Monggo Guisado

Ingredients:

1 cup monggo beans, soaked in water while prepping other ingredients
1/4 pound pork shoulder, cut in strips
1/4 pound shrimp, peeled and deveined
1 piece Tinapa, hand shredded, meat only
1/2 piece ampalaya, enough to make 1 cup
3 tablespoons patis(fish sauce)
3 cloves garlic, minced
1 medium onion, chopped
salt and pepper to taste
5-6 cups water
1/4 cup cooking oil, for sauteing

Cooking Procedure:

1. Boil the monggo bean with 4 cups of water until soft and tripled in volume.
2. Take half of the mix and put in the blender to puree.
3. In a separate pan, saute the garlic and onion. Add in the pork, ampalaya, patis, the boiled and blended monggo, but leaving out the liquid. Saute in the pan for 3 minutes.
4. Add in the liquid from the boiled monggo, and the rest of the water. Bring to a boil. If it's a little too creamy, add more water to your preference.
5. Stir in the shrimp and tinapa, cook for another 2-3 minutes. Add salt and pepper to taste.
6. Serve with rice.


Tips:

•The shrimp and Tinapa are added in the end so they don't get overcooked. Shrimps tend to be rubbery and the Tinapa will disintegrate when overcooked.
•For added flavor, pound the shrimp shell(shrimp meat not included), boil in water and strain. Use this to boil the monggo bean instead of using plain water.
•You can skip Step 2 if you don't want your Monggo Guisado to be thick and creamy.
•Some people add tomatoes during sauteing. I left out the tomatoes because the dish tend to spoil faster when cooked with tomatoes.
•For the Tinapa, I use the frozen Tinapa flakes easily found frozen in most Asian stores.