Kasilyo

[Cavite kesong puti/water buffalo white cheese]

I am thankful for the commissary and exchange just across where I and the family now live - it is subsidized - all items are tax-free. That means a lot when you have kids, and the price difference in milk fomulas can reach up to Php100 per can.

However, the commissary is a big study in paradox - it is stocked with olive oil, sesame oil, and all kinds of cooking oils. But it carries only Hunt's tomato and spaghetti sauces, there is only one kind of pasta - Fiesta spaghetti - and to my horror, there is no butter, and the cheese shelf contains only Eden and Quezo processed cheeses. A quick tour of other grocery stores downtown yielded the same type of cheeses, and the nearest supermarket is an hour away.

Good thing I discovered, quickly, since I am a purveyor of bakeries, kasilyo. It is Cavite City's local fresh cheese - kesong puti - made from carabao's milk, in thin squares wrapped in banana leaves. I've had kesong puti before I came to live in Cavite, but those were mainly bought from supermarkets at hefty prices, were almost always too salty, and not very fresh.

Kasilyo is made fresh daily in Cavite City, available all throughout the morning, starting with the fresh batch of pandesal. Pandesal with kasilyo is the Cavitenos' favorite breakfast fare - it's heavenly with a steaming cup of thick tsokolate - that it is common to find kasilyo in bakeries all ready to go with your morning order.

And because I believe in the saying that "When in Rome.....", in this case, in a home not quite my own, I find myself buying kasilyo every morning to go with my pandesal. I eat it with a pat of salted butter melted by five minutes' toasting, open-faced. Or with my favorite fruit jam - the kasilyo is the perfect foil for the cloying sweetness.

Kasilyo is delicately soft and creamy, with mild sour notes that are barely noticeable, no hint of salt, fragrant from the banana leaf wrapping. Making kasilyo is actually a way to preserve excess carabao milk, which lasts only a day, even when chilled. Kasilyo can stay fresh up to a week inside the refrigerator. I'm in awe, though, about the volume of carabao milk that churns up the kasilyo, since I see no ricefields in the city, only marshes and ponds and bays hoarding mussels and clams.

Kasilyo makers at the public wet market tell me the Cavite kesong puti is made only with vinegar, whereas the kesong puti from Laguna and Quezon are made with rennet (the acid inside a goat's or calf's stomach) and/or vinegar, always with salt. The way they described the process made it sound easy - just add the carabao milk to boiling water with vinegar - but I haven't tried making it yet. I don't wake up that early to catch the fresh bottles of carabao milk.

But I am enjoying bought kasilyo to the hilt. Besides being a part of my morning fare, I incorporate it into a lot of dishes. It is the perfect local, fresh substitute to mozzarella - so my baked macaroni, lasagna and pizzas are now Filipinized - they are now Cabitenya. Kasilyo is also excellent for baked tahong. Fresh Cavite mussels topped with a mixture of butter, crushed garlic, salt, pepper and kasilyo and baked til bubbly - a purely Cabitenya dish I can now enjoy anytime.

Cooking with kasilyo - Baked Tahong
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Lasang Pinoy 20, Binalot, All Wrapped Up! is hosted by The Unofficial Cook.

Rodic's Tapsilog

Rodic's tapsilog

This kind of tapsilog can only be found at Rodic's, where you eat your best, at the Shopping Center inside the Diliman campus of the University of the Philippines in Quezon City. Its uniqueness lies in the tapa being macerated to almost a floss, which otherwise would be thin slices of marinated beef in other tapsilog. It is also made from carabao beef (what? you didn't know that? neither did I!), commonly termed carabeef.

Most dormers from Kalayaan, Yakal, Sanggumay, Molave, Ipil and Ilang-Ilang, and of course the residents near Shopping Center (SC), would be familiar with the SC foodscape, and so would most students residing outside the campus who did not restrict themselves to CASAA, the Beachhouse or Katipunan. But I had a lot of classmates, both during my undergrad and graduate years, who didn't eat at SC, and I always took it as my responsibility to introduce them to Rodic's tapsilog.

Their reactions were invariably the same - staring blankly at the dish served them, saying, "aahhh....." and mustering enough courage to ask "this is tapsilog?" But after a few spoonfuls all reacted invariably the same. Satisfyingly and fillingly delicious. Additional rice, please.

The members of the org (short for university organization) I stuck to frequented Rodic's, so much so that even after we had graduated and left the campus, when we felt like going senti and wanting to reminisce we would round everybody up and troop to SC.

When a former member took his vows to be part of the order of the Society of Jesus in the United States, he chose to say his first mass at the Chapel of the Holy Sacrifice inside the UP Campus. We all met to practice in accompanying the mass, and afterwards we proceeded to, where else?, Rodic's.

Jumbosilog

We were all laughing and marvelling at how we had all grown but still stayed essentially the same. How we retained our distinct gestures, mannerisms. And we still had our appetites, the hunkering cultivated by years of absence, for tapsilog, and other good things at Rodic's - spamsilog, jumbosilog, bopis, kaldereta, saba con yelo, etc.


A month ago today, on June 18, 2007, a celebration was held to kick-off the year-long centennial festivities that would culminate on the 100th foundation anniversary of the University of the Philippines on June 18, 2008. During the program there was a lot of reminiscing, and one common thread was the sense of constancy in the system. In everything, from the suspension of classes so we could join rallies, to the way your survival is determined by your memorization of your student number, to the dreaded process of registration. It seemed all underwent, and would undergo, the same harrowing and enlightening, exuberant experiences.

Bopis

Which brings me back to Rodic's. Why do we return? I guess it's also about constancy. We go back for the same dishes, and we get the same. Year after year. The same Ilongga cooks and servers, the same red-checked tablecloths, the same tin plates, the same vinegar bottles. The same tapsilog. The same greasy smell on your hair and clothes after you've eaten your fill.

Rodic's is not celebrating its centennial yet, having been established only in 1949, but it has been around long enough to generate the same experience in generations upon generations of iskos and iskas.

Of course all this is not to say that UP, and Rodic's, and we, have not changed. There have been astounding changes, in fact. Like there's water now in the comfort rooms, there are garbage bins around the oval. There are a lot of new buildings, there are TOKI jeeps (reverse of IKOT), there's a spanking new alumni building.

And among my friends, there are now bulges here and there, a lot are now accomplished in their chosen fields of profession, we are now "moneyed" - to the point that, as someone noted, even though Rodic's tapsilog had doubled in price from when we were still in school, we can now afford to "eat all you can."

At Rodic's there are noticeable changes, too, like the upstairs space is now air-conditioned, and it has expanded with a branch in Makati City, serving mostly homesick alumni.

But in all things I guess what's essential remains and will stay the same. The same aims for academic excellence, leadership and service. The same bonds of friendship that attach people far away from one another. The same anise-flavored, vinegar-spiked, flossy tapsilog.

UP made you in such a way that when the world is sitting, you would be standing.
And when the world is standing, you would stand out.
And when the world stands out, you would be outstanding.
And when the world tries to be outstanding, you would be the standard.
Hannnneeeeeep!!!
In short, naging pasaway ka!
Happy Centennial, UP!

---

Rodic's

• Shopping Center
  UP Campus, Diliman
  Quezon City

• G/F, Fedman Building
  199 Salcedo Street
  Makati City
  Delivery Tel.No. (632)7592875

---

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Tinapay: Sweet Loaves of Pangasinan Bread

This is part of an ongoing series, "Tinapay," about local breads found in street corner bakeries across the Philippines.

After our freshman year in college I brought home to Pangasinan my roommate in the freshman dormitory, who hails from Bulacan, for a short summer vacation. In the course of trying out things Pangasinan-made, she commented that our loaf bread was sweet.

And I realized that, yes, indeed, most bread loaves sold in local bakeries in the province were sweeter, compared to loaves made outside Pangasinan. I have grown up accepting that bread loaf slices can be eaten like sweet pastries, not needing any palaman.

But that had not always been the case. In the early 1970s we ate tasty, or pan americano, those small white, tasteless, bland and dry loaves that paired well with a thin spread of katiba.

But towards the middle of the decade, specifically in 1976, a new restaurant was established in Dagupan City, and it made such a splash that it re-defined the way bread was eaten in the province.

Pedrito's, the foreign connections ending with the name and its logo of a Mexican hat, served chicken sate - grilled chicken with peanut sauce - that was such a novelty at that time. It also made an impressive pastel de lengua, baked with mashed potatoes on top. Lunch packs of these specialties dominated parties and events everywhere in the province.

Pedrito's expanded fast, putting up three branches across the city, and it became the party venue of choice, as well as the in dating place. Its pastries - cheese tarts, brownies, etc., became the ubiquitous pasalubong.

But trade liberalization reached Dagupan City, and the coming of malls introduced Pangasinenses to new food, and concepts that tasted new. Pedrito's has also surpassed its business cycle. Its longevity actually is admirable, having stayed alive all these years. But it is now down to one outlet - where it transferred from its  first outlet after the ruinous earthquake of 1990, at Lucao District. It is not as influential as before, since the multi-national fastfood chains can deliver at your doorstep.

But Pedrito's legacy lives on, and has made a permanent mark on Pangasinenses' tastebuds. For the most infuential of all Pedrito's products is the loaf bread. Pedrito's made it big, brown, milky, and yes, sweet. Such that after it baked its first loaf all other bakeries, big or small, in the province, tried to imitate it. And they have succeeded, perhaps not exactly as Pedrito's loaves, but when you buy bread nowadays anywere in Pangasinan it is most likely bound to be big and sweet. Unless you specifically seek bakeries that sell their own unique white, bland bread, like Kwong Tay along AB Fernandez Avenue.

Pedrito's influence is such that another bakery was established in Dagupan City to sell bread imitating its loaves, in taste and packaging, and actually gained following that ate up Pedrito's market base. Jech has its own restaurant, too, and a line of pastries which I haven't tried yet. It opened only several years ago, but it has already gained equal footing with Pedrito's, perhaps even surpassed it.

Jech's loaves are distinctively sweeter than Pedrito's, and they have a longer shelf life, perhaps due to the higher sugar content. The bread slices are also heftier and denser. I just hope the incidence of diabetes has not increased in the province.

---

Pedrito's Bakeshop, Restaurant, Catering Services
No. 70 MacArthur Highway
Tapuac District, Dagupan City
Tel. Nos. (075) 5157021-22, 5220765

Jech Food Shop
#251 De Venecia Avenue
Lasip Chico, Dagupan City
Tel. Nos. (075) 5221053, 5221483, 5234414, 5175214

---

The Tinapay Series

• Puto Seko (Laguna)
• Ensaymada
• Dealo Apas, Broas and Other Southern Tagalog Biscuits
  (Lucban, Quezon)
• Charito's Delights (Catbalogan, Samar)
• Half-Moon Cookie (Puerto Princesa, Palawan)
• Baker's Hill (Puerto Princesa, Palawan)
• Crema de Fruta
• Napoleones (Bacolod City, Negros Occidental)
• Panaderia de Molo (Iloilo City)
• Pastel (Camiguin)
• Inipit (Bulacan)
• Cinnamon Swirl Loaf (Baguio City)
• Kabukiran

Black Forest Cheesecake

Yesterday we gave a send-off to the statue of the Virgin Mary, which stayed in our house for a week for the Black Rosary. We received the invitation to be a Black Rosary host with joy - the timing was very opportune as we were settling down in our new home. It also paved the way to our meeting the members of the local religious community.

In my elementary days not so long ago, I participated in black rosaries around town in Pangasinan during the hot days of summer. It punctuated the idle days, which were otherwise mostly spent in reading Mills & Boon and Sweet Valley High pocketbooks. Led by a mass lector in our parish, I joined friends, mostly young girls my age, in bringing a small image of the Virgin Mary from house to house every three days.

Reception of the image was always accompanied by a small gathering and a short repast. Departure was celebrated likewise. So we didn't mind the kneeling and recitation of the novena every three days - we knew there were treats to be had afterwards!

I was just a participant then, though, with no care at all about the logistics and the leading of the prayer. This time around we were the hosts, and we had the responsibility, first, of leading the rosary, maintaining daily prayers, and choosing the host to whom we would next be entrusting the image. And of course, all the Black Rosary snacks I have eaten in my childhood were now being compensated for by my having to come up with a suitable handa to welcome and send-off Our Lady.

But I realized that was not the end of it. When She did come and we started the prayers, I found out to my horror that the prayer folder thrust to me was in Tagalog - pure, archaic, formal Tagalog. I had been confident before the devotees arrived - I can still recite the entire novena, plus all mysteries and prayers, by heart, in English and Pangasinan, to boot. In my excitement in the planning of the merienda I had forgotten that I was now in Tagalog country.

The rosary proceeded with me murdering most of the beloved words of Aguinaldo. I was glad for my 2 1/2 year-old daughter kneeling innocently in front of me the whole time - at least there was one person in the room who was blissfully unaware of my bloopers.

And I was quite relieved when it was all over. At least I could hide in the kitchen with the pretext of fixing the food, all the while praying fervently that the black forest cheesecake I made would make the devotees forget about my murderous frenzy - at least for a while.

This is my version of a cheesecake that became a black forest cake. I happened to have in handy what I thought would be suitable for an impressively luxurious yet easy to make refrigerated dessert - cream cheese, Knoxx gelatin, cherry topping, chocolate sprinkles and Cream-O cookies.

The result did not have a chocolate crumb or filling - rather it was by all means still a cheesecake, with all the flavors of a black forest cake.


Black Forest Cheesecake

1 pack cream cheese, sliced and softened
3 packs multi-purpose cream
1 big can condensed milk
1 envelope Knoxx clear, unflavored gelatin
1/2 kg pack Cream-O cookies, without the creme filling
1 can cherry topping in syrup
1 small pack chocolate sprinkles or chocolate shavings

1. Process in a blender the first three ingredients until free from lumps.


2. Sprinkle the gelatin slowly with the blender on mix or stir mode.


3. Crumble the cookies coarsely or break them into quarters and lay randomly on the bottom of a deep glass dish.


4. Pour the cream cheese mixture on the cookies, allowing them to rise at uneven levels.


5. Cover and refrigerate for at least four hours, or until firm.


6. Arrange the cherry topping and chocolate sprinkles on top alternately.

Notes:
Cream-O cookies without the creme or sandwich filling can be bought by the pack, ground, crumbled or whole, at Chocolate Lovers, and at the stalls selling marshmallows and shake flavors in Divisoria, at the side of the market.

Chocolate Lovers
MAIN: 45 P. Tuazon Blvd. Corner C. Benites St.
Cubao Q.C. Philippines 1109
Tel. Nos. (+63 2) 411-7474 / 724-5752 / 724-4964
BRANCH: CLI WELCOME ROTONDA
# 2 Kitanlad Corner Quezon Blvd.
Tel. Nos. (+63 2) 732-8576 / 741-7487

Other cheesecake variants:
Langka Cheesecake
Mini Cream-O Cheesecake
Cream-O Cheesecake

LP 19: Igado

[Pork internal organs stewed in vinegar]

Fiesta was not given much weight in our house. Let me add that I think it was given the same treatment elsewhere in poblacion, where our house was located. This is probably because there was not much community spirit, relative to the barrios.

We celebrated fiestas by joining the parade, or watching it, and attending the nightly baile in the town auditorium, again either as spectators or as active participants to the dances. But participation is rare – it was more fun to watch the politicians, those who wielded influence in the town, and the wealthy, cavort to the beat of the chacha or the tango as dished out by two live “orchestras.” Nowadays probably these are interspersed with Itaktak Mo. Midnight marks the end of the baile and the beginning of the annual beauty pageant.

Fiestas are also the time for the archbishop to confirm Catholic baptisms. Which gives more reason for a cooking frenzy, though confirmations are not celebrated as much as baptisms are.

We kids in the house having been confirmed right after our baptisms, our mom didn’t see any reason to be on a fiesta mood during fiestas. She just prepared some, for those who got tired and hungry after the rides in the plaza, or for those who wanted to join the dance and watch the beauty contest. But we didn’t receive that many visitors, anyway.

But both my parents grew up in the barrios, and my mom never missed a fiesta in Don Pedro, sometimes to the chagrin of my dad. It was the opportunity for her to catch up on the lives of her relatives. I always tagged along, until I was old enough to join the dances held on empty lots with dirt-packed floors. But that was not the reason I asked my mom to take me.

It was because my uncles cooked the best igado. My uncles’ take on meat dishes during big celebrations have become my standards. My uncles have always been the better cook as long as I can remember. Anyway, killing a pig and cooking the different parts into different dishes requires bayanihan – involving several families, which we did not have in the poblacion.

I have attended fiestas in different parts of the country, and in all of them it always involved a pig slaughter. This is actually practical, because with a whole pig a family can feed visitors for days, especially those with visiting big clans.

Various dishes can be created from a single pig, utilizing all the parts – the meat for embutido (ground pork meat roll), the belly and tail for adobo (vinegar stew) and giniling (sauteed ground pork), other fatty parts and liver for menudo (diced meat and liver in tomato sauce), the head for dinakdakan (grilled ears and snout mixed with pig brains), the thighs and legs for crispy pata, the lungs and heart for bopis (lung stew), the internal organs for igado, etc.

For me, these dishes may look different, and are called differently, but they taste all the same. Except for the igado. What sets the igado apart is the flavor imparted by the internal organs – the altey (liver), the pait (intestines), the kidney, all stewed together in vinegar with laurel and peppercorns. Very little or no meat flesh at all is included in the dish, which somehow makes the igado taste not as porky a dish as the others. The distinctive vinegar taste also sets the dish apart further. It is not makatama, or nakakaumay.

I have also been fascinated by the preparation of this dish. Not the cooking itself, but the cleaning of the organs after the slaughter. The long, long pig intestines are turned inside out – binaliktad – to wash out its contents, cupping and pressing with your hands the inside lining and running them from one end to another several times, frequently dousing with hot water. I can’t remember if my uncles used soap, but maybe I don’t need to know.

Then at dawn, the barrio is awakened, not by the tolling of chapel bells, but by the constant hammering of bolos and knives on thick wooden planks, chopping the ingredients of the day’s porky meals.

I’ve mentioned before that I don’t eat pork on a regular basis, and try to avoid it if possible. There are only two exceptions to this – when the pork is cooked with pancit, and if it is igado.

I live far away from my uncles now, and going home during fiestas has become impossible. I’ve searched far and wide for the dish that best approximates my uncles’ igado. For a time I lived in La Union where my husband used to work, but I was disappointed to find out that igado in that Ilocano province is cooked with tomato sauce.

It’s ironic, but the only igado that surpassed my uncles’ is one that was cooked by Tito Don Manuel, an Ilocano expat then living in Jerusalem. I was with friends – we were mostly just kids then – and it was the first foreign travel for most. Tito Don prepared a Filipino fiesta for us. Perhaps the poignancy of the moment added to the memory of that gathering. The aroma of vinegar, soy sauce, laurel, pepper and pork liver perfectly blending in the stew, and the smell of pandan-infused steamed rice – they sustained me during the 1 ½ months I was out of the country, away from my family and all things familiar and comforting.

And here is my igado, the version of an uprooted Pangasinense who cannot attend fiestas at home.


Igado

½ kilo pig intestine, cleaned previously
¼ kilo pork liver
¼ kilo pork meat
1 big onion, sliced
1 head garlic, peeled and crushed finely
1 big onion, chopped finely
1 small red pepper, sliced thinly
5 dried laurel leaves
10 pieces whole peppercorns
½ cup vinegar, more or less
3 cups water
a few drops of soy sauce for color/annatto (achuete) seeds
cooking oil
a pinch of salt

1. Wash the intestines, liver and meat. Boil in a pan of water with sliced onions.
2. Throw away the water and repeat if the meats still smell.
3. Chop the intestines, liver and meat into inch-long slices.
4. Saute garlic and onions in oil. Add the red pepper when the onion has turned transparent. Cook for a minute.
5. Add the meats, stirring until well-blended.
6. Add the vinegar, laurel and peppercorns, cover and let boil without stirring for about 20 minutes.
7. Pour in the water, and add the soy sauce or annatto water, and let boil covered until the meats are tender.
8. Season with salt to taste.

Notes:

• This recipe is good for 6-8 persons. Half a kilo of intestine is about half of the entire thing, but at the wet market they usually sell the whole thing wholesale.
• Like any stew with vinegar, igado tastes even better reheated the next day, so if you get the entire length of the pig intestine and you are not cooking for a fiesta, you can always serve the left-overs the day after, or the next. Or freeze what can't be consumed.
• If it is impossible to turn the intestines inside out, you can cut it lengthwise to open it up. Brush the inside lining thoroughly and rinse with hot water.
• If using annatto or achuete seeds, steep a handful in half a cup of hot water, then strain the dyed liquid into the cooking meats after the vinegar has cooked.
• When the meats are soft and tender, you can let it cook until the water dries up, or until there is just enough sauce. I love a little sauce made thick by the liver on my igado, to spoon on steaming rice.

A Lasang Pinoy 19 entry.

A Lasang Pinoy event.

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Pancit Puti

When I was just starting in my job, pancit puti used to be a craze in the office. All birthdays were celebrated with bilao upon bilao of this pale noodle concoction, delivered by LSS Foods.

The fad has passed, but every Thursday an enterprising officemate includes a small plastic bag of pancit puti in her weekly menu. Her pancit is not faithful to that of LSS's, but I like hers better because she uses minced chicken instead of the original pork slices - that's pork with skin and the sliver of fat. And, because hers is more like the pancit puti that I cook at home.

Being a lover of all things noodles I was ecstatic to add pancit puti to my pancit repertoire when I was first introduced to it. It is simplicity personified, but it can be very tasty, with the blending of several flavors. It is a good companion to any other dish you would want to serve, but it can also stand on its own. It is also a fresh alternative to the usual soy-drenched pancit.

So during parties at home, especially when I have visitors coming from out of the city who I am sure haven't tried it, I serve pancit puti.

I thought it fitting to continue my posts in this blog after a long hiatus with pancit puti because this serves as the starting point - of a new direction that resulted from several developments in my life, and which will surely affect my writing and the course that this blog will be taking.

First is that I have successfully finished my training, which unexpectedly stretched to more than a year. Thank you very much for the good wishes - I am now in an assignment that would probably take me around the country more often (yehey!).

Second is that Cavite has become more than a weekend thing for me - it is now my permanent home, at least for the next five years or so. During a much-needed vacation after the training I had the opportunity to settle all our things and the family down, got to know the wet market intimately, and have started to sample the local food scene with the viewpoint of a resident and not just of a weekend visitor.

So this blog will now be dotted with the Cavite foodscape. Pangasinan food will continue to be the main theme, and as before my blogs will be interspersed with my favorites and discoveries in other places, with the food scene in my place of work, and now Cavite, being regular threads.

Before I came back to work I made sure to have our place blessed, throwing a party for all the neighbors and new acquaintances afterwards. Of course, it was the perfect way to introduce pancit puti, especially since the community is made up of a hodge-podge of immigrants from all the country's islands.

Pancit Puti

Ingredients

5 whole cloves garlic
oil for frying
1 1/2 kgs chicken soup pack or chicken bones
minced garlic and finely chopped onions for sauteeing
1/2 kg bihon or stick noodles
patis or salted fish sauce
sesame oil
ground white pepper
spring onion leaves
calamansi

Fried Garlic

1. Peel the 5 cloves of garlic and finely pound in a mortar.
2. Heat over medium fire enough oil for deep frying. Fry the garlic until golden brown, turning occasionally to keep from burning.
3. Drain well of excess oil. Set aside. This keeps in a tightly sealed container for weeks.

Chicken Broth

1. Saute chicken in garlic and onions. Add a dash of patis and pepper. Cover and let simmer.
2. When the chicken juices have come out transfer to a pot full of boiling water. Cover and let boil over medium heat for about 30 minutes.
3. Ladle out the chicken on a plate to cool, then pick out all the chicken meat.
4. The chicken broth can also be made in advance, storing it and the chicken meat in the refrigerator, or freezer if not to be used for several days.

Pancit

1. Bring the chicken stock again to a boil. While waiting for the stock to heat, soak the noodles in tap water, for about 10 minutes.
2. Add the noodles to the boiling broth, stirring once in a while to keep from sticking to the bottom. The noodles are cooked when they have turned transparent and are soft to the bite. If there is excess stock, drain.
3. Mix into the noodles the chicken meat, about half of the fried garlic, sesame oil and patis, adding small quantities at a time to ensure that the pancit does not get too salty. Mix well to distribute the flavors evenly.
4. Garnish with finely chopped green onion leaves. Serve on the side more of the chopped green onion leaves, the rest of the fried garlic, sliced calamansi, patis and ground pepper.

   Notes:

• 1 kg chicken thighs or quarters can be substituted for the soup pack.
• You can use previously made/commercially bought chicken stock instead of water or use chicken bouillon to add more flavor.
• Before adding the minced chicken to the cooked noodles, you can also saute them again in garlic and onions.
• Ground black pepper can also be used instead of white pepper - this is just in keeping with the white theme and black pepper actually stands out more if you like your food ma-paminta, although I've read somewhere that black pepper has more toxins than white.
• The amount of garlic, sesame oil and patis will depend on how you want each of their flavors to stand out in the pancit.

LSS Foods
#7559 Santillan Street, Makati City
Tel. No. 632-8191196