Mixed Veggies (Eggplant, Squash, String Bean, and Bitter Gourd) with Oyster Sauce for Lunch!

I've been craving vegetable dishes these past few months rather than meat or fish, which I think is good for my health too. I'm getting used to it now - less rice but more veggies! Awesome me! Awesome me!

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The only problem is that I can eat any vegetables, but my oldies can't. They are still picky when it comes to the vegetables that are allowed. That is why it is harder to choose what dish to cook, even though I can eat everything. Cooking separately for them is not a good choice, as it can take more work and also increase expenses. But I am lucky today because my oldies allow this dish for today's lunch. I'm sure they are already sick with the same veggies over and over, which is why they want to try this again.

Seriously, this was our favorite dish when my mommy D has no allergies yet and Mommy F doesn't experience arthritis. But since they developed that due to old age, maybe we don't cook this often now, just very rarely, or when they finally get tired of the same cooked dish. It's sad that when we get older, there's only a limited amount of food that we can have. Soon I will also experience that, but today is more important, so I'll just enjoy today and savor every drop of these dishes.

Let's go cooking!

Here at our place, you can buy those packed veggies, particularly for this dish that I will cook. They will cut it like this, pack it, and sell it for 20 PHP or $0.35. Not bad because we can already consume this for two meals, which is lunch and dinner.

So yes, I'll be cooking pinakbet with oyster sauce today. This dish consists of different kinds of veggies, such as eggplant, squash, bitter gourd, and string beans. It is an incomplete version, by the way, because it is just my own version, and I cook it with the thought of making it a little healthier as much as possible. So you won't see me using oil here - no sautéing and everything - just my way of cooking. Here it is...

So here's the main ingredient: I really love oyster sauce because it can make a dish more flavorful and delicious. I also love the sweetness it has, which blends well with any dishes, and even just the soup will make you crave more rice. But in my case, these veggies will serve as my rice so that I don't need to consume more rice. This is enough.

Now, for the vegetables, even though they were already cut, I'm still not satisfied with the size, so I cut them into much smaller pieces, or just a bite size, just like this. And by doing this, the veggies will cook faster than if they are cut into large pieces.

And just like usual, to make sure that it was cleaned thoroughly, I soaked them with water and a pinch of salt for a minute or just until I finished preparing other things.

And here's a whole black pepper and some rice water that I will use as a soup for our dish today instead of just water. This rice water can make your dish taste even better, and at the same time, the benefits of rice water can help our bodies become healthier.

Moving on, I just put the rice water in the pan, next were the onions, garlic, and oyster sauce. I stir it continuously just until the oyster sauce dissolves and the rice water turns this color.

I finally put it on the stove, heated it, and then waited for it to boil. It's about to boil when I decided to put the string bean in, as I think it is much harder than the other veggies and it will take more time to make it softer. Next, I put in the pepper. Now it is starting to heat up and to smell. It smells good, guys.

Then I put the eggplant and let it boil for one minute, and then I put the rest of the veggies, just like this. I stir it a little, then cover it again and let it boil for about 3 minutes. With this, the flavor of the soup will completely transfer to our vegetables, giving them more awesome flavor. Now I sound like a real chef here, lol. Though it is really just a simple dish, But I cooked it with lots of love, so it tasted extra special too.

Let it boil! Let it boil! Because my oldies want them a little softer, I cook them just until the veggies become softer. I don't have a problem with it, because the softer it gets, the easier it is to digest. Right? Lol. And Yes, let's boil it real good. At this point, I really, really want to get steamed white rice and fried or even dried fish and put a spoonful of these mixed veggies on it and eat it. I'm drooling, my gosh.

Oops! I did it ( ꈍᴗꈍ)! Here's our finish product. I put the fried fish in there as I also want the soup in the veggies to completely covered in that fish. This dish is really good that you will request for more serving of rice, lol. So this is my version of Pinakbet, I hopw you all like it.