Hawaiʻi Community College culinary instructor, Tori Hiro, shares her family’s pinakbet recipe
The holiday season is here, and UH News is asking members of the University of Hawaiʻi ʻohana to share their favorite recipes. The hope is these recipes and the short stories that accompany them will give everyone some ideas for eats throughout the holidays along with some good feelings of the season.
Hawaiʻi Community College’s Tori Hiro, a culinary program instructor who was featured at “A Taste of Hilo” in October, shared her family’s recipe for the traditional Filipino dish: pinakbet.
Hiro said, “During the holidays our family never cooked the traditional holiday meals. We always prepared Filipino food—it’s our comfort food!”
The stew made from pork and a mix of local vegetables, such as squash, pumpkin, eggplant, okra, yard-long beans (otong), and bitter melon, is distinctly flavored with bagoong (a condiment made from salted and fermented seafood).
“This was one of the first dishes my apo (grandfather) taught me how to cook using vegetables grown in their backyard in Laupāhoehoe,” Hiro said.
Pinakbet
Prep Time: 10 minutes
Cook Time: 20–30 minutes
Total Time: 45–50 minutes
Servings: 8
Ingredients
- 3 tablespoons oil
- 1 pound pork belly – cut into strips
- 4 small onions – julienned
- 10 cloves garlic – minced
- 2 5-inch pieces of ginger peeled and smashed
- 4–6 tablespoons bagoong (add more to taste if needed)
- 6 medium tomatoes – julienned
- 1 small squash (tabungao or togan) – peeled and cut into 1 ½-inch cubes
- 2 cups chicken brothv
- 1 tablespoon shrimp dashi powder
- 10 young okras – ends trimmed, cut into halves diagonally
- 2 bunches yard-long beans (otong – ends trimmed and cut into 3-inch lengths
- 6 medium bitter melon – seeded then halved and cut into ½-inch slices
- 4 large eggplant – ends trimmed and cut into oblique cuts
- 1 karabasa (pumpkin) – peeled, seeded and cut into 1 ½-inch cubes
- Cornstarch slurry
Instructions
In a pot, heat oil over medium-high heat. Add pork and cook until browned and fat rendered.
Lower heat to medium and add the onion, ginger and garlic and cook until pork is tender and aromatic.
Add tomatoes and cook for about 3–5 minutes or until it becomes soft and the skins peel off the flesh.
Add bagoong and continue to cook for about a minute.
Add squash, chicken broth and shrimp dashi. Cover the pan and let it simmer for about 2 minutes.
Add yard-long beans (otong), karabasa, bitter melon and eggplant. Season with more bagoong if needed. Cook for about 2 minutes. Add the okra and cook for another 2 minutes or until vegetables are tender yet still a bit crisp.
Taste the sauce and add more bagoong or shrimp dashi to taste.
Thicken Pinakbet with a cornstarch slurry at the end. Thicken sauce to your desired thickness to tighten up the sauce so the vegetables are well coated when serving.
Transfer to a serving plate and serve with rice (inapoy).
Mangan tayon! (Let’s eat!)
*This story originally appeared in University of Hawai'i News on December 3, 2024.
