Mongo Guisado is one of my favorite Filipino dishes. It’s hearty, comforting, and delicious. The stew tastes even better the next day when the flavors marry. Below is my mother’s version of it adapted from Reynaldo Alejandro’s version in The Philippine Cookbook.
Ingredients
- 1 cup mongo (mung beans)
- 3 cups of water
- 2 tbsp vegetable oil
- 3 cloves of garlic, minced
- 3 scallions, chopped (separate the white bulbs from green tops)
- 1 tomato, cubed
- 1/2 cup pork loin, thinly sliced
- 1 lb shrimp, shelled and deveined
- salt and freshly ground pepper, to taste
- 2 bunches of watercress
- 1 red bell pepper, chopped into quarter-sized pieces
- 2 cups of water
Directions
- Boil mung beans in 3 cups of water until tender.
- In another pot, heat oil over medium heat. Add garlic and white bulbs and sauté for about 3 minutes.
- Add tomatoes and cook until softened.
- Add pork and cook until tender. Remove from the pot, and set aside.
- Add shrimp and cook until pink, about 5 minutes. Remove from pot, and set aside. We remove this so that it won’t overcook.
- Pour the boiled mung beans, pork, and 2 cups of water back into the pot.
- Bring to a boil then add shrimp, green tops of the scallions, bell pepper, and watercress.
- Season with salt and pepper.
- Cook for 2 more minutes and serve hot, ideally over rice. For added flavor, and saltiness, add a dash of patis.
