adobo

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chipotles en adobo

See also adobo sauce.

Adobo is the Spanish word for seasoning or marinade. The noun form is used to describe the actual marinade or seasoning mix, and the term used for a meat which has been marinated or seasoned with an adobo is referred to having been adobada.

The word is the first-person singular present indicative form of adobar, a Spanish verb meaning "to marinate."

General

Adobo can be a general term referring to marinated dishes, such as chipotles en adobo, which are chipotle chili peppers marinated in a rich, flavorful, tomato sauce.

Adobo is prepared in almost all regions of Latin America, especially in Mexico, Peru, Ecuador, and Bolivia, as well as Spain. The usual method in preparing adobo in these countries uses pork and spices, especially red pepper.

Filipino-style adobo

Filipino chicken adobo

In Filipino cuisine, adobo refers to a common and very popular cooking process indigenous to the Philippines.^[1]

When Spanish colonizers first took administration over the Philippines in the late 1500s and early 1600s, they encountered an indigenous cooking process which involved stewing with vinegar, which they then referred to as "adobo," which is the Spanish word for seasoning or marinade. Dishes prepared in this manner eventually came to be known by this name, with the original term for the dish now lost to history.^[1]

Thus, the adobo dish and cooking process in Filipino cuisine and the general description "adobo" in Spanish cuisine share similar characteristics, but in fact refer to different things with different cultural roots. While Philippine adobo can be considered adobo - a marinated dish - in the Spanish sense, the Philippine usage is much more specific. The dish is also strongly associated with large Filipino communities, notably in Hawai'i.

Typically, pork or chicken, or a combination of both, is slowly cooked in soy sauce, vinegar, crushed garlic, bay leaf, and black peppercorns, and often browned in the oven or pan-fried afterward to get the desirable crisped edges. This dish originates from the northern region of the Philippines, where dog was originally a prominent protein source for adobo-style dishes. It is commonly packed for Filipino mountaineers and travelers. Its relatively long shelf-life is due to one of its primary ingredients, vinegar, which inhibits the growth of bacteria.

The standard accompaniment to adobo is white rice or pancit noodles.

Outside the home-cooked dish, the essence of adobo has been developed commercially and adapted to other foods. A number of successful local Philippine snack products usually mark their items "adobo-flavored." This assortment includes, but is not limited to nuts, chips, noodle soups, and corn crackers.

Puerto Rican-style adobo

Adobo is a seasoned salt that is generously sprinkled or rubbed on meats and seafood prior to grilling, sauteing, or frying. Supermarkets sell prepared blends like Goya but are loaded with MSG. There are two exciting types of adobo on the island. One is a wet rub called adobo mojado. It is a mix of crushed garlic, olive oil, salt, black pepper, dry orégano, citrus and vinegar or a mix or both citrus fruit with vinegar. But more widely used on the island is a dry mix, adobo seco. It is easier to prepare and has a long life shelf. Adobo seco is a mix of garlic powder, onion powder, salt, black pepper, dry orégano and sometimes dried citrus zest.

Ingredients

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In the Philippines and Latin America, preparing adobo is simple and requires but a handful of ingredients. In good-tasting adobo, none of the spice flavors dominate but rather the taste is a delicate balance of all the ingredients. The most widely preferred type has been traditionally pork adobo, followed by chicken adobo which is generally considered somewhat healthier.

Other ingredients such as squid, beef, lamb, game fowl like quail and snipe, catfish, okra, eggplant, string beans, and water spinach (kangkong) are also made into adobo, with appropriate changes in the basic recipe. Squid adobo (adobong pusit), for instance, is quite different. While most adobo preparations have a brownish sauce, squid adobo has a deep, purplish-black sauce not unlike the Spanish dish calamares en su tinta due to the inclusion of squid ink.

See also

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Adobo

Wikibooks Cookbook has a recipe/module on Adobo

• Cuisine of the Philippines

References

External links

• Adobo Recipe - Filipino Food Lovers
• Adobo Recipe - Collection of Free Filipino Food Recipes
• Smoked Pata Adobo and Other variations of the Adobo
• Adobo Recipe
• Classic Adobo Recipe
• Pork Adobo Recipe
• Adobong Manok Sa Duyan (Chicken Adobo In Hammock)
• American actor/model Travis Kraft gives a cooking lesson on Chicken Adobo
• Adobo Mojado
• Adobo Seco