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A healthy mix of vegetables and seafoods

Seafood and vegetables often make a good medley when cooked together. A few of the celebrated Ilonggo vegetable dishes are made with this combination like laswa and ginata-ang tambo. Others like nilatik or the Ilonggo adaptation of pinakbet can also be revised to include seafood.
Laswa is probably the simplest among the Ilonggo vegetable dishes. Its a stew of differnet kinds of vegetables usually kalabasa (squash), tagabang (saluyot), hantak (string beans), okra, talong (eggplant), takway (taro plant tendrils) and a lot more. Dried seafood like pinakas na guma-a (daing) or balingon (dilis) often accompanies this recipe for the saltiness of the fishes add flavour to the mix of vegetables.
Another favorite is ginat-an na tambo (bamboo shoots with coconut milk). Shrimps and/or crabs create a perfect dish in combination with the bamboo shoots, saluyot and at times, corn all cooked together in coconut milk.
Another coconut milk based vegetable dish is the quintessential nilatik. Usually it is squash that is made as such and partner with malunggay leaves, this simple vegetable combination maybe just vegetables only or with shrimps or even dried seafood as well.
Lastly, an Ilonggo adapatation of the Ilocano specialty, pinakbet. What makes this feel and taste "Ilonggo" is the use of the local guinamos (bago-ong) and the addtion of takway to the variety of vegetables made into this dish.
And here's a perfect partner to all these vegetable dishes above - balaskugay. Shrimps that spurt luscious juiciness with every bite. Steamed to a bright orange, they're inland shrimps - meaning they were grown in ponds rather than harvested from the sea. Cooking them while still jumping fresh would bring out the real sweeteness of the shrimp.

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