Tell me what you eat, and I will tell you what you are.
Jean Anthelme Brillat-Savarin

(Phrase used in the intro of the original Japanese version of Iron Chef)

I have mentioned a couple of times already that I don’t consider myself a foodie; instead, I am just a person who enjoys food and blogs about it. One of the reasons (I don’t consider myself so) is that I don’t have any formal culinary/hospitality training – with the closest thing to “training” that I have is that from working in a restaurant when I was younger. Given the case, where did I get all my thoughts, perspectives, mindset about food then? One word: mom. Since today is Mother’s Day in Canada, I thought it would be suitable to honour the one person who made me who I am currently. And, to do so, what I ate in my last trip to Panama…

My mom’s stove.

One thing I must say: At home, my mom does 99% of the cooking. If there is any prep work that needs to be done, that would be usually me. My father can barely cook; whenever he does, the end result is usually barely edible. As for my sister, I have the odd thought she can burn water. While I did take some from my mom’s side, i.e., she taught me how to do some dishes, in the end, she only allowed me to cook in a couple of instance… The dishes were simple but, even then, I screwed up more often than not. Oh, well, that was the learning curve… Learning curve for what? Just take a look…

Lo mai gai, or glutinous rice wrapped in lotus leaves. Yes, my mom knows how to make this! This is something really time consuming as you have to prepare the rice, the filling, the leaves, etc. The filling is a make or break component: not savoury enough and the rice will not “soak” the juices which will then provide an additional layer of flavour. In my mom’s case, she had pork, shiitake mushroom, Chinese sausage and so on. Yummmmm!

This is what I had in one of the noons for lunch. Top right is a plate of lentils. When I mentioned I love legumes and my mom knows that… Bottom left is the plate of almost everything my mom used to make a beef bone soup (Panamanian style). Sometimes, in addition to the usual suspects, like corn, carrots, pumpkin and so on, she add unexpected ingredients – like Chinese radish (aka, daikon). And, finally, to the bottom right, steamed fish with soy sauce. Since the fish was fresh, it was the best option.

We had this for breakfast a couple of times: stir-fried rice noodle roll with some side, in this case, BBQ pork. Oh, about the fork and spoon: my parents did not formally teach me how to use chopsticks (oh, heresy!). No, I know how to use them – sort of. ^_^;;; (But, a lot better than most non-Asian).

My mom can also prepare non-Chinese dishes and here is an example: a shrimp salad. Underneath the shrimps there is avocado, pineapple and tomatoes.

Can my mom make dim sum dishes too??? Errr…. Actually, no, my mom “cheated’ here. What happens is that my mom knows a lot of the cooks/chefs in the big restaurants. So, if she wants something, she gives them a call the previous night and have them prepare some extra. That way, she buys them and cook them at home.

Similar to the veggies from the beef bone soup above; this time, a chicken soup. In the case you are wondering what is that yellow-ish thing at the bottom left (not the regular shaped one – the “other” one), that is plaintain.

Green beans stir-fry. Yup, back to Chinese/Cantonese, hehehehe.

My mom’s version of red kidney beans, cooked with pork tail. Compare it to my version… ^_^;

Shrimp omelette, something my mom seldom does but…

Did I mention prep work? In this case, I was assigned to de-shell the shrimp – which I did on several days for several dishes. In this case, to make this:

Which is the filling used for this:

And what is this? Wonton! Oh, the ones that “look funny” are the ones I made, hehehehe. And what do you do with wonton?

Either boil it…

Or pan fry it!

And, to serve the boiled one, a broth made with mushroom, chicken feet, bones, etc. The bok choy was boiled in this broth and served along with the wonton. Was it good? Of course it was!

And, finally, to show one of the biggest food assets in Panama: seafood. Here, langostino (not necessarily “langosteen”), something similar to black tiger prawn but larger.

And how do you cook it? Keep it simple…

Again, I don’t have any food credentials. At least, with this, I hope to show where I learn what I know! And, mom, I love you!