On the 24th of December, we had pastel de lengua for dinner. But I used up only half a kilo of the lengua I had HHA cook. Tonight we shall have the other half, cooked using this recipe from the link which you, Malou, shared in FB. The recipe by Gene Gonzalez goes:
500 grams ox tongue (lengua)
2 tablespoons butter
1/2 white onion, chopped finely
1/2 teaspoon minced garlic
4 pieces rehydrated shiitake mushrooms, sliced into strips (reserve mushroom water)
1/3 cup halved button mushrooms
4 pieces oyster mushrooms, sliced
1 1/2 cups cream
1/4 cup chicken stock
3 tablespoons shiitake mushroom water
1/2 teaspoon liquid seasoning
1/8 teaspoon dried sage
2 tablespoons brandy
salt and pepper
1 Soften ox tongue in a pot of boiling water until tender, about 2 1/2 hours or 35 to 40 minutes in a pressure cooker. Cool completely. Peel. Slice and set aside.
2 Melt butter in pan, sauté onion, garlic, and mushrooms.
3 Add cream, chicken stock, shiitake mushroom water, liquid seasoning, and sage. Simmer for 5 minutes. Add ox tongue and simmer for 5 minutes. Add brandy and simmer. Season with salt and pepper to taste. Serve.
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But I gave HHA a modified version of the above recipe: no sage and only button mushrooms. Husband isn’t exactly a fan of mushrooms, and he and son might find it odd to have shiitake mushrooms in an apparently non-Oriental recipe. And instead of chicken bouillon, I let HHA use beef bouillon to avoid having to buy a box of the former. Hope this will taste good.
Also lined up for dinner tonight is chistorrado. I couldn’t find the recipe in my notebook but remembered having blogged about it. Look what I found. And guess when we last ate it? During our New Year’s eve dinner as well. Coincidence? Serendipity? Predictability?
And we shall have salmon, baked salmon, the recipe for which I found in janis’s website. I had brought this dish to our family’s potluck lunch on Christmas day and everyone liked it.
For midnight, on the other hand, we shall have the ensaimada of Cunanan, cold cuts from Rustan’s, ham and fruit salad. I think this is but the second time I have made fruit salad since husband was pronounced diabetic. I used to make fruit salad a lot in college, from a recipe taught us in second year high school. The one thing I will never forget about her recipe was to use one can of Nestle cream and 1/2 can of condensed milk. The can has now been replaced by the tetra pak in my household, as it sells lower than the canned cream, though I think the canned version is richer. We shall also have the leftover cheese from Christmas eve and I was able to get Marca Pina queso de bola for good measure. Such a lot, right? So we shall be having the leftovers for several days afterward.
What might have compelled me to prepare such a menu? I think viewing an Unang Hirit episode with Nancy Reyes as guest chef did: she said to prepared escabeche with a variety of colored veggies – for good luck. In lieu of this, however, I chose to prepare the salmon with mixed veggies (peas, carrots and corn).
The chistorrado’s rice will be sticky because of the cheese – in a TV show I recall that the Chinese believe in eating sticky rice on New Year’s (their own) for the family to be closer (sticky).
Fruit salad – the usual reason – round fruits? Thought the fruits in the fruit cocktail are not round any longer, right?
Cheeses and cold cuts at midnight – for lightness of being – literally? Whatever…
That reminds me… the ensaimada has yet to be picked up…
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Postscript: I mistakenly posted this in my other website derdo2.wordpress.com which is for my favorite novenas. The few who go to that website must have been shocked. OH well…
Now for some updates:
- the fruit salad was super watery maybe because:
a. I didn’t drain the fruit cocktail well enough
b. There was too much condensed milk
c. Though it was refrigerated, the container was too thick for the cold to penetrate (this is HHA’s theory)
So what did I do to correct matters?
a. add whipped cream
b. put it in the freezer
Update to the update – none. We forgot to check it out yesterday. If still it is watery, I’ll add another can of fruit cocktail. Or will that be like putting good money after bad? Oh well.
The dinner of lengua from Malou’s link, the chistorrado and the salmon got an A from husband and son.
The midnight repast of cold cuts, cheese and ensaimada was praised by son for being light. He and husband had this after the midnight “snack” -
How deadly is this? I wouldn’t know from personal experience. But a friend we gave this to kidded me, “Ikaw ha, you’re contributing to vice in our household.”
I passed the blame on to husband and son, citing how they said it was good. I said I’d make up for that – days after, I sent them a bottle of granola. 
I thought lengua is difficult to cook, parang hindi naman pala, medyo matagal lang. I should try this.
The thing to do I think is blanch it first to remove some film over it. Then all one has to do is boil it till it’s tender. We were lucky this time around, perhaps the source was a young ox(?), so the meat didn’t take too long to tenderize.