Inubaran

Chicken and banana pith in coconut milk, with the pith soaked in salted water so it keeps white.

Chicken. Not vegetarian — contains chicken, fish sauce.

Ingredients

• 1.2 kg chicken, in pieces
• 700 g banana pith, in thin rounds
• 600 ml coconut milk
• 3 lemongrass stalks, bruised and knotted
• 60 g fresh ginger, in matchsticks
• 1 onion, sliced
• 8 garlic cloves, crushed
• 3 tablespoons fish sauce
• 4 long green chillies
• 2 tablespoons oil
• 1 tablespoon salt, for the soaking water

Method

1. SOAK THE PITH IN SALTED WATER THE MOMENT IT IS CUT. Banana pith browns within a couple of minutes of meeting air, like a cut apple but faster, and brown pith makes the whole coconut sauce grey. A bowl of water with the tablespoon of salt in it, ready before you start cutting.
2. Strip the outer layers off the stem until you reach the pale core, then slice it across in 5 mm rounds. Pull the stringy fibres out of each round with your fingers -- they do not soften and they catch in the teeth.
3. Squeeze the rounds in the salted water, drain, and squeeze again in fresh water. Some bitterness comes out with it.
4. Fry the ginger, garlic and onion in the oil, 4 minutes.
5. Chicken in, 5 minutes, turned until the skin tightens.
6. Fish sauce, then 300 ml of the coconut milk and the lemongrass. Simmer covered 20 minutes.
7. Pith in, drained, 15 minutes, until it has gone translucent and gives completely under a spoon.
8. Remaining 300 ml of coconut milk in, heat right down, 8 minutes at a bare shiver. Boiled now it splits.
9. Chillies in for the last 3 minutes. Lemongrass out before serving.
10. The sauce should be thick and white and the pith should have disappeared into it in texture while staying visible.

Our own recipe. This one was written for this site rather than taken from anywhere, so there is no source to point you at. The quantities and the order of the steps are choices, not the only way to do it.

Filed under Philippines · All recipes