Recipe: How to Make Kare-Kare (Filipino Beef Peanut Stew) in the Style of Aling Edith and Aling Zeny

Kare-Kare - Mmmmmm.

A simple word to describe Kare-Kare - Mmmmmm.  Kare-Kare is one dish that evokes a warm feeling inside because it has complex favors that are held together by an earthy essence; that is, peanuts.  Recently, Mike had the chance to make Kare-Kare, as of course, taught by yours truly.  It was a recent visit to the Philippines that we decided to make this video because it would be fun to show him making the dish in the presence of our Manila based family and also, it would be a great thing to use all the natural peanut butter we have in the cupboard which we got from Costco. 

What makes Kare-Kare difficult is its multi-step process from the preparation of the ingredients prior to the cooking and that includes all the cutting, chopping, boiling and tenderizing.  That alone is work! And when  it's time to cook the dish, one has to decide which of the vegetables go first as each has a different cooking time from the other and surely a discriminating lover of Kare-Kare does not want the veggies to be overly soft - "lusaw" as we call it in Tagalog. 

My mother was something like this in the
1940s.  This is Norma Blancaflor, a movie
star during the golden age of the LVN studios.

Now, my mother, who is a product of her affluent Chinese-Filipino background, thanks to her once millionaire father, a shipping magnate in late'40s Manila, never learned how to make this dish.  But we did get the idea from a good friend of hers, a certain Aling Edith (translated as "Madam Edith" in Tagalog) whose family procured pigs for slaughter from us when we had managed a pig farm in the 1980s.  She and Aling Zeny, her sister would hold parties in Marikina, a suburb of Metro Manila, in their house which strangely to say, also doubles as a funeral parlor at the side because their father (Mang Peping) manages that  and is considered as another one of their family businesses aside from selling pork in the wet market.  So, pork monger and a funeral parlor - just how unique is that? So far, I don’t recall that certain body parts got mixed with the other and vice versa - but I digress. 

Now, I have some leftover natural peanut butter from Costco (Kirkland brand).  I love this brand because not only is it already ground which is what one needs in making smooth peanut sauces, but also, it is made from all natural peanuts with no other preservatives or treatments to the oils like hydrogenation and all that. No sugar either which lessens the tendency to add sweetness to the dish when it is not called for.  So, simply stated, it is most recommended for use in this dish. 

This is how I remember Mang Peping's house looked like.
Yes, Virginia.  They held parties in a house with a funeral
parlor beside it.  But the Kare-kare was phenomenal.

And yes, after eating the sumptuous lunch. I would walk in
a room and I would see these. Morbid? As long as the
food is great...well, not really.

Now this is what they did.  But don't worry.  I do not
think I sever saw a human thigh hanging somewhere.

And that's bagoong. Shrimp so small you cannot even see
the heads, or the eyes or bodies. This is fresh.

And this is how they sell them in the
wet market a.k.a. "palengke".

In the olden days, as in turn of the last century, it would have been impossible to get peanut butter; for one thing, peanut butter is a later creation -- think of the George Washington Carver story.  The peanuts would be ground manually with a heavy stone grinder and since they are not finely ground, a thickening agent was needed in the form of rice flour which again is ground using the same grinder.  As one can imagine, this alone is a tedious and time consuming process that by the time one starts to actually cook, the chef has already drained  his energies just producing the ingredient.  So, thank God for peanut butter! 

Then of course, there is the cutting, chopping, peeling and mincing of the other ingredients from spices to vegetables. Oh! Do not forget we have to extract the annatto color from the seeds, you know.  And tenderize - we must tenderize the meats. 

To better describe the method of making a great Kare-Kare; it is just better to demonstrate it.  Our resident white guy, Mike will do that with his broken Tagalog.  We did this video while in Manila and because of the tremendous heat, he was sweating from all crevices and orifices which as I won't expound on so as not to turn off the reader from reading further.  So, I do apologize.  Also, you would see some of our family members participate in the video just to add a bit of variety show like ambiance to the whole affair.  But try it please, the recipe is authentic as it is tasty that despite the stockpot-ful of Kare-Kare, it was literally chowed down by about twenty people in just four hours. 

First, the ingredients. 

Kare-Kare in the Style of Aling Edith and Aling Zeny 

The first thing one should know is that the preparation of Kare-Kare is multi-layered and to facilitate things, divide the ingredients in the following sections: 

Spices. 

• 1 head garlic, peeled and chopped 
• 1 head medium onion, peeled and chopped finely 
• 2 tablespoons atchuete seeds (in US, called as"ahoite")  
• 1/8 to 1/6 cup oil 
• 3 laurel leaves 

Vegetables. 

• 1 small head cabbage, sliced lengthwise with stems intact 
• 1/2 kilo Bokchoy, traditionally the Baby White variety although the Broad Napa Cabbage is also acceptable. 
• 1/4 kilo long string beans ("sitaw" in Tagalog) 
• 4 pieces Asian long eggplants, sliced diagonally (may use 1 big Italian eggplant but cut lengthwise then sliced diagonally) 
• 1/4 kilo okra, washed and stems removed 
• 1 small or medium banana heart, cut into 2 to 3 inch pieces) 
• 1/2 jar natural peanut butter (about 20 ounces) 

Meats 

• 2 kilos beef tripe cut into four inches squares 
• 2 kilos ox tails or beef hocks with skin (or even both) 

Bagoong condiment 

• 1 small jar raw shrimp bagoong (about 8 ounces: in the absence of bagoong in some parts of the US, may substitute with 8 ounces fresh or cooked salad shrimp, minced finely added to about two to three tablespoons of salt, mix and knead well) 
• 1/2 cup brown sugar (to taste) 
• 1 tablespoon black pepper, freshly ground 
• 1/2 cup vinegar 
• 1 head garlic, peeled and chopped 
• 2 laurel leaves 

Procedure. 

1. Boil enough water in a stockpot that would cover the meats to simmer.  To this add  the laurel leaves and leave under medium heat to tenderize the meats - usually taking four hours.  Once this is done, separate the broth from the meat using a colander and set aside.  Discard the laurel leaves. 
2. In a large stewing pot, heat the cooking oil and once it begins to smoke, add the achoite seeds and lower the heat.  Mix and using the end of a cooking spoon, grind the seeds into the oil to extract the color which lie on the surface of the seeds.  This Is a slow process so be patient.  One would notice that the oil becomes deep orange as the seeds slowly become brownish from red which means that the seeds are showing its colors on the underneath of the color layer.  Separate the seeds from the oil using a small colander and discard the seeds. 
3. With the achoite oil, sauté the garlic and the onions until brown and toasted but not burnt.  Add the broth and cover to boil. 
4. Once boiling, lower the heat and gradually add the peanut butter.  Because peanut butter has a tendency to settle and congeal making it difficult to incorporate in the broth, one may choose to blend together some broth and peanut butter in a blender.  Blend at the highest speed and add this to the boiling broth in the stockpot. 
5. Lower heat and stir occasionally to boiling taking care not to let the bottom burn.  Add the vegetables, stirring then covering and simmering them once in a while to cook in the following order:  cabbage, banana hearts and string beans, then okra and eggplants, then napa cabbage and bokchoy last. The whole point of this stage cooking process is to cook the vegetables according to their toughness without overcooking some compared to the rest. The meats could be added with the bokchoy at the same time taking care not to vigorously stir the meats as it might disintegrate them.  Simmer a bit then turn the heat off. 
6. Do the bagoong condiment. 

• Starting with 1/8 cup oil in a hot wok, sauté the garlic until brown, then add the pepper.  Once fragrant, sauté the bagoong until the proteins are a bit caramelized and then add the sugar.  Saute some more until the sugar is melted and caramelized as well.  Add the vinegar and laurel leaves.  Boil then lower the heat as the sugar and vinegar reduces into a thick paste. 

Tips. 

• Achoite color is lipophilic, and therefore extracting them by sautéing in heated oil is more efficient than the traditional way of infusing the seeds in hot water and manually rubbing them as the water turns red.   Besides, this will lessen having red fingers. 
• Always brown the garlic and onions.  It adds a more well-bodied flavor to the kare-kare that blends well with the peanuts. 
• No salt in the stew please.  This is the point of using sautéed bagoong which is not only a salting agent but rather it also adds the complex briny smack on the creaminess of the dish.  Kae-kare is a multi layered dish in flavor and texture that blends well amidst the blank backdrop of white rice.  This is what makes it so exciting! 
• Feel free to add liquids if the sauce is too thick.  But another reason why it's a good thing to add the vegetables first in the stew rather than the meats is the stewing would extract the liquids of the vegetables making it thinner.  It is fine; however, if one chooses to stew the meats further in the peanut sauce before adding the vegetables and the rationale for this is that the peanut flavor get to integrate first with the meat.