Expectations, reality and kare kare

In the chasm between expectations and reality, there's room for disappointment, elation and an unsettling amount of bacon fat.

My first winter break home from college, I woke up to the smell of bacon frying and pancakes on the griddle.

By the time I rolled out of bed at noon (the only thing I miss from my teens: sleep), everyone else had finished, but my mom saved me a plate on the stove next to a still-warm cup of maple syrup. I doused it on my pancake stack, cut through the soft, soaked-through layers with my fork, and unhinged my jaw for that first greedy bite.

What I tasted — didn’t make sense.

My brain expected sweet and fluffy. Instead it got fatty and coagulated; a funk that clung to all the cells of my tongue, coating them and clogging them.

That wasn’t maple syrup. It was rendered bacon fat.

A couple decades after sponging down the inside of my mouth with a paper towel, I still think about that day and the vast chasm that can form between expectation and reality. How that chasm can work against us, as it did for me that morning, but how it can also work for us.

Yesterday, I made my first-ever kare kare. The easiest way to explain kare kare (that’s kar-eh kar-eh) is that it’s sort of like a Filipino take on Indian curry. It’s a stew thickened with toasted rice powder and ground peanuts, and spiced with fish sauce and shrimp paste.

Curry, but make it tangy and deliciously funky, like so much of Filipino cuisine.

When I was a kid, my mom made kare kare on special occasions — special-to-her occasions, I should say. We half-breed children wanted nothing to do with the strong smells emanating from that pot. In another moment of expectation-vs.-reality, I remember digging into the fresh peanut butter this recipe calls for, thinking it would taste like Jif, then trying to scrape it out of my mouth while gagging, as my mom doubled over in laughter.

Over the years, kare kare has become almost as popular as Filipino adobo. I’ve watched chefs and cooks embrace this dish, and I’ve tried to do the same. I’ve adjusted my expectations and reframed kare kare not as a weirdly funky immigrant Mom dish but as a branch connecting me to that side of my past.

Last year, I texted my mom asking for her kare kare recipe. Her all-caps response, “YOU NEED PEANUTS AND FRESH PEANUT BUTTER AND BAGOONG,” wasn’t helpful. To round out her sage advice, I’ve been studying recipes and ordering annatto seeds online. But it wasn’t until the new “Filipinx” cookbook arrived last week that I was confident I could tackle this dish properly.

This stunningly beautiful book (which you can order here) comes from Chef Angela Dimayuga and my other favorite half-Filipina food writer, the brilliant and poetic Ligaya Mishan of The New York Times. It has recipes for everything from Filipino Bolognese laced with hot dogs, to pancit and longaniza, banana ketchup and fermented chili paste.

It’s like a parade of all the foods served at all the Filipino celebrations of my childhood, but with stories and context — AND RECIPES WITH MEASUREMENTS AND DIRECTIONS.

I made my first kare kare last night. I expected it to take some time, which is why I saved it for a lazy Sunday. I went light on the shrimp paste (aka bagoong) and added a touch of vinegar to round out the fish sauce. The result — savory, velvety, rich and absolutely packed with wondrous vegetables — defied my expectations in the very best ways.

I brought some to my mom this morning.

“YES, IT’S PRETTY GOOD,” she texted afterward. “BUT I LIKE MORE VEGETABLES!”

There’s that dose of reality.

Recipe: Kare kare

Adapted from “Filipinx” and Panlasang Pinoy

Yields 6 servings

Ingredients

You can make this with any and all vegetables, don’t feel bound by this list.

1 quart stock (beef, chicken or vegetable) plus 2 cups water

2 large onions, one unpeeled and quartered, the other peeled and roughly diced

2 bay leaves, fresh or dried

2 teaspoons kosher salt

5-10 whole peppercorns

3 pounds oxtail (or pork shoulder cut into 2-inch chunks; to make this vegetarian (well, pescatarian) omit the meat and make a vegetable stock instead)

5 dried Thai chilies (can substitute 1-2 teaspoons dried chili flakes)

3/4 cup toasted rice* ground into a fine powder

4 teaspoons ground annatto seed (can substitute paprika, turmeric or a mix of both)

2 teaspoons cracked black pepper

3-4 tablespoons coconut oil (peanut, vegetable or olive oil will also work)

1 cup coarsely ground peanuts

1 thumb-sized piece of fresh ginger, peeled and finely minced

6 cloves garlic, smashed and peeled

2 large carrots, roughly diced

2 serrano chilies, seeded and thickly sliced

1/4 cup fish sauce (I like patis or nuac mom; find it at your local Asian market)

1/4 cup white or cider vinegar

1/2 cup fresh peanut butter (unsweetened and unsalted)

1 medium eggplant, cut into 1.5-inch pieces

1 1/2 cups long beans or green beans cut into 3-inch pieces

10-12 pods of okra

1 large red bell pepper cut into 1 inch pieces

1/4 head green cabbage or 1 small head bok choy, roughly chopped

2-3 handfuls of spinach

1-2 tablespoons bagoong (shrimp paste; find it at your local Asian market)

Rice for serving

*To toast the rice, place it in a dry pan over medium-high heat until it starts to brown. Turn the heat to low and stir constantly until the grains are uniformly browned and a lightly smoky smell has permeated your kitchen/home/pores. Remove from heat and grind it into a mostly fine powder (there will be some coarse pieces left) using a spice grinder, food processor or with a mortar and pestle and some serious elbow grease.

Directions

In a large pot, bring the stock and water to a boil. Add the quartered onion, bay leaves, salt, peppercorns and oxtail or pork. Simmer for 2.5 to 3 hours or until the meat is tender.

If using a pressure cooker, cook for 40 minutes and allow for 15 minutes of natural pressure release.

As the meat is cooking, grind the peanuts and prep/chop the vegetables.

Once the meat has cooked, strain the broth into a large, heat-safe bowl. Place a large, heavy pot over medium heat and add the dried chilies, toasted rice powder, ground annatto and black pepper. Stir to allow the spices to toast for 2-3 minutes. Add coconut oil and ground peanuts and continue stirring until the mixture is nicely browned (this will give the kare kare its rich color).

Add ginger, garlic, carrots, serrano peppers, fish sauce, vinegar and fresh peanut butter and cook for 3-5 more minutes, stirring as needed.

Add the meat along with the strained cooking liquid. Add the eggplant, long beans, okra, red bell pepper and cabbage. If there’s not enough liquid to mostly cover the vegetables, add water or leftover stock as needed. Bring pot to a boil and then lower it to a simmer. Cover and let cook, stirring occasionally, for 20-25 minutes or until the sauce has thickened and clings to the vegetables.

A few minutes before serving, stir in the spinach and bagoong.

Serve over warm rice.