Slow Cooker Pinakbet (Filipino Vegetable Dish)

When I went home to the Philippines recently, the vegetable dish called pinakbet was in almost every meal I had when I ventured out to eat at the different restaurants. Of course I had it also at my brother's house where I stayed while there prepared by their wonderful cook, Baby.

When I and my husband Bob took a road trip to Vigan in the Ilocos region of the Philippines together with my sisters and their hubbies, pinakbet was the number 1 dish we made a point to order when we ate out. After all the iconic dish originated from Ilocos.

We relished it during our first dinner in Vigan at Café Uno. It was also served at the buffet in a restaurant across from the Marcos Malacanang Palace in Ilocos Norte. We also had it in every restaurant we ate at when we went out, Judy Anne's Crispy Pata Place in Malabon, Jerry's in Edsa, Club Filipino and also at the hotel in Rock Inn in Sagada.

One can use any combination of vegetables with the most popular ones being squash or kalabasa, eggplant or talong, green beans or sitaw, bitter melon or ampalaya, okra, tomatoes together with the aromatics, onions, garlic and ginger. I used in this recipe what I had and you can improvise too. For example I love adding spinach in everything which I did here.

For flavor fermented fish or shrimp called bagoong is used. For myself I used miso paste as an alternative to make it vegan. You can also just use salt or fish sauce. For protein, pork or shrimp is added which I skipped in this vegan version.

You may or may not use coconut milk. I noticed while in the Philippines, they do not use thick coconut milk like I am used to here in the US since I use canned ones. They make their own fresh which comes very thin with barely a whisper of the taste of coconut. So, you can skip it. You can add hot chili pepper and leave them whole like I did and remove it before serving or warned your guests or just skip it.

You can sauté the mixture in oil if using the stove top method and then simmer till the vegetables and meat are cooked. In this recipe I decided to experiment and see if I can use the slow cooker approach. Namely, to just dump all the ingredients and forget it. The result was a dish I relished for several meals. Though the different vegetables really needed different lengths of cooking times, they came out together fine and created a very delicious combination of texture and flavor. Yes, Kuya and Ate, you can cook pinakbet in the slow cooker.

Slow Cooker Pinakbet (Filipino Vegetable Dish)

• 1 medium butternut squash, peeled, seeds removed and cubed
• 1 medium eggplant, cubed
• 2 cups green beans 
• 1 onion, sliced
• 1 large garlic clove, minced
• 1 bag prepared spinach leaves
• 1 tbsp miso paste for vegans or for the nonvegans use shrimp or fish bagoong or fish sauce
• 2/3 cup vegetable broth
• 6 tbsp coconut milk full fat from can (optional)
• 1 whole red chili pepper uncut (optional)
• Pork or shrimp for nonvegans (optional)

Place all the ingredients in a crockpot and slow cook on high for 4 hours. I used a Crock Pot Brand casserole slow cooker. Note: After 2 hours, the squash and spinach are cooked but not the rest of the vegetables so I cooked further the whole mixture for a total of four hours.

Serve over rice. Yum.