November 20, 2007

Laing

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laing stewed in coconut milk, prawns, and pork

Recently, I have been reading about laing as pizza topping in many Filipino blogs. Laing is a Filipino dish made with taro leaves stewed in coconut milk. I have never cooked it before and neither did my mother. She used to buy from an ambulant suki (a favorite purveyor of anything from food to house ware) who cooked her delicious laing wrapped in whole taro leaves. My mother preferred to buy rather than cook laing to help the hawker make money and because she did not want to do all the tedious work.


Occasionally, I would buy the canned laing but on my recent trip to the Filipino grocer I saw a package of dried taro leaves which has a recipe card attached to it, the laing served on a young coconut shell. What a great idea! I don't have a young coconut and put the laing in an empty mature coconut shell. It surely would have been better if you get bits of young coconut with every bite of the laing. I tweaked the recipe a bit by reducing the amount of dried leaves by half and came up with a tasty laing, not as delicious as those of my mother's suki but hey, it's good enough for me.:D

Laing
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 medium onion, chopped
1 tablespoon minced garlic
1 tablespoon minced fresh ginger
¼ cup minced prawns
¼ cup minced pork
2 tablespoons fish extract (patis)
1 14-oz can coconut milk
2 ounces dry taro leaves
¼ cup water, if needed
2 bird's eye chili, sliced
salt, to taste, if needed
  1. In a wok or large skillet, heat the oil and saute garlic, onion, and ginger for 3 minutes. Add the prawns and pork, stir fry for 2 minutes. Add the fish extract and stir fry for 1 minute.
  2. Pour the coconut milk, mix very well then mix in the leaves.
  3. Cover and simmer over low heat for 20 minutes, checking if it needs water.
  4. Add sliced chili, taste and adjust seasoning, and dish up. Serve with steamed rice or as a side dish.

6 comments:

Ruy said...

I remember an aunt of mine who had laing as her cooking specialty. She took hours cooking it (I wonder why) but the result was really so tasty.
I think your idea of having it with bits of young coconut flesh while scooping it from inside a young coconut shell is just pure genius.
I'm inspired.

Chibog in Chief said...

why are you torturing me like this :-(, before pinakbet and now laing..only the things i love and i miss so badly to eat)..i love my laing this way very very spicy..why cant we order them online, for that would be really really nice..:-)have a nice day

Oggi said...

ruy, it really takes long to cook laing the usual way, i.e., wrapping in taro leaves and slow cooking them, I think. I'm dying to try it with buco. Later maybe after the holidays when I have the time to figure out how to hack open a buco.:)

dhanggit, I used to buy those teensy canned stuff which is not as good as freshly cooked until my Philgrocer started importing the dried leaves. If you have an Asian store where you live, maybe you can ask them to import them.:)

ssvetkaa said...

i love ur blog!!! just cooked laing ( found it in google search ) very tasty :) I am amrried to a filipino guy so he loved it as well :))) thanx!!!

Oggi said...

Hi Ssvetkaa, you're welcome. Oh, that's good to hear.:)

Dexie said...

My Bicolana Aunt makes the best Laing I've ever tasted in my life. Ahhh, I miss it.

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