I had been cooking my latest version of Filipino-style Spaghetti for quite sometime now and have been planning to blog about it but never had the chance.  It’s a good thing this month’s KCC theme, hosted by Gio and Bea, is all about this pasta with sweet, sometimes with a hint of chili, tomato-based sauce.

My parents never cooked spaghetti for us.  They are partial to strictly Filipino dishes and on our birthdays they cook the meanest pancit bihon.  Well, they never really liked spaghetti, or any type of pasta regardless if it’s Italian or Filipino-style.  Before I knew Jollibee spaghetti, I remember pasta from the school canteen – barely reddish with ketchup and finely diced carrots and hotdogs.  At friends’ birthday parties, the addition of minced pork (more popular than minced beef) and bigger slices of hotdogs was such a treat for us kids.  For some reason even if I’d choose bihon over it anytime of the day I still ate it with gusto when served.

Having said all that, the first spaghetti I cooked was Italian Bolognese following procedures from the first non-Filipino cookbook I bought in my early 20s.  Funny that it’s when I realized that the tomato sauce is not supposed to be sweet!  If you ask me, my guess is that our ancestors probably got our version from the Chinese.  During the years we lived in Beijing, we were introduced to authentic northern Chinese food and one of them is called zha jiang mian, translated to us as Chinese Spaghetti.  We were really surprised how similar it is to the Filipino-style not only in color but also in taste.  The meat sauce is also sweet no wonder our Chinese translator loves the way Tita Glo (my son’s yaya then) cooks her pasta ala-Jollibee.

I love making my tomato sauce from scratch and perfected a version I got from watching Masterchef NZ but I admit I get cravings for Filipino-style from time to time.  For ages I struggled to replicate it until I made something I am comfortable with.  If I cook for Filipino friends who grew up in the Philippines, it goes without saying that the sauce should be sweet and with sausages.

More than a year ago I ‘re-mastered’ it using Kiwi ingredients.  When I cook it for Filipino friends as well as my stepson who grew up in Manila, it always hit the spot.  My son, who was never exposed to this style and partial to white sauce or olive-oil based sauce, surprisingly loves it.  I always tell them I have a secret ingredient.  Some of you may not know, in New Zealand there is no ketchup but something called tomato sauce (not to be confused with tomato pasta sauce) and my tomato sauce of choice is NZ made with a small percentage of beer in it.  Yes, beer!  And the sauce is sweet I don’t need to add extra sugar.  I personally call this ‘Kiwipinoy spaghetti’.

For KCC, I cooked the sauce with slices of corned beef silverside and beef meatballs.  Corned beef silverside maybe different from the canned corned beef normally used in another version of pinoy spaghetti but that’s the inspiration.  I intend to use minced pork but I grabbed the wrong minced meat at the market.

Ingredients:
1 cup olive oil (Masterchef says don’t be afraid to use more)
2 onions, minced
4 cloves garlic, minced
A bowl of button mushrooms, quartered
1 small carrot, diced
Pre-cooked corned beef silverside, sliced
2 1/2 cup of Tuimato Sauce (or a mixture of crushed tomatoes and sugar)
5 to 6 tbsp of tomato paste
Freshly grated black pepper
500g spaghetti
Salted water
Beef meatballs (you may use this recipe as a guideline)
Parmesan cheese (or grated cheddar cheese)

Heat olive oil in a saucepan while you prepare the onions and garlic.  Over low heat, cook onions and garlic until soft and melted for about 20 minutes.  During this time, prepare the mushrooms, carrots and corned beef silverside.

Add the carrots and corned beef, and cook for about 5 minutes.  Throw in the mushrooms and cook for another 2 minutes.

Pour in Tuimato Sauce and tomato paste.  Stir to combine.  Heat and simmer for about 5 minutes.  Set aside while you start to cook the pasta and meatballs. Cook pasta in salted boiling water until al dente. In another pan, pan-fry meatballs over medium heat for about 10 minutes.  Both should be cooked about the same time.

Place saucepan over hot hob.  Using slotted pasta spoon, remove spaghetti from water and stir into cooked pasta sauce.  Fold the pasta and sauce together gently.  Transfer to a serving platter or individual plates.  Top with meatballs and sprinkle generously with cheese.

“Kulinarya Cooking Club was started by a group of Filipino foodies living in Sydney who are passionate about the Filipino culture and its colourful cuisine.

Each month we will showcase a new dish along with their family recipes. By sharing these recipes, we hope you find the same passion and love for Filipino food as we do.” - Kulinarya Cooking Club

Iska

I am not a professional cook. My only claim to having a culinary background is a short stint as my dad’s teen ‘sous chef’ in his carinderia ages ago. Dad ran small eateries since I was a young kid - serving standard ‘turo-turo’ food ranging from the likes of menudo, adobo, pritong isda, dinuguan, binagoongan, bopis, munggo, pinakbet and giniling to merienda fares like goto, ginataan, pancit bihon, halu-halo and saging con yelo.

My father, a farmer in his hometown before working his way to becoming an accountant, definitely influenced my cooking in a lot of ways than I thought. My siblings and I were raised in a backyard full of fruit trees and vegetable garden. We spent weekends and the summer breaks running around with ducks, chickens, goats and pigs. I had wonderful memories of gathering eggs, butchering chickens, selling vegetables and the sweet aroma of preserved fruits. But my love for art led me to a degree in Architecture. Just few months after getting my license, I went abroad and lived independently at age 23. Definitely no maid, no cook, and a totally different food culture. Along the way I met lots of friends and spent what seemed a lifetime learning new tricks and recipes.

Now living in Auckland, I am a work-from-home mum who juggles time between work, fun and family - in pursuit of work-life balance. No matter how busy I am, I love the idea of cooking for my family. My blog chronicles home cooking greatly influenced by life outside my home country from Southeast Asia to Beijing and Auckland. And most of the time, being busy also means easy (sometimes quick), affordable meals.