Lutong Bahay: Pan-Fried Bacon-Wrapped Enoki Mushrooms

Lutong Bahay is a short tag on the title which I use to feature home-cooked food, either in our own home or at a friend's house, either my own cooking or not.

Whenever we eat at Yakimix or at Sambo Kojin, there's always this one item my parents and I would go back for again and again aside from the tempura, salmon sashimi and makizushi. They're these beautiful pieces of bacon-wrapped enoki mushrooms for grilling which taste really savory and with an interesting and highly-addicting crunch.

It was funny how my mom who isn't really a big fan of Japanese cuisine would always crave for these wrapped goodies, and it isn't just a casual craving, mind you. So one time she arrived home after a session of seafood and vegetable shopping at Arranque Market in Binondo, she showed me the packs of enoki mushrooms she just got. And with bacon in our fridge, a stick of butter and a pan, I immediately knew what to do with them.

Ingredients:

• 1 pack of enoki or golden needle mushrooms
• 1 pack of bacon (just plain bacon)
• A quarter stick of butter (optional)

Procedure:

1. Wash the enoki mushrooms after taking them out from the package, then cut off the root parts before separating them into smaller bundles.
2. Cut the bacon slices into halves, or even in thirds if they're long.
3. Roll the smaller bundles of enoki mushrooms with bacon. You may secure them with toothpicks or put about 3 to 4 pieces in a skewer. (Or, you can just fry them seam side down to secure like what I did.)
4. In a non-stick frying pan, you may heat the butter (Or not, this is totally optional!) before laying down the pieces of your bacon-wrapped enoki mushrooms.
5. Pan-fry the bacon-wrapped enokitake, turning them over every once in a while.
6. When the bacon turns brown and has achieved your desired crispiness, remove them from the pan and drain them on paper towels before serving.
7. Of course, remove the toothpicks or skewers if you used them.

This is a fairly easy recipe you can follow to enjoy bacon-wrapped enoki even without going to a Japanese restaurant. You can also use some blanched asparagus instead of enoki to make your very own bacon-asparagus maki. I guess the hardest part here is getting your hands on some enoki mushrooms sine this recipe is just more of assembling. I'm not sure though if SM, Landmark or Cash and Carry have them. But if not, you can pay a trip to Arranque Market in Binondo or to Farmer's Market in Cubao.