GINISANG MUNGGO

Here's another staple on the Filipino dining table, ginisang monggo or munggo. Very easy to prepare. Very flexible, too! The first time I prepared it was palpak, because the meat was half-cooked when I served the dish, and by the way, I did use whole chicken drumsticks instead of small cuts. Can you imagine? So please learn from my mistake. :-)

GINISANG MUNGGO

Ingredients

1 cup munggo (mung) beans (soaking overnight is recommended)
4-5 cups water
2 tbsp cooking oil1 to 1 1/2 cups pork or chicken, diced
5 cloves garlic, crushed or minced
1 medium onion, minced
3 medium-sized ripe tomatoes, sliced
Salt to taste ( I prefer fish sauce, patis, instead of salt)
1 cup malunggay (moringa) leaves (1 1/2 cups, if you prefer more)

Wash the munggo beans in running water. Drain.
In a pot, heat 2 tbsp cooking oil.
When the oil is hot enough, saute the garlic, onion and tomatoes.
Once the tomatoes are mushy, add the meat (pork or chicken).
Season with salt or patis and cook till meat is almost  (90%) tender.
Add water and the munggo beans. Let boil till the munggo beans are tender. By this time the meat will have been fully cooked and tender as well.
Add more fish sauce if needed. Let your taste buds decide.
Lower heat and add the malunggay leaves. Let simmer for a minute then remove the pot from heat.
Don't cover to prevent the malunggay leaves from being overcooked.

Serve hot with rice and a couple of fried daing or tuyo (dried fish). Dried pusit, too! Yummm!

Some prefer that they boil the munggo in a separate pot and add to the sauteed mixture when the meat is cooked and tender. That works well, too, but we'd be able to save even just a little cooking time and gas or electricity this way. Plus that's one less pot to wash. :-)

You can actually cook this with slices of kalabasa (squash), or a half cup of sitaw (string beans), or ampalaya (bitter gourd) or some slices of okra, or eggplant. Even with gata. And you can substitute malunggay with dahon ng ampalaya, kamote, alugbati or pechay. Y'know, just to give variety to this ulam.

Munggo (mung) beans are a rich source of fibre, protein, vitamins A, B, C and E.  And the minerals calcium, iron, magnesium, and potassium, to boot.