My mom laughed at me when I told her I wanted to attempt cooking adobo, a Filipino meat dish (usually fatty cuts of pork or chicken, but in this case, beef) marinated in garlic, soy sauce and vinegar, in my roommate’s Crock Pot. “Adobo is supposed to be a little crispy, not like stew,” she told me, referring to the adobo cooking process: simmering the meat for hours until the liquid disappeared, then frying it in a bit of oil to crisp up the fatty edges. Cooking adobo in a slow cooker would turn the meat into a soupy, tender mess, which sounded absolutely fine to me.
Anyways, the result was delicious. The meat was so tender that it fell apart when I prodded at it with a spoon. It tasted, surprisingly, a lot like my mom’s version of adobo: saucy with a lot of onions. I’d definitely do it again, but next time, I’ll add fried potatoes at the last minute, just the way my mom does.
Recipe:
2 1/2 lbs stewing beef
3 tbs soy sauce
2 tbs white vinegar
8 cloves garlic, crushed and roughly chopped
1 tsp whole black peppercorns
1/2 tsp kosher salt
2 bay leaves
1 large onion, roughly sliced
2 large potatoes, chopped into large bite-sized pieces
Dump all the ingredients except the potatoes into a slow cooker. Leave it in there for six hours on the high setting. When it’s done, fry the potatoes in cooking oil and drain. Stir it into the adobo. Serve with freshly steamed rice or garlic fried rice.
Note: the adobo in the photo above contains chicken…you can substitute chicken or pork in this dish, and it works just fine.
