Good food…man, I miss it.
There’s something to be said about experiencing the local culinary delights and becoming a more worldly person. Theres also something to be said for getting fed up with crap and getting back to food you savor! Mexican food–think about it for a second—this was not the achievement of great cooking minds. This was the product of necessity.
Phil food? Well, there’s a lot of pork, grease, chicken heads/feet, and thick brown gravy. This should tell you all you need to know about the evolution of necessity in the Phils. They like fat so much that when shopping, the heavy fatty meat of the pork belly is more expensive than the lean cuts…the opposite of what I’m used to. My neighbors brought some roast pork from downstairs and he gave me what he considered to be selections from the best stuff……………..several thick slabs of fat with a little trimming of pork on the side. A five square inch section of roasted pig skin with, yup, fat on the inside. A 2 inch square of fatty pork meat with about 6 cubic inches of fat around it. ————- oh yea, and a Styrofoam coffee cup full of gravy.
He was smiling when he brought this up to the house, I wasn’t about to offend him so I took it and thanked him. I tried eating it but just couldn’t do it, (in private of course).
And that would have been nice if I was a tourist, but now I live here. I was working for a week on the Island of Gambell (Bering Strait) when they killed a whale. I had some muck-tuck…it was the single greasiest thing I have ever tasted. More oily than plain oil. I was a visitor then. I would not eat that shit for more than a week or unless I was starving.
So, getting back on topic, I found this food blog and its pretty damn funny. It’s the anti-Vegan site. If you like red meat, this is the place. This fucker is all about cutting up some dead cow. Heres an article about grinding your own beef…and considering I cant get decent cuts of beef on this island or even get the butcher to leave the meat thick..I’m gonna try this. Every time I order beef, I tell them thick, not thin. 2 inches thick I say…ok’ is the response. But they must think I’m crazy because they still always cut it into thin-assed ‘breakfast steak’ strips. Which have virtually no use or flavor. So I think I’m gonna start grinding patties now. My own hamburgers…..its been forever since I had a decent hamburger.
