Lechon Kawali Caesar Salad

a match made in heaven: lechon kawali and Caesar salad

After reading about the much maligned Chicken Caesar Salad in Michael Ruhlman's blog and his improved version with pork belly confit in place of chicken, I was convinced and made Caesar salad topped with Filipino lechon kawali or bagnet which is the same thing as the pork confit, btw, only crispier and yummier, IMHO. The salad dressing I have been using is the recipe I learned from the sous chef of all places, the Asian Development Bank executive dining room. The sous chef, I can't recall her name, gave a half-day lesson to bank employees who were interested on how to prepare a few popular dishes the dining room had in their menu at the time. One of my favorites is Caesar salad and the other that I never wrote down but still remember from memory is Quiche Lorraine. I don't have precise measurements for the salad's dressing and the following is just a guide which can be adjusted to suit your taste. Or you can prepare your own recipe and top the salad with lechon kawali. I never knew this combination is really delicious, unhealthy but indescribably delicious.

Lechon Kawali Caesar Salad
chopped lechon kawali, homemade or store bought
hearts of romaine, torn into largish pieces
garlic flavored croutons, homemade or store bought
1 egg yolk
2 tablespoons lemon or calamansi juice
2 teaspoons Dijon mustard
2 anchovy fillets in olive oil
1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
¼ cup extra virgin olive oil
¼ cup finely grated Parmesan cheese
shaved Parmesan for topping, optional

• In a large bowl, whisk egg yolk, lemon juice, mustard, anchovies, and wooster sauce until well combined and thickened a bit. Slowly pour olive oil while constantly whisking. Stir in grated Parmesan cheese.
• In another bowl, toss some lettuce and dressing. Transfer into a salad plate and top with croutons and chopped lechon kawali.

Marvin of Burnt Lumpia made a yummy, delightful, and very creative version of Caesar salad using some of our beloved Filipino ingredients such as pandesal, bagoong alamang, and chicken adobo. His wonderful recipe is here. Enjoy!

Pinakbet

I usually make this vegetable dish when I have leftover crispy fried pork belly. The pinakbet I made today is similar to the Ilocos style of layering the vegetables and cooking it just until the vegetables are al dente. I used half of a medium size bitter melon (ampalaya). I don't recommend the very small Indian variety because they are super bitter unless you love bitter things. To prepare bitter melon, cut in half lengthwise, scrape the seeds and the white soft innards until you can see the light green meat, slice into 1 inch pieces, blanch in salted water, rinse with cold water 2 or 3 times. This process is supposed to remove some of the bitterness but I'm not sure if this really works, though.

Pinakbet

1 cup diced bagnet/lechon kawali (pork belly confit)
a 2-inch piece fresh ginger, peeled and thinly sliced
1 cup yard long beans (sitaw), cut into 1 inch pieces
1 Asian eggplant, halved and cut into 1 inch pieces
1 large tomato, sliced
2 tablespoons sliced shallots
10 pieces okra
1 cup kabocha squash, cut into ½ inch pieces
½ bitter melon, prepared as above
¼ cup bagoong alamang (salted shrimp paste) mixed with ¼ cup water or ½ cup fish bagoong (may substitute 2 tins anchovy filet mashed in ¼ cup water and strained)

• In a medium pot, arrange the pork evenly at the bottom, add the ginger on top of the pork spreading it evenly. Layer the vegetables, with the bitter melon either on the very top or if you want some bitter taste, in the middle. Pour the alamang mixture all over the vegetables. Cover the pot.
• Over high heat, boil rapidly for 10 minutes. Do not mix while boiling. Serve with steamed rice or as a side dish.

Bagnet
2 ½ pounds boneless pork belly
1 head garlic, cut in half crosswise
2 bay leaves
1 ½ tablespoons sea salt
water
vegetable oil

• Put pork in a large pot. Add bay leaves, garlic, and salt. Add water to cover pork. Boil for 1 hour. Remove pork, drain well, dry with paper towels.
• Transfer to another pot. Add enough oil to cover pork, fry over very low heat for 1 hour to remove excess moisture. Remove pork and transfer to a large plate to cool completely.
• When cooled, reheat the same oil over high heat and fry the pork belly until skin is golden in color and very crisp.

For flexi-vegetarian pinakbet omit pork.
For vegan pinakbet, omit pork and substitute 4 tablespoons soy sauce for the shrimp paste. Adjust seasoning with sea salt to taste.

Lechon Kawali (Fried Pork Belly) and Snow Pea Shoots

I was going to make Pinakbet (vegetable medley) with Bagnet (fried pork belly) that I got from my cookbook Flavors of the Philippines by Glenda Barreto of Via Mare restaurants in Manila. I got this cookbook as a 2001 Christmas gift. It is a very beautiful, clear, direct and precise cookbook showcasing the best recipes of different regions in the Philippines. The photographs done by Japanese American Neal Oshima are fantastic.

The vegetable medley is not the one I grew up eating, we have a different version in my hometown. After deep frying, the pork looked delicious I ended up chopping and serving half of it as Lechon Kawali (pork belly roast/fried in a wok) and reserved half for the pinakbet that I will make this week. This lechon kawali is eaten with either Mang Tomas sauce or vinegar, soy sauce and garlic dip, I had both. I also cooked these fine looking veggies snow pea shoots I spotted at the Korean grocery. They are very tender young leaves that I just washed thoroughly then steamed in a little water and 1/4 tsp salt until just wilted and still a little crisp.

I like the simplicity of just adding a little calamansi juice or lemon juice to this side dish. It does not need garlic, onion or some meat flavorings, I'm really loving it more than spinach or Swiss chard, this is the perfect veggies to serve with the fat laden pork.