a water bath. Put the bain marie into the oven. Bake for roughly an hour, or until the leche flan is set.

Let cool, then chill. Unmold and serve when needed.  

Happy New Year! Here's to the hope that 2008 will be better than the last.