Day 18: Pinoy Fried Chicken and Ginisang Upo

Before we were introduced to the KFC-style fried chicken, Filipinos had their own idea of what fried chicken should be. I for one enjoyed the tart & salty flavor from my family's style of cooking fried chicken. It certainly has no resemblance in taste and appearance to the breaded fried chicken of today. In fact, no breading is required for this version of fried chicken. And cooking it every once in a while just gives me a mega dose of nostalgia of life way back then.

Here's how:


Cut a whole chicken into several pieces and marinate it for an hour in a mixture of 1/2 cup of soy sauce, 1/2 cup of Calamansi and some pepper to taste. Make sure that the chicken stays in the refrigerator while it marinates so it won't develop any harmful bacteria. Turn the chicken half an hour into the marinating process. After an hour, drain the liquid off and deep fry the chicken in hot oil till it is fully cooked and till the skin turns crispy. It's a bit dark in color because of the soy sauce marinade but I assure you, it's very tasty. It goes well with tomato catsup.


For the vegetable accompaniment, I made ginisang upo. Upo is very similar to a zucchini but it's much bigger in size. In making this dish, peel a whole piece of upo, chop it into bite-size pieces and set it aside. Saute some garlic, onions and tomatoes in a large pan till they release their flavor and aroma. Add 1/4 cup of dried shrimp or Hibe, half a cup of water and the chopped upo. Add some patis and pepper to taste and simmer the upo till it's done.