One is never more keenly aware of the change in the seasons unless dependent on it for sustenance. Back when I was a student in Manila, rainy weather meant just one thing: flood. We called the school no matter what Amado Pineda had to say (“Kaya mga bata, may pasok bukas”), because La Salle had a more sensitive instrument to gauge weather-related damage than PAGASA did: it’s pocket (it was obligated to put up stranded students for the night and feed them).
What did I care about habagat then? Monsoon season or not, the menu at Zaide’s (arguably the biggest of the school’s many canteens) never varied: pancit palabok, lumpia Shanghai, and the pork-and-chicken adobo combo. Zaide never had to worry about a deserted seafood market, or the steep prices charged for the rare fresh fish (“No? Then good luck making tinowa with your ₱100 bill instead,” a suki likes to say). He certainly never had to feed the likes of my parents.
Some bangus (milkfish), perhaps? Nah — not for two meals in a row. “Hey,” someone behind me said, “are those dawdàwo?” My ears perked up at the mention of my other favorite snail. Sure, they were puny, but at least they were fresh. Heck, at least there was some to be had at all.
Wikipedia says dawdàwo are mangrove whelk. They are conical in shape with a pointed end which vendors chip/cut off. That’s the end you suck on first, to create a vacuum inside the shell. Then you suck on the creature’s God-given opening and the meat should shoot straight into your mouth. It takes practice and lots of noise.
There is no secret to making good tinunuan. Everyone knows it is coconut cream that makes all the difference: the thicker, the better. But even all the tunô in the world amount to jack without the requisite salt and seasonings, and here’s where I give you my “secret” ingredient to elevate your dish to a new level of oishi-ness.
Presenting instant dashi (also known as hon-dashi):
I know what it looks like, and, yes, it contains MSG, like everything with the name Ajinomoto on it. But dashi is no newfangled culinary wonder — in fact, it forms the base for many a Japanese soupy dish (think miso). A key ingredient is skipjack (bluefin) tuna, which is smoked for up to a month, then treated with a mold culture to remove any residual moisture. The end product, katsuobushi (commonly referred to in English as dried bonito) is added to cooking liquids in the form of shavings or flakes. The taste is very much like the best fish stock: subtly sweet, yet not at all fishy. If you’ve had proper tinowa, you know what I mean.
By all accounts, it is easy to make your own dashi, so if you know where to find dried bonito (the seaweed known as kombu, too, another ingredient), give me a holler. In the meantime, I make do with the instant kind. Suffice it to say that I’ve made a lot of people happy with my tinunuan of late, and the only new ingredient in there is hon-dashi. One sachet (about two teaspoons) is about right for three cups of coconut cream (two thin and one thick). Try it in law-oy, too. Lord knows we need all the tricks we can pull out our sleeves to get us through this season with dignity (and sanity) intact.
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