Kamatis or tomato is the ever popular vegetable in the world, rightly so because of its versatility in the culinary world and also for its nutritional value. Regarded as either a fruit or a vegetable, either way, tomato is good to eat by itself or combined with other foods especially in salad or salsa.
There are hundred of varieties of tomatoes. I particularly like the heirloom kinds because it reminds me of the tomatoes we have in the Philippines, sweet, sour and juicy.
I have been experimenting on the types of lettuce that will grow well in my garden. So far I’m successful. Like this red oakleaf lettuce I planted a month ago. They are so good, crunchy and sweet. I like the red color in combination with the green leaves of the Manoa lettuce in my salad…
Banana – (Musaceae) is by far the most widely known fruit in the world and the most cultivated. The varieties of banana is so wide it is divided into 10 groups from the cavendish type to cooking bananas called plantains but the Philippines also have the cooking banana variety we call “saba” or “popo’ulu” in…
Bataw or Lablab is a relative of the purple-hyacinth bean. It is a very versatile bean because you can use it in almost all type of cooking that requires beans. I particularly like to cook it stirfry with pork and shrimp. It takes a while before the seeds germinate after sowing but when it does…
Kalabasa or pumpkin is a favorite vegetable of mine. I like to cook them in coconut milk with shrimp and a little bit of curry powder. It’s so delicious especially with ginger and lemon grass as added flavoring. It is easy to grow. When it starts to flower, you can gather the flowers too for…
The bittermelon plant in my garden really took off so fast because of the recent rains that we had. I actually had been gathering the fruits as well as the leaves which we use in soups like mung bean soup and chicken tinola which locals call Chicken Paraya. I have done a little research on…
Malunggay/ moringa (Moringa Oleifera) is also known as horseradish tree because the roots taste just like horseradish. It is also called drumstick tree because the fruit or bean pod is long. The fruit is segmented in a triangle and has lot of seeds inside. In the Philippines, we used the fruit or beans as vegetable. …