foodandsh-t

[foodandsh-t]

Our next pop-up is on February 16th: AROI/SARAP

The words “aroi” and “sarap” are cousins. They both mean “flavorful” in Thai and Tagalog, respectively. Both languages borrow many words from Sanskrit, and both words likely derive from the Sanskrit word for flavorful, or delicious: सुरस, “surasa” (In Laos “saep,” In Indonesia and Malaysia “sedap”).

Over homecooked meals and drinks, distracting ourselves from the pain of Super Bowl XLIX, we thought of Thai and Filipino as cousins. We thought about how Hawaii already laid out a blueprint for various food traditions to meet on one plate. We pinpointed the many similarities that tropical Thai and Filipino cooking shares: rice (of course), fermented seafood products, lots of citrus acid, banana leaves, coconut milk. Both cuisines carry many pre-Western contact influences from China and India. There were also distinctions: Thai food is all about that spicy kick—chiles are a main cooking ingredient; Filipino food is rarely spicy, and, if so, is usually only made so through condiments.

So we went back to what was most familiar to both of us, and tweaked a few ingredients. We came up with a menu that we hope exemplifies the idea that our food has always evolved through exchanges with one another—that “fusion” may be a buzzword to some, but to us it’s just how we’ve always done it. One person shares a recipe, the other shares a recipe, both try something new with something they’ve done many times before. And no matter how much time has passed or how many miles separate us, food can both bring us back to where we started, and tell us where we’re going, much like languages themselves.

Hit foodandsh-t.com for menu & reservations

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[foodandsh-t]

LIMITED EDITION HOOD FAMOUS BAKESHOP "12" BUKO PANDAN CHEESECAKE. AVAILABLE ONLINE FOR PICK UP AT INAY'S (SEATTLE) ON SAT 1/17 & SUN 1/18

hoodfamousbakeshop.com

[foodandsh-t]

S/o to the bro @prometheusbrown and @foodandsh_t for the Hood Famous Ube Cheesecake. I just got the word that I invented the the name but I barely remember saying it haha. Purchase a cake now for your mom, sister, wife, girlfriend or side bitch.

[foodandsh-t]

ATTN GOOD PEOPLE OF SEATTLE & BREMERTON AND NEARBY AREAS

Hood Famous Bakeshop is now taking orders for whole 6" and 9" Ube Cheesecake!

To reserve your cake in time for pick-up in Seattle at Inay's Asian Pacific Cuisine on Thanksgiving Eve (11/26) or Thanksgiving Day (11/27), or in Bremerton at Lumpia Factory on Thanksgiving Eve (11/26), order by Monday 11/24 at http://hoodfamousbakeshop.squarespace.com/ube-cheesecake

[foodandsh-t]

SABAW - NOVEMBER 17, 2014

Filipino stews and soups, born in the heat of the tropics, are also perfect cold weather food. It's like our ancestors knew their descendants would one day span the globe, working and living in every part of the world, eating our way home with every sabaw-heavy dish.

Sabaw is the liquid soul of the Filipino stew. It is more than just a complementary sauce, gravy or soup stock. When done right, it's often simply added to rice and, boom--a meal. It is flavorful but not overpowering. Sophisticated but without pretension. It is cooked in one pot, in volumes anticipating multiple servings and leftovers, and shared by all. It is a cuisine that reflects the communalism present in most Filipino households, itself a reflection of a country where 70% of the population come from the peasant class.

This month, Food & Sh*t honors this tradition with SABAW: a return to an a la carte dinner menu featuring five stews--four modern-but-not-"Modern" variations of familiar traditional Filipino dishes and a Cajun Gumbo with Filipino flavors and Northwest seafood. No reservations required. Walk-in and online takeout orders are welcome. The Adobong Puti na Manok will also be available for pre-order and day-of delivery in select neighborhoods in partnership with Lish Food.

SABAW pop-up is at Inay's (2503 Beacon Ave S, Seattle WA) from 5-10pm. Music provided by Melenie & Mr. Melanin. All ages welcome. Bar open for 21+ patrons.

Want to bring your food home? Take-out orders for pick up on during the pop-up are now available in the shop!

SABAW MENU

A la carte. No reservations. Sit down & take out orders welcome.

STARTERS

Balut - 3 Salmon Fish Balls - 5 Inasal Chicken Wings - 7

ENTREES

each dish comes w/ white rice Tofu Arroz Caldo - 9 (w/ soft egg - 10) Pork Sparerib Sinigang - 11 Adobong Puti na Manok (Chicken Adobo in white sauce) - 12 Oxtail Pinapaitan - 14 Bagoong Shrimp Gumbo - 15

DESSERT

Chera's Hood-Famous Ube Cheesecake - 6 Halo-halo Macarons - 8

For more info and goodies, hit up foodandsh-t.com

[foodandsh-t]

KAMAYAN MENU

#KALSADA menu

420pm-sunset

Sisig Tacos

(pork, chicken, bangus or tofu): $3/taco (+ 1 w/ egg), $8/3 tacos (+2 w/ eggs)

Balut 3

Salmon Fish Balls 5

Taho 4

Puto & Kutsinta 5

Ube Cheesecake slice 6

[foodandsh-t]

Kalsada

Summer has arrived in Seattle and we're taking it to the streets.

Following the incredible response to our Adobo Burger collaboration with Lil' Woody's earlier this month, we're moving our usual kitchen service onto the sidewalk. Right outside Inay's, we're setting up outdoor grills and griddles, and fryers to provide an a la carte menu inspired by Filipino street food, which we've themed our Kalsada (Filipino translation: "street") menu. 

On this month's menu you'll find Filipino street food staples: balut, fish balls, taho, mom's puto & kutsinta. Our featured item is a tribute to the OGs of Seattle street food--the taco truck--with tacos filled with a sisig-flavored choice of protein to fit whatever dietary parameters you have: pork, chicken, fish (bangus) & tofu. Also, on the menu: a "Breakfast in Hawaii" taco made from the many packs of Portuguese sausage we brought back with us from our recent trip to Hawaii.

Kalsada is also a big-up to the current wave of hood-famous-to-everywhere-famous street food-inspired food trucks and eateries such as Kogi BBQ (LA), Baohaus (NYC) & Señor Sisig (SF). The proprietors of these eateries: Roy Choi, Eddie Huang, Evan Kidera are all homies that I'm fortunate to have met via hip-hop.

As 2nd generation children of Asian immigrant parents coming of age in America in the 80s & 90s, hip-hop wasn't just our soundtrack, but a methodology. When I bite into a Kogi taco, Baohaus bao or Sisig burrito, there's a soulful reinvention present that I could never taste in bourgie "Asian Fusion" eateries. But, like the homies, I always found it somewhere closer to the taco trucks, hot dog stands and falafel carts you'd find wherever people worked or played loud music. Or both.

It's like the difference between a song composed by a technically refined musician vs a song crafted by a knowledgeable DJ who instinctively improvises and samples. If rap was food, this is definitely one genre of it--creations sampled from one's own culture, mashed up with others we've grown familiar with, and reinvented with reverence to where it came from. Asian kids raised on Black music, Brown food and White skepticism making mix tapes you can eat.

Say what you will about the state of hip-hop music in the era of late-stage capitalism--hip-hop in food form is killing everything right now. From the food truck explosion, to big food chains attempting "mash up" menu items, to high end restaurants playing Wu-Tang Clan Aint Nuthin Ta Fuck With while you eat a fancy bone marrow dessert--Kool Herc & Afrika Bambaataa is somewhere embedded in the DNA of the food you just posted a photo of on instagram. Which is great. But sometimes, you just gotta take it back to the street.

 MENU

Tacos: Pork Sisig Bangus Sisig Tofu Sisig Chicken Sisig Portagee Sausage 

Sides: Salmon Fishballs Balut 

Sweets: Taho  Puto at Kutsinta  Ube Cheesecake 

[foodandsh-t]

Kalsada

Summer has arrived in Seattle and we're taking it to the streets.

Following the incredible response to our Adobo Burger collaboration with Lil' Woody's earlier this month, we're moving our usual kitchen service onto the sidewalk. Right outside Inay's, we're setting up outdoor grills and griddles, and fryers to provide an a la carte menu inspired by Filipino street food, which we've themed our Kalsada (Filipino translation: "street") menu. 

On this month's menu you'll find Filipino street food staples: balut, fish balls, taho, mom's puto & kutsinta. Our featured item is a tribute to the OGs of Seattle street food--the taco truck--with tacos filled with a sisig-flavored choice of protein to fit whatever dietary parameters you have: pork, chicken, fish (bangus) & tofu. Also, on the menu: a "Breakfast in Hawaii" taco made from the many packs of Portuguese sausage we brought back with us from our recent trip to Hawaii.

Kalsada is also a big-up to the current wave of hood-famous-to-everywhere-famous street food-inspired food trucks and eateries such as Kogi BBQ (LA), Baohaus (NYC) & Señor Sisig (SF). The proprietors of these eateries: Roy Choi, Eddie Huang, Evan Kidera are all homies that I'm fortunate to have met via hip-hop.

As 2nd generation children of Asian immigrant parents coming of age in America in the 80s & 90s, hip-hop wasn't just our soundtrack, but a methodology. When I bite into a Kogi taco, Baohaus bao or Sisig burrito, there's a soulful reinvention present that I could never taste in bourgie "Asian Fusion" eateries. But, like the homies, I always found it somewhere closer to the taco trucks, hot dog stands and falafel carts you'd find wherever people worked or played loud music. Or both.

It's like the difference between a song composed by a technically refined musician vs a song crafted by a knowledgeable DJ who instinctively improvises and samples. If rap was food, this is definitely one genre of it--creations sampled from one's own culture, mashed up with others we've grown familiar with, and reinvented with reverence to where it came from. Asian kids raised on Black music, Brown food and White skepticism making mix tapes you can eat.

Say what you will about the state of hip-hop music in the era of late-stage capitalism--hip-hop in food form is killing everything right now. From the food truck explosion, to big food chains attempting "mash up" menu items, to high end restaurants playing Wu-Tang Clan Aint Nuthin Ta Fuck With while you eat a fancy bone marrow dessert--Kool Herc & Afrika Bambaataa is somewhere embedded in the DNA of the food you just posted a photo of on instagram. Which is great. But sometimes, you just gotta take it back to the street.

 MENU

Tacos: Pork Sisig Bangus Sisig Tofu Sisig Chicken Sisig Portagee Sausage 

Sides: Salmon Fishballs Balut 

Sweets: Taho  Puto at Kutsinta  Ube Cheesecake 

[foodandsh-t]

Instagram photos from #HI

[foodandsh-t]

Welcome back to Alternative Dining, a column by Jen Chiu that explores the unconventional dining and drinking scene in Seattle, whether that be pop-up, food truck, gastro-brewpub, or underground dinner...

[foodandsh-t]

Hi! A Kamayan Pop-up Dinner. Honolulu, HI

Hawai'i is where all my food memories begin. 

I was 2 years old when my pops got stationed at Pearl Harbor. Before that, he worked at his auntie's restaurant in the Philippines to help pay for school, and when he joined the Navy, he wanted to cook. But hearing how fucked up everyone treated the Filipino cooks and wanting to pursue a trade that matched his interest in math and science, he chose the electrician route instead. But he never stopped cooking. His favorite market was Tamashiro's in Kalihi, where he'd cop octopus tentacles that he'd turn into tako kilawin with seaweed we picked ourselves at some random beach. He'd always make me try it but I hated it then. Now, I crave it. And tako anything is always one of the first dishes I look for upon returning to Hawai'i.

Moms also put work in the kitchen, turning food into a side hustle for the fam. Her puto & kutsinta became legendary at the big Filipino weekend parties. Every Friday, she'd cook up batches that aunties would pick up on Saturday and Sunday. My sisters and I got to eat the rejected ones. Our Toyota Corolla hatchback always smelled like something died in it because when moms wasn't hustling pastries, she was hustling fresh shrimp. She'd get a big cooler-full straight from North Shore shrimp farms, then resell 'em to folks in town in smaller batches. On days where I helped her deliver shrimp, she'd give me a little money, which I'd then spend on rap cassette tape singles and comic books. 

Even now, 20 years later, cooking Filipino food somewhere in the Northwestern corner of the "mainland,"  I carry the sights, sounds, tastes and smells of my upbringing in that small island in the middle of the Pacific. The halfway point between where my parents grew up and where we now call home. Every menu of every pop-up Chera and I have done is woven with these stories. 

I'm thrilled to bring Food & Sh*t to the place I think of most when I recall the first time I ate many of my favorite dishes. Especially at a place--Fresh Cafe--that blends together all the creative things that fuel me daily: food, music, art, literature, drink. We're bringing with us some of our popular menu items from our Pulutan, Kamayan & Luzviminda pop-ups and tweaking them to reflect local culture using local food products. 

What Hawai'i taught me is that every dish is a story you can eat; a past you can remember, a future you can invent. And, sometimes, out of necessity, a hustle. And here I am, a generation later, still hustling shrimp and dessert. 

- Geo

Prix-Fixe Five Course Kamayan Dinner Menu - 40

served w/ white rice

Shrimp Sinigang Shooter Pomelo & Mango Salad Tako Kinilaw & Taro Chips Inasal Pork BBQ Spare Ribs Chera's Hood-Famous Ube Cheesecake

Pulutan (a la carte)

Balut - 3 Sisig Lumpia - 4 Adobong Gizzard na Manok - 4

Hi! is a prix-fixe Kamayan (hands only) menu dinner with Pulutan (bar food) a la carte menu available for both diners with reservations and walk-in diners. There will be two dinner services, from 530-730pm and 800-1000pm. Guests are welcome to stay for music and entertainment following the later dinner. Reservations and advance payment required. All ages welcome, with bar & alcoholic drinks available for 21+. Seating limited to 40 per dinner. Please make reservations at the link below:

[foodandsh-t]

Instagram photos from #LUZVIMINDA

[foodandsh-t]

Luzviminda

We're going back to the Philippines again. 

Well, not physically. But via the next best way to transport oneself to another place and time: through food and drink. This month's Food & Sh*t pop-up dinner is an excursion outside the familiar dishes of the Filipino Cuisine metropolis and into the countryside, where the provincial and rustic reign supreme.

There are 10.5 million Filipinos working and residing overseas. But even within the Philippines itself, within families themselves, there is a diaspora. Ours is a story that mirrors thousands of Filipino families: recent generations have found themselves relocating and working in urban landscapes, removed from the countryside villages and towns they lived in for generations. Many have left, some have stayed--and with them, a handful of traditions that have survived the journey and others that dissipate along the way and over time.  

Our families hail originally from Nueva Ecija, Nueva Viscaya, Benguet & Tarlac, with many more cousins, aunties, uncles spread out through other cities and regions. We spent a majority of our month-long trip to the Philippines last winter outside of the cities and catching a glimpse of livelihoods where "farm-to-table" and "artisan" aren't just recent culinary buzzwords but a way of life that's existed for many generations.

We visited Chera's auntie's and uncle's bakery in Gapan, where Manong , an 80-year old baker who began baking when he was 15, makes fresh baked goods every day with little more than his hands and a wood-fire oven. In Davao, we encountered the best "ceviche" we've ever had in the form of local kinilaw. In Baguio, I finally understood why pops loves goat so much after hitting the kambingans there.

These dishes don't exist on any menus in any restaurant in Seattle. And we can't recreate them even if we tried--many of these provincial dishes rely on locally sourced food items that aren't available here. But, like so many of us diaspora folk have done in our kitchens, we've turned the things that have gone from local to global back to local again: taking what's available to us now and reconstructing them in our image.

It is remarkable that the Filipino identity can claim so many kinds of traditions and tastes. While there's a tendency to identify things as Filipino that are familiar, we often forget that there are more stories that don't fit the main narrative that deserve shine too. On our last trip in the PI from region to region, we witnessed a nation across Luzon, Visayas, Minanao--Luzviminda--that embraces its multiplicity. In a small way, 8,000 miles away, one dinner at a time, we aim to do the same.

MENU

Kinilaw Fried Pancit Inasal Pork BBQ Ribs Kambing Caldereta Cassava Cake Luzviminda is a prix-fixe menu dinner. There will be two dinner services, from 530-730pm and 800-1000pm. Reservations and advance payment required. All ages welcome, with bar & alcoholic drinks available for 21+. Seating limited to 40 per dinner. Please make reservations at the link below:

[foodandsh-t]

Filipino Spaghetti Is the Worst

I’ve always hated the abomination that is Filipino Spaghetti.

But before my fellow kababayan march on me with digital pitchforks, let me contextualize that statment with a story:

Pops was recruited in the late 70s out of Subic Bay Naval Base, joined the US Navy, and got stationed in Italy. At the same time, Moms was recruited from the countryside to work overseas as part of the first wave of young Filipina domestic workers. She was placed in the home of a kind, elderly Italian couple. So Moms and Pops, originally from towns in neighboring Philippine provinces, met thousands of miles away in the land of Real Fucking Spaghetti. Pops loved to cook, moms had to cook—to Señor Luigi’s liking—and both learned the ancient ways of the Italian pasta. Plus, being from the countryside, they never really had the bastardized version of spaghetti there anyway.

Growing up, we had lots of pasta, especially spaghetti, cooked to the standard of the old Italians that Moms and Pops always recalled fond memories of at the dinner table. No sugar, no American cheese, no processed banana ketchup, no hot dogs. Lots of basil, oregano, thyme & parsley. A slow-cooked meat sauce that didn’t disrespect the umami and acidity of the tomato. And garlic. Hella garlic. Their particular twist: dashes of patis and chopped straw mushrooms. I always looked forward to spaghetti night.

This enthusiasm for spaghetti always died at the Filipino potluck party. All the auntie’s and uncle’s dishes, laid out in a row buffet-style, and me, standing in line with my paper plate and plastic cutlery debating whether or not to try the red slop with the hotdogs that someone called spaghetti. Not wanting to disrespect, and also because of young blind faith, I always gave it a try. And every time, yuck. I recall once asking Pops “why is this spaghetti so gross?” “Because it’s Filipino spaghetti,” he said, “not the real kind.”

Fast forward to last week, at Jolibee. The kids are eating the “spaghetti,” and loving it. I ask my older one, Ajani, which spaghetti he likes better: the Jollibee kind or the kind that I cook? They’re about the same, he said. And I felt some type of way about that, which prompted the twitter rant about Filipino Spaghetti (excerpts above) the next day. To my surprise, many agreed with me. Not to my surprise, many others defended it. But others hit me with “you right, it’s mostly bad. But there’s good Filipino Spaghetti out there, you just haven’t tried it yet.”

Maybe those people were right. But I wasn’t about to wait until I come across that dish. I was inspired to try to create it myself. I looked up a handful of “Filipino Spaghetti” recipes online, and wanted to see if there was a happy medium between that and the Italian Filipino Spaghetti that I grew up on. So I cooked it. And I wasn’t mad at it. And the kids said it was the best spaghetti I’ve ever cooked. Here it is:

Italian Filipino Spaghetti 

16 oz Capellini

2 Cipollini Onions

10 Garlic Cloves

1 lb Ground pork

10 oz (5 pc) Fresh Mild Italian Sausage

16 oz Crushed Fire Roasted Tomatoes

16 oz Jufran Banana Sauce

Shredded Parmesan Cheese

1 can Straw Mushrooms thoroughly washed and pre-cooked because of the Formaldehyde that it’s usually soaked in

1 t dried Basil

1 t dried Oregano

Salt & Pepper to taste

Crushed Red Pepper to taste (optional)

CLICK HERE TO SEE THE ORIGINAL POST AT FOODANDSH-T.COM

[foodandsh-t]

MITS feat. La & Kixxie Siete (Official Video)

The Bar is for raising the minimum wage.  Cool things to note about this video: - it was shot in one take - Prometheus Brown, Bambu and DJ Nphared had just gotten back from a 24-hour trip to Manila - Prometheus Brown was in the middle of preparing the kitchen for the pop-up restaurant (which is why he dashes off right after his verse) - The woman in the beginning of the video is not Nphared’s Auntie - The man with sticks uses MapQuest - LA shot this on his actual lunch break - Kixxie flew up to Seattle and mixed Flaming Hot Cheetos with Bangus Sisig - DJ Nphared spent a portion of our video budget on walkie talkie’s to add authenticity to his role as a valet driver - Bambu found a beer by the garbage and drank it - DJ Nphared and Bambu did not coordinate the missed high-five - Bambu got into a car accident a few hours before the shoot - Prometheus Brown and his wife, Chera, do their “Food & Sh*t" pop-up restaurants regularly throughout Seattle and are looking to take it on the road soon - DJ Nphared saw the movie Gravity twice - Grynch did not know we were filming a video - Our homeboy Nam made sure nobody walked through the ‘set.’ - Chel, who opens the door and calls us in at the end, is a family friend who loves this little girl: http://laylashlhfight.org/ - and so do we! - Kizamu, The Bar’s manager, wore three different Seahawks tops throughout the day - The Bar listened to Chip Fu the entire day The In4mation X The Bar shirt is coming soon! Stay tuned tohttp://in4mants.com for release date! Shot by Jerome Buenaventura during The Bar’s hosting of Food & Sh*t’s Pulutan Pop-Up Restaurant at Inay’s in Seattle. http://thebarmusic.com http://twitter.com/thebarmusic http://instagram.com/thebarmusic http://beatrockmusic.com

[foodandsh-t]

Kamayan Pop-up

The big spoon and fork on the wall, found in many Filipino kitchens, are considered a source of tradition and pride, a symbol of health and prosperity, even the butt of earnest jokes about our love of food. But more than anything to anyone familiar with Philippine history, it is a reminder of our colonized history.

There were no spoons and forks before Spanish conquistadors took over the islands now known as the Philippines. The native Indios, like practical indigenous people all around the world, ate with their hands, kamayan style (meaning “with hands,” from the Filipino “kamay” = “hand”). The Spaniards saw this as savagery. Kubyertos—the spoon and fork—weren’t merely “introduced” to our ancestors, they were forced upon us as a way to “civilize” us in the eyes of our new colonial masters. 

Those who continued to eat with their hands were looked down upon by the master, and so the big spoon and fork on the wall became to natives what the big American flag became to many brown people in the US after 9/11. A visual display to the oppressor that we’re down. Or a way to play along and hope they leave us alone.

Whatever the case, we never stopped eating with our hands. And we’re not going to stop anytime soon. This month’s pop-up, Kamayan, is a continuation of the spirit of our last pop-up, Pulutan. It’s a celebration of a new season that merges the fresh local seafood of our Pacific Northwest setting with a tradition that we’ve always known. This month’s menu features one prix-fixe meal—a Filipino version of the Northwest crab pot, including a soup and salad starter course, a gang of seafood, and a dessert.

Kamayan isn’t about bringing it back as much as it is pushing it forward.  This ain’t a yearning for pre-colonial days. What happened, happened. There are bigger battles to be waged on new grounds. Kamayan is a nod to my Ilocano parents and grandparents who taught me and my sisters how to use a spoon and fork at the dinner table even as they ate with their hands. It’s us saying “we see you.” 

Often, my non-Filipino friends, carrying on the tradition of the irony-deficient Spaniards who came over 400 years ago, would come over to eat and make some snarky comment about how moms and pops eating with their hands was gross. Perhaps Kamayan is a way of shedding the shame of moments like that. Plus, it’s kind of the thing right now. It’s dope to see this way of eating propagated by the current generation of food curators throughout the Filipino diaspora, from the Kamayan Nights at Jeepney Filipino Gastropub in NYC, to the traveling SALO Project Filipino pop-up, and even all the way out in Germany at restaurants such as Kamayan. 

Lastly, who doesn’t use their hands to eat these days? No disrespect, but if you’re cutting up a burger or pizza with a fork and knife, then you are the weirdo, not us. This month, we leave our spoons and forks on the wall, say “fuck the colonizer!” and celebrate our past and future with family, friends, fresh food, and good music. Like we always do.

KAMAYAN MENU

Garlic Broken Rice Sinigang Shooter & Salad Adobong Gizzard Inihaw na Pusit Lemongrass & San Miguel Manila Clams & Mussels Uli’s Vigan Longanisa Roasted Red Potatoes & Corn Alimango (Sauteed Dungeness Crab) A Bangin’ Dessert by Chera

Kamayan is a prix-fixe menu dinner. There will be two dinner services, from 530-730pm and 800-1000pm. Reservations and advance payment required. All ages welcome, with bar & alcoholic drinks available for 21+. Seating limited to 40 per dinner. 

Make your reservation at Foodandsh-t.com.