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Cook this: Longganisa — Filipino-style chorizo — from Filipinx

'These little rotund sausages are something that's so quintessential to our cuisine,' says chef Angela Dimayuga

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Our cookbook of the week is Filipinx: Heritage Recipes from the Diaspora by Angela Dimiyuga and Ligaya Mishan. Tomorrow, we’ll feature an interview with one of the authors.

To try another recipe from the book, check out: Bistek (seared rib eye with lemon and onions) and laing with flowers (greens stewed in coconut milk).

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“These little rotund sausages are something that’s so quintessential to our cuisine,” says chef Angela Dimayuga.

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Longganisa is among the most popular Filipino cured meats, she adds, and is akin to an exceptionally juicy chorizo.

“But ours has some sweetness to it. It has a lot of garlic. And to me, it has to be dipped into this vinegar sauce (suka at bawang), which gives it a lot of balance,” she adds.

“The way that we cook it is in a pan to the point where the juices drip and then this caramelization happens with the juicy runoff drippings.”

A sense of abundance was important for Dimayuga to communicate in her debut cookbook, Filipinx. Most of the dishes in the book can be enjoyed all day, at any meal, which longganisa exemplifies.

“This is a nice thought about Filipino food, that even our breakfast dishes are good for any time of the day,” says Dimayuga.

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Longganisa was one of her favourite foods as a child growing up in Northern California. She was drawn to its strong flavours — owing to more than a head of garlic in the sausages themselves, and the accompanying chili-garlic table vinegar.

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The breakfast dish is a Filipino classic and fitting Filipinx cover star: “(It) belongs on the cover of a book.”

Filipinx: Heritage Recipes from the Diaspora by Angela Dimiyuga and Ligaya Mishan
Filipinx: Heritage Recipes from the Diaspora by Angela Dimiyuga and Ligaya Mishan. Photo by ABRAMS

LONGGANISA

lawng • gah • NEE • sah
Filipino-Style Chorizo

1 lb (455 g) ground pork
1/2 lb (225 g) pork shoulder, 1/4-inch (6 mm) dice, fat included
1 1/2 heads garlic (4 1/2 ounces/75 g), finely minced
1/3 cup (75 g) packed brown sugar
2 tsp soy sauce
2 tsp salt
2 tbsp suka at bawang (garlic and chili table vinegar) or apple cider vinegar, plus more for serving
2 tsp coarsely cracked black pepper
2 tsp paprika
5 feet (1.5 m) pork sausage casing, 1 inch (2.5 cm) in diameter (optional)
Garlic Butter Fried Rice or steamed rice, for serving
Eggs, any way you like, for serving
Your favourite pickles and vegetable sides, for serving

Step 1

Put the ground pork, diced pork, garlic, sugar, soy sauce, salt, suka at bawang, pepper and paprika in a large mixing bowl and combine using clean hands, until just melded. Be sure not to over-work the mixture; otherwise the meat will have a bouncy texture once cooked.

Step 2

If you are making caseless sausages, roll the meat into short, fat cylinders, 1 inch (2.5 cm) thick and about 2 inches (5 cm) long, weigh-ing about 1 1/2 ounces (40 g) each. Arrange on a plate or in a food-safe container and store in the refrigerator for the seasoning to marinate the meat overnight.

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Step 3

If using a sausage casing, first submerge the casing in a bowl of cold water and rinse carefully, so it doesn’t get tangled on itself. Drain and refill the bowl with fresh water. Press the water gently through the inside of the casing, to flush out any remaining salt. Then place one end of the casing over the tube side of a funnel and double-knot the other end. Push the meat mixture through the funnel and into the casing with the handle of a wooden spoon. Once the casing is filled, press it at 2-inch (5 cm) intervals, twist to make individual links, then tie off the open end. (If you tie off the end first, it can create too much pressure and cause the links to burst when you twist.) Store in the refrigerator overnight, then cut the links with scissors and prick the sausages before cooking.

Step 4

The next day, heat a non-stick frying pan to medium high. Add the longganisa and just enough water to pool at the bottom of the pan, then cover with a lid and let steam for about 2 minutes if caseless and 3 minutes if cased. Remove the lid and flip the sausages. Keep frying and flipping until the juices render and begin to caramelize and coat each sausage, another 5 minutes if caseless and 7 minutes if cased.

Step 5

Serve with rice, eggs, lots of suka at bawang, and any of your favourite pickles and vegetable sides.

Makes: about 16 links

Recipe and image excerpted from Filipinx: Heritage Recipes from the Diaspora by Angela Dimiyuga and Ligaya Mishan. Text copyright © 2021 Angela Dimiyuga. Photographs copyright © 2021 Alex Lau. Used by permission of Abrams, an imprint of ABRAMS.

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