Why Filipinos don’t make Chicken or Beef Stock
Generally, we don’t. If I can count Filipinos I know who make the glorious concoction of chicken or beef stock that is the base on which all stews and sauces undergo the process of transubstantiation from a ritual of just padding the stomach just to get through the day into a praise of taste buds, a bang on the mouth, a taste of heaven, the divine wave with the rattling of the spine and flashing of jazz hands; nine of my ten fingers will melt like ice sticks in the anger of the kitchen gods and the surviving finger that points to me, rises up and sways from left to right saying that I, the only Filipino I know who makes chicken stock between the beckoning hours of 9-5 on the first Saturday of every pope-ordained month is not even making a stock that is worthy of the cheap, bendable, aluminum pot.
Give me a moment to cough my brains out. That paragraph took me 30 minutes of thinking. That task though, is not minutely challenging than making a stock… which swallows my wife and my daughter for the whole weekend.
So why don’t Filipinos make chicken or beef stock at home if it makes every stew and sauce fabulicious? Given also the fact that we have a lot of soups and dishes in Filipino cuisine? I’ll go back in time and look at myself, when I was still the kitchen idiot in unreasonable reasoning.
Number 1 We don’t make stock in the Philippines because chicken bones/beef bones (don’t even think about veal bones) are not sold as bones. Let me spell it out for you: there are no chicken carcasses because everything in the chicken including the head goes to every member of the society communist-style. If you haven’t had chicken brains on your dinner roll or toast, Philippines is a place to visit. So you don’t go to your local supermarket with your demure demeanor and ask the butcher if he has chicken bones. He’ll look you in the eye, look to the ceiling, look you in the eye again and ignore you even existed. He’s looking for aspirins now.
Number 2 Filipinos love making bubbles or boiling stuff, instead of making beef or chicken stock. We boil fish, we boil vegetables, we boil spoons, forks and plates, we boil mystical tree branches and roots, we boil clothes, we boil boiled water, we boil everything. So why would we make beef stock if you can boil that beef for 5 hours, dunk in a few vegetables, salt, pepper and it’s a meal.
Number 3 Seriously, why would I go to the process of making stock? Seriously? The fact is, the recipes that are handed down to us did not require our native ancestors to make stock separately. So what’s the need? All you have to do is saute garlic, onions and tomatoes, pour a cup of water and you have yourself a tasty stock. Really.
Number 4 Now how about the golden cube of awesomeness? The glowing cube of power? The cube that is the gift of science, mass production and gods of quick-fixes. I guess you know what I’m talking about by now. Here are some ingredients that make up The One Cube that rules them all:
Bouillon Cube from Wikimedia Commons
Monosodium Glutamate – still debatable but nonetheless lethal if taken in high doses. This is not sugar. Keep away from the coffee table.
Disodium Guanylate – I don’t know what it is but Wikipedia says it’s not safe for babies under 12 weeks and should generally be avoided by Asthmatics.
Disodium Inosinate – This one says “Die So, Jim I Know Is In 8″. Makes no sense isn’t it? So why do they put it in food? Beats me.
Hydrolized Vegetable Oil, Hydrolized Vegetable Proteins, Hydrolized Yeast – Wikipedia says, Hydrolysis is (you need to read this) a chemical reaction during which molecules of water (that’s what’s inside a frog) are split into hydrogen cations (H+conventionally referred to as Hydronium ions – this doesn’t make sense) (don’t stop reading) and hydroxide anions (OH) (surprised?) in the process of a chemical mechanism (you can do it papi). It is the type of reaction that is used to break down certain polymers, especially those made by step-growth polymerization. (good name for a baby; Polymer) Such polymer degradation is usually catalysed by either acid (inserting parentheses is fun), e.g., concentrated sulfuric acid (H2SO4), or alkali, e.g., sodium hydroxide (NaOH) (that’s a surprised sodium compound).
If you base your judgment on the names of the ingredients alone, you would likely think that chemists are the people that make the meal and not cooks.
Fact is, most households in the Philippines use chicken cubes and beef cubes oftentimes. There are no ridiculous side-effects… so far. If you ask me, it definitely heightens the flavor and does miracles to any dish.
If you ask me again chicken stock or beef stock heightens the flavor and does miracles to any dish too… better than any other chicken or beef cubes. If you do it right. And it is very easy to do it.
So again, I’ll ask, why do Filipinos don’t make chicken or beef stock even though most of our dishes are soups and stews? Why do we still opt for The Cube that has monstrous amounts of salt and laboratory compounds? You have to tell me about it because honestly my mind’s eyes are wide open but I fail to see the picture. I can only hear the song Vincent playing on a loop with the words “starry starry starry starry starry starry”.
This post had me busting at the seams. I couldn’t stop laughing. There is so much truth, especially on Number 2 – Filipinos do love to boil…everything.
But I timidly raise my hand – because *I* make my own stock. I do! I roast a chicken and save the carcass to make the best stock for my own arroz caldo. And my aunt is known for spending days (okay, maybe hours) brewing her very special stock out of pata to make the most perfect pancit bihon.
We do exist
I think the reason also why Filipinos in the Philippines doesn’t do stock is that most of them have a very small fridge, they buy their ingredients everyday freakin’ day (I find it time consuming). There’s no space to store it, if left outside..it can spoil easily and the supply of electricity is not dependable. You have to simmer stock for hours and cooking fuel can be expensive there. With regards to MSG and stock cubes, hehehehehe…to tell you frankly I grew up with this magic flavours when I was growing up in Pinas, but I swear I didn’t grew an additional eye or limb or tail because of it=). Only now in Australia I totally 100% don’t use MSG and only occasionally use stock cubes…you can’t go cold turkey (I need the bad stuff, every now & then…or I get withdrawals!!!)…just joking! And I totally agree on Filipinos love to boil things…LOL!
hahahaha! wait wait! i wasn’t supposed to post this one yet. i still need more pictures. i actually made it this morning, went to the market, and when I came back people are talking about it in twitter. i accidentally published the thing. let me lodge my chicken stock in the stove and then i’ll fix this. and grammar errors too. goodness, I didn’t know I was clicking the publish button.
How true is this. I use beef of chicken boullion all the time.
We only do that on special occasions. Why? because we use wood or coal to boil beef, pork or chicken.
But honestly, using the broth cubes is much easier. So technically, we just want everything to be instant, we just hate to admit it but that is where we headed at and there are now different varieties that I am seeing in the supermarket. They are all the same, MSG.
@cusinera spot on. that’s what I noticed too. the climate in the philippines spoils food faster than the neighbor’s dinner-stealing cat.
@joy the last time i used the cube was 5 years ago. when i was sick and can’t do anything but boil water. instant soup.
@jeck very true. you may finish half a sack of coals when you do stock if you don’t have gas available. if you think about it, Filipinos in the Philippines are very lucky because anytime you need anything it is very easy to get it. the neighborhood store sells everything in retail. need a spoon of sugar? they have in exchange for a peso. we’ve got a genius (or lazy) culture – easy access to everything.
@liren you gotta share that bihon stock. or else…
I’m Filipina but I make my own stock. I just throw in some meat bones, fish or vegetables and add peppercorns, bay leaves, water and salt in a stock pot. Boil it and remove the scum. So easy to make and free from msg and sodium.
watch out tomorrow noe, i’ll be putting a post on how to make chicken or beef stock.
i really appreciate you guys leaving comments. cheers!
I don’t make my own stock – quite frankly, it never occurs to me to save the bones of a roast chicken, etc. BEFORE everyone has gnawed on them for every bit of protein possible. I purchase ready-made, low-sodium organic broths but I don’t know what I’ll do when we move to the Philippines soon. Looks like I’ll have to start simmering away if I want to avoid using the magic cubes of hypertension. Hurry up and show me how it’s done!
ziggy, you made me feel so guilty (joke only!)…went to my butcher today and usually I say no to free chicken frames, but I found myself saying yes=P
Hmn… come to think of it, Filipinos definitely love to boil stuff. Think sinigang, tinola, nilaga, bulalo, binakol and on and on and on. These dishes take hours to make though, so I guess a pre-made stock is really not necessary. Oh, now I’m hungry! I can definitely use some sinigang right now.
[...] Or as we commonly call it, Ajinomoto. (Has the crown gone to Magic Sarap now?) Here’s a trivia for you, “aji no moto” is a Japanese phrase which means “the essence of taste”. The flavor comes from glutamic acids which has a high concetrations in seaweeds. I have tasted it in its raw form, represented by white stains on a dried kombu seaweed. It doesn’t taste like MSG from the bottle but you know its MSG. The natural way of getting the flavor is to simmer kombu in water for the whole night to get a concentrated flavor of MSG or umami which is now classified as the 5th of the basic tastes – sour, sweet, salty, bitter and savory or delicious for umami. It’s really silly but it’s true. You can say this is sweet, or that is salty, or that is sour, but when you say that’s delicious, it is different from salty or sweet or sour, it is actually…delicious! I’ll stop talking about it pronto because I may not stop. Just click this and read about artificial flavoring. [...]
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