BOX GRATER: A simple yet durable four sided stainless steel grater can go a long way in the kitchen. Aside from grating cheese, I also use my handy box grater for shredding any number of fruits and vegetables needed to be mixed into various Filipino dishes such as lumpia, pancit, atchara and the like.
COCKTAIL SHAKER: As you’ll see in Chapter 6, “Filipino Finger Foods and Cocktails,” there is a rich history of cocktails in Filipino cuisine. As such, a good sturdy cocktail shaker is a handy and necessary tool when mixing a number of different drinks. The shaker made by OXO is a good all-around cocktail shaker that doesn’t leak and has plenty of room for liquids and ice.
DEEP FRY THERMOMETER: Filipino cuisine has more than its fair share of deep-fried delicacies. Although there are other ways of checking oil temperature (e.g. dropping a cooked rice grain into the oil to see if it sizzles), a deep fry thermometer takes the guesswork out of frying and allows you to better control and maintain the desired frying temperature. It’s also inexpensive and easy to store—more reasons why you should own one.
FINE-MESH SIEVE/STRAINER: An indispensable tool for straining stocks as well as for draining any number of fragile Filipino noodles. Choose a large metal sieve that will still fit into your largest bowl.
KNIVES: You don’t need an entire set of expensive knives to be a good cook. I know it may seem like common sense in today’s world of cooking shows and food blogs, but I’ll say it anyway: you only need one good chef’s knife. My personal knife of choice is the Shun Ken Onion Chef’s Knife. It cuts like a dream and feels like it was custom fitted to my hand. I use my Shun for everything from breaking down whole chickens, to portioning precise squares of pork belly, and my favorite—smashing cloves of garlic. But I suggest you use whatever knife is comfortable in your own hand, making sure that the knife you choose remains sharpened and honed at all times. A sharp knife is a safe knife, and a safe knife is a versatile knife.
NONREACTIVE COOKWARE: Because acidic liquids, such as vinegar and citrus juices, are used so frequently in Filipino cuisine, it’s vitally important that you use nonreactive cookware such as stainless steel or enameled cast iron. Do not use aluminum cookware as it will color acidic foods with a gray tinge. Do not use cast iron (enameled cast iron is okay) as acidic foods will leach iron from the pan. The pots and pans I used the most while writing this cookbook were a large stainless steel sauté pan for searing meats and stir-frying vegetables, and a 6-quart enameled Dutch oven for making soups, stocks, and many adobos.
OVEN-SAFE RAMEKINS: Ramekins can be used for so much more than for just holding prepped vegetables (does anyone really use ramekins for that anyway?). Ramekins with a capacity of 6–8 ounces are perfect for making individual dessert servings like Creamy Leche Flan Custard (page 138), or for more savory applications like pot pies.
RICE COOKER: Plain and simple, an electric rice cooker is an essential tool for every Asian household, or even any household that prepares Asian food on a regular basis. I’ve lived my entire life with a rice cooker in my home—literally—so I don’t know how I’d function without one. My current rice cooker of choice is the Zojirushi Neuro Fuzzy model, where “Neuro Fuzzy” is just some techie-speak for “this rice cooker does a bunch of other stuff besides cooking rice.” For instance, I often set the timer of my rice cooker so that a batch of warm oatmeal is ready for me when I come downstairs in the morning. The Zojirushi is an investment, but in return you’ll have perfectly cooked rice, among other things, whenever you want. While the fancy Zojirushi is nice to have, you can definitely get by with a more inexpensive rice cooker. In fact, I owned a tiny 3-cup capacity one-button rice cooker throughout college, through my days as a bachelor, and into my first years of marriage. That’s a long stretch of time for a “cheapo” rice cooker.
ROASTING PAN: A large heavy roasting pan is not only useful for roasting big hunks of meat or large amounts of vegetables, but it is also a great vessel for making the water bath necessary for a creamy leche flan. Choose a roasting pan that has handles you can comfortably grab while you have oven mitts on your hands.
SPIDER SKIMMER: Primarily used for fetching fried items from hot oil, a bamboo spider skimmer with a steel mesh basket is also great for draining small amounts of noodles and blanched vegetables, or plucking hard-boiled eggs from boiling water.
WOK: Like the Chinese, Filipinos use the wok (called a kawali in the Philippines) for deep-frying, stir-frying, and steaming. Large 14-inch carbon steel woks with a flat bottom are not only inexpensive, but they are the perfect shape for most home stovetops. Choose a wok with a long heatproof handle on one side, and a shorter helper handle on the other side. Also be sure that you have a metal wok spatula that is specially shaped to fit the curves of your wok to better flip and stir food during cooking.
STOCKING YOUR FILIPINO PANTRY
One of the stumbling blocks to cooking a great Filipino meal is the perceived lack of available Filipino ingredients. But considering the fact that Filipino cuisine is heavily influenced by the cuisines of China, Spain, Mexico, and the U.S., and because Filipino cuisine shares many similar ingredients to other Southeast Asian countries like Vietnam and Thailand, it is very likely that you'll be able to find the ingredients you need without traveling too far from your home. With the proliferation of large Latin and Asian markets, as well as smaller markets that specifically cater to Southeast Asians, the world of Filipino food is more accessible now than ever before.
While I'm fortunate enough to live near a large Asian grocery store, as well as a small Filipino market, I can usually find many ingredients in my local supermarket as well. So even if you live in a small town without any ethnic markets, it is still possible to find all the ingredients you need from the ethnic foods aisle at your regular grocery store, or by ordering more hard-to-find items from the internet.
The following is a list of the Filipino ingredients I use most often; the same ingredients I relied upon to write this book. This isn't a conclusive list that will turn your kitchen into Little Manila, but it is a list to get you well on your way to preparing dozens of Filipino dishes.
ANNATTO SEEDS (ACHUETE): Part of the legacy from the Manila-Acapulco galleon trade, annatto seeds are usually steeped in cooking oil to produce annatto oil (see page 26). The annatto oil is then used to impart a beautiful—and natural—reddish-orange hue to any number of dishes.