Garden Chef's Needle and Pen

When the Enhanced Community Quarantine (ECQ) took effect in March this year in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, we were made to implement a skeleton schedule for a month. That caused most of us to report to work at least twice a week and work from home for the remaining days. Hubby was fortunate to arrive home from work before a lockdown was imposed in our region. That meant he would be home the whole time... and that also meant I had to prepare fish and veggie meals while he’s home.

When I posted the Bitter Melon - Cucumber Salad last week, a blogger friend commented that it's like "eating the rainbow." I loved her comment and I said that sounds like a very nice title for my next blog post! Inspired by that, I'm featuring one of my signature dishes, an appetizing dish I learned from my parents and grandmother years back . Another rainbow dish, Astri? :)   Very simple and easy to make, this salad has become a favorite of my colleagues at work. Searching the net would yield many recipes of this salad appetizer, some giving tips on how to remove its bitter taste. Oh yes, some bitter melons are more bitter than the others, that's exactly why many people don't like bitter melon (known as ampalaya in the Philippines). Through the years, I learned that sprinkling some rock salt over the ampalaya and squeezing out the juice remove the bitter flavor. Removing the juice however reduces the nutritional value one can get from this vegetable...