Bigo Sa Suman

I was so brave and bold. I decided to make suman from the left over banana leaf. There was too many banana leaf and I only need a few for ironing purposes. That's why with the grated coconut, frozen cassava (thawed earlier in the day), and the banana leaf we bought in Kinta while waiting for my daughter's Sunday School to be over .. I SEIZE THE DAY! I decided to do a few more chores since it's not yet time for merienda. 15 minutes before 5pm I decided to prepare all the ingredients together with the printed recipe I got from Manang. Ever since I found Manang's kusina from Google, she's really been very helpful. F3 can't get enough of the pichi-pichi I made. In fact I always made it every week for our merienda. But this afternoon, is different. Like I said, CARPE DIEM.

While my two kids, were having early dinner, my husband's too busy washing our car, I decided to be brave. I started in cutting the banana leaf, almost half the size of an A4 paper. I even asked my daughter to take photos of me doing all the procedures. Yes, I'm documenting my Suman Experiments properly. After cutting the banana leaf, which I think is enough already for the whole bunch of Suman that I'm about to cook, I boiled 1 liters of water in our electric kettle. I'm very careful and taking steps one at a time, I wouldn't want to end burning up my precious hands. After I finished wiping out the banana leaf, I decided to mix all the dry ingredients together. I really have to make sure that the banana leaves were already dry before I put the combined ingredients. I decided to add one more cup of cassava or ubi kayu. After a few strokes I assembled them on the banana leaf and put them one by one on my steamer (I'm using an electric steamer instead since I don't have the stove top). The timers set for 20 minutes so meantime, I can go back to my laundry and folding.

After 20 minutes, the moment of truth comes. Oh, wow, my excitement turn into disappointments. Tons of it. The grated coconut is not cooked and there's a whole lot of them compared to the cassava. I realized that cassava should be more than the greated coconut. Whew, the whole bunch, 12 pieces of my suman masterpiece is wasted.   Oh my, kung kailan pa naman ako kumpleto sa ingredients and documentations saka naman naging ganito .. dapat pichi pichi na lang muna :)

F3 tried a few but still. Even in the photos you can see that it's not the way it should be LOL!  (Oh well, I don't feel like showing the photos either :( Nah, just kidding. ) Parang kanta ni Avril Lavigne, " It's not supposed to feel this way .. I need you .. I ... tell me why ". :( I even asked them to taste it ASAP while it's still warm so that I still have time to share it with my good friend/neighbor, Ate Weng. But bigo ang aking Suman

Well never mind, as the saying goes, try and try until you succeed. I'm going to make another batch of Suman again next week. So that my husband can bring home a few on his three days trip to Thailand. :)

Morale of the story : Don't get too excited.  Ask if you're not sure what to do.  And most of all every body makes mistake and you should learn from it.  I'm not yet even finished with this post I already know what to do next time.  I think it would be better if I blend all the ingredients to make it finer. Just like the ones I used to do with the pichi-pichi.  Oh, wow, it's never too late.  

PS: You can even read how short this post is, at talaga po namang nawalan ako ng ganang kumilos LOL! Special thanks to Manang. not just for the recipe and for the slide show ideas as well which I'll only be making for this post only.  My daughter and I took turns in taking the photos and it would be such a waste not to include them here.