Long-time readers know my penchant for making broth by simmering scrap bones with vegetables, herbs and spices. While the best are scrap ham bones (sold per kilo by ham makers Majestic and Adelina), they are not always available. Not only are the nearest outlets of both Majestic and Adelina quite far from our house, supply is always limited since the availability of scrap ham bones is dependent on the volume of ham sales. What is available in most groceries and even wet markets are scrap bones — raw bones from which the meat had been carved. The large bones are sawed or chopped into smaller pieces and sold by the kilo very, very cheaply.
But scrap bones differ from one seller to the next. Some are really just bones with some cartilage attached. The better ones, however, the kind I’m always on the lookout for, are scrap bones with a substantial amount of meat still attached. This is something I’ve written about before but I think it’s worth reiterating — there can be so much meat from those scrap bones to make a complete dish with.
Like these tacos that Speedy and I had for a late brunch today — after noon, actually, but since it was our first meal of the day, I prefer to call it brunch.
Recipe: Scrap pork tacos
Ingredients
- about 1 c. of shredded meat from boiled scrap bones (mine was pork; you can use meat from beef or chicken bones as well)
- 2 tbsps. of cooking oil
- 2 tbsps. of minced garlic
- 2 tbsps. of minced ginger
- 1 bird’s eye chili, finely chopped
- about 2 tbsps. of patis (fish sauce)
- juice of half a lemon
- 2 tbsps. of sugar
- 6 six-inch flour tortillas
- shredded lettuce
- a small cucumber, julienned
- crisp fried onion slices
- roughly chopped cilantro
Instructions
- Inspect the shredded meat to make sure that there are no small pieces of bones in them.
- Heat the cooking oil in a pan. Saute the garlic, ginger and chili just until fragrant.
- Add the shredded pork meat to the pan. Pour in the lemon juice and fish sauce. Sprinkle in the sugar. Stir. Over high heat and with occasional stirring, cook the pork until light browned and crisp.
- Warm the tortillas in a clean oil-free pan (sprinkle with a little water, if you like, to rehydrate the tortillas) and assemble the tacos.
- Spread shredded lettuce on each tortilla, top with the browned pork, add some julienned cucumber then top with crisp onion slices and cilantro.
Preparation time: 10 minute(s)
Cooking time: 10 minute(s)
Number of servings (yield): 2 to 3
Tita Connie para shang pulled-pork sandwich noh? Kelangan pa ba nito ng barbecue sauce? Or hindi na kasi may sugar na sha konti? It looks masarap ha. I wonder if mas yummy if ang leftover lechon gawing ganito noh?
Parang pulled pork in looks but not in preparation because pulled pork starts will a whole slab of meat. Wag na bbq sauce because it will just drown out the subtle flavors and textures.
Leftover lechon sounds good!
Suggestion ko lang ha …
Reincarnation : A Fabulous Second Life for Leftovers
Yan na. Ang title ng cookbook mo. Then the names of the dishes could be … The Miriam Sandwich. Leftover turkey with a really hot chili sauce, guaranteed to make you want to claw your eyes out.
Sorry. I’m going insane. It’s really rainy in Cebu and I can’t go out to get food so I keep looking at your posts. Hehe.
I love it! hehehehe