Sinigang

This is a dish that I love, love, love. It's very traditional Filipino food and since it is, it's one of those dishes that has a lot of variation. It's basically a dish that has an equal amount of meat and vegetables in a "bath" of sour broth. Lots and lots of sour broth. That's the best part!

I was craving it the other day and managed to find a recipe that doesn't have tamarind (sampaloc in Filipino) in it. I wasn't sure I could find it at the local grocery store. I substituted lemon juice and distilled vinegar instead and ended up with a perfectly acceptable, American-grocery friendly version that my hubby really loved. This is how I made it:

2 lbs. pork stew meat (they were ribs I think)
6 cups of water, more if you like it soupier, broth if you like it richer
1 large japanese eggplant, cut in chunks
1 daikon radish, cut in chunks
1 bok choy or similar green veggie
1 medium onion, cut into strips
Half a bunch of string beans, also called long beans (not green beans) cut into 3 inch lengths
juice of 2 lemons
1/4 c. distilled white vinegar or coconut vinegar if you can get it
salt

Boil the pork in the water until the meat is tender. Add the daikon and onions which, next to the egg plant, is the best veggie in this stew. Cook for about 10 minutes. Add the beans* and eggplant. Cook for about 5 minutes then add the bok choy. Cook until the bok choy turns bright green. The daikon should be easy to pierce with a knife and will have soaked up a lot of the sour taste of the broth. YUM. Serve over hot rice. Make the rice swim in the broth!

Traditionally, this dish has patis (or called nam pla in other south Asian countries) which is a fermented fish sauce. It imparts a strong pungent taste. Since we can't have that on our diet (Feingold.org), I eliminated it. All I wanted was the sour and I got just as much as I wanted :) You can also use other veggies with this, of course, even okra (I like okra, but I am an odd one out I think). My grandma made it very simply and that's how I like this humble dish.

* I have no idea how long it takes to cook the beans. I couldn't find any at the store but my grandma always made it with string beans for me. I was sad that I didn't have any this time around but that's ok.