My Tasmeem Doha 2013 Food Preparation Workshop Experience -- Part 1

Warning: A bit of a long post, this was also the thought process documentation I submitted to our workshop leaders to incorporate with the other participants' written documentation for our exhibition. You will find my own Tinola Recipe here. I'll be writing more about my Tasmeem Doha 2013 Experience in my other blog Doha Domestication.

In this workshop, I decide to make Tinola, a traditional Filipino chicken dish most commonly prepared as a viand to rice. As a variation, I had initially thought of the various ways this dish could be turned into, mostly as a viand. Eventually, I decided to vary the dish and turn to another Filipino Classic, the Lugaw or more commonly known for its Spanish name Arroz Caldo.

Being a Filipino, I know when it comes to dishes, the first thing that other nationalities would normally think of is Adobo. Again, I would think that the dish is a recipe coming from the Spanish colonizers. Filipino cuisine, more often is a fusion of a local dish and another foreign dish. This being, that the Philippines have been colonized/ ruled by different nations throughout its history and their influences are more commonly evident in our present day dishes. It can be observed that Filipino dishes would more often than not have a Spanish, American, Japanese influence and on other dishes, influence also by Chinese and Indian traders who had come to the Philippines to trade prior to the Spanish colonization. It is a surprise really that the Filipino palate did not develop any preference to the various spices they have introduced to the country.

Although Adobo is very popular for a Pinoy Dish, in this workshop I would like to prepare something which I believe has a distinct Filipino origin. The Tinola by its name alone is very Filipino.  As I researched its origin, it turns out that the dish is truly Filipino. According to Wikipedia:

Tinola in Tagalog or Cebuano, or la uya in Ilocano is a soup-based dish served as an appetizer or main entrée in the Philippines.^[1] Traditionally, this dish is cooked with chicken, wedges of green papaya, and leaves of the siling labuyo chili pepper in broth flavored with ginger, onions and fish sauce. A common variant substitutes pork for chicken, chayote instead of papaya, or moringa leaves known as marungay or malunggay or "kamunggay" (in Cebuano), instead of pepper leaves.^[2] However, an all-vegetable broth in Cebu with 'kamunggay' in prominence is called "utan kamunggay" or "utan bisayâ".
Tinola was invented in the late 19th century. The dish was also referenced in José Rizal's first novel, Noli Me Tangere.

The above description aptly describes what the dish is all about. And had I been in the Philippines I would be preparing this classic the same way. However, being here in the Middle East, circumstances call for substitution since like leaves of chili pepper is not available here in Qatar. Also, with the chicken being so oily here in Qatar (I don’t know why) the traditional cooking method of sautéing the chicken and eventually coming up with a very oily oily soup doesn’t really look so appetizing. However, for the purpose of the workshop, I decided to present the traditional cooking method just so I would be able to present how a simple soup dish can be converted into a full meal with the variation of the last few steps.

As I mentioned, I decided to use the traditional cooking method, so after I have prepped the ingredients, I have heated the oil in a saucepan over medium flame. Once hot I have put in the garlic and sautéed it for a minute until soft. I then added the ginger. Once fragrant, I added the shallots and sautéed them together until the shallots are soft and translucent. I have then added the chicken, sautéed for about 5 minutes and left it for another 5 minutes on low flame. Once the chicken started to brown and about halfway cooked, I added the papaya and the chicken broth cube.  Adjusted the heat to medium flame and left it to cook for 5-8 minutes and then I added the rice wash which will serve as the broth for the dish. I adjusted the flame to high to bring it to boil which took about another 10-15 minutes. After which I adjusted back the flame to medium-low heat to simmer. I have also added the long green pepper at this time. I cooked it for another 5 minutes and turned of the heat, at which point I have added the scallion. The residual heat from the broth will cook the scallions in just a minute or 2.

As a variation to the dish, the vegetables will be replaced with rice and egg. The method will also vary a little but, what I would like to point out is that although there is a very minimal variation in the recipe, it would not be very obvious that these two dishes are very similar.

Again I started with prepping the ingredients the chicken and only the vegetables needed for sautéing. This time, I have dry-rubbed the chicken with turmeric. The reason is to give the dish a very mild yellow color (I’m not sure why it had to be yellow, but that’s just how it is. I still actually don’t know how they make it yellow in the Philippines, but the turmeric is just my own touch. So basically the heirloom lineage for our family, I guess will start from me). Just like the first dish, I had sautéed the vegetable chicken and chicken broth together. Then I added the rice sautéed it for about 5-8 minutes and then added the rice wash. I then continued stirring until the rice is cooked. This part is a little bit tedious and somewhat tiring since  I really had to stir the chicken and rice until the rice is cooked. For the very small amount of ingredients I have, it took me 30 minutes on this part. Maybe because I made the mistake of using biryani rice. I am not very familiar with biryani rice since we don’t use this in the Philippines. Jasmine rice would be more appropriate for this dish. The biryani had also given the dish a very different smell so it was really a wrong move on my part. Although I’m still glad that the taste did not really deviate from the original recipe, but the texture of the dish is really different. The biryani did not have that much starch in it I guess to really turn the dish moist.

When the rice is starting to cook, I had then cooked the egg in a different pan. Once cooked, I added the peeled hard boiled egg into the dish.

I have also prepared garnishes just like how we normally served the dish in the Philippines. This includes  chopped scallions, shallots, and chili pepper, sliced lemon and roasted minced garlic. Usually the lemon juice will be mixed with soy sauce and chili pepper and poured over a bowl of this Lugaw.

In this two dishes it could show that basically both are chiken and rice dishes. The only difference is that the Tinola serves as a viand for rice, unlike the Lugaw where the rice is already incorporated in the cooking process. Both this dishes exhibit the strong garlic-onion-ginger taste in them.

In the Philippines, I will be surprised if there will be any Filipino who did not grow up with these two dishes. Not only is it a classic but it is very economical and practical that any household would be always be happy to include it intheir menu.