Coconut Chicken and Shrimp

Labor Day weekend. The unofficial end of Alaska's summer, the weekend when the tourists leave and the locals sigh with relief and the state returns to its natural state: cold, dark, and full of people who chose to be here despite everything, because the mountains and the light and the fish and the particular rawness of a place that doesn't accommodate weakness are worth the price of admission, which is seven months of winter and a utility bill that could fund a small country.

Two years of the blog. I didn't write a big anniversary post this time — last year's was enough, the reflection, the gratitude. This year I just cooked. Made adobo. Not because it was a milestone but because it was Tuesday and adobo is what I make on Tuesday, the same way Lourdes made it on Tuesday, the same way Reynaldo ate it on Tuesday, the tradition continuing not because we decided to continue it but because the habit is the tradition and the tradition is the identity and the identity is: on Tuesdays, the Santos women make adobo.

The blog has settled into something I didn't anticipate: a steady, quiet presence. Not viral — the moose adobo spike was an anomaly — but consistent. Two thousand regular readers, give or take. Comments that show up reliably, from the same names, the community that has formed around my kitchen and my words and the particular intersection of Filipino food and Alaskan life that apparently resonates with people I'll never meet. This is enough. More than enough. This is the blog doing what the cooking does: healing, quietly, one post at a time.

I made bibingka for the Labor Day weekend — the rice cake with banana leaves, a summer farewell, the last warm dessert before the winter cooking begins. The coconut was fresh. The salted duck egg was salty-sweet. The banana leaf gave the rice cake its green, fragrant edge. I ate the bibingka warm, standing at the counter (some habits die harder than others), and the taste was goodbye — goodbye to summer, goodbye to the light, goodbye to the season that was generous and warm and too short, always too short.

Fall now. The third fall. The light shrinking. The leaves turning. The kitchen warming up for winter the way an engine warms up before a long drive. I'm ready. The freezer is stocked. The light box is cleaned. The adobo is on Tuesday. The tools are in place. Bring on the dark.

The bibingka is gone — eaten warm at the counter, the last of it — and the banana leaves are folded and the summer is over. But the coconut stayed with me, that clean, faintly sweet richness that runs through so much of the food I grew up with, and I found myself reaching for it again the way you reach for something familiar when the light starts to go. This Coconut Chicken and Shrimp is what I made the Tuesday after Labor Day: not adobo, just this once, because the coconut felt like a bridge between the farewell dessert and the hearty winter cooking that’s coming — something warm enough for fall, bright enough to remember summer by.

Prep Time: 15 minutes | Cook Time: 25 minutes | Total Time: 40 minutes | Servings: 4

Ingredients

1 lb boneless, skinless chicken thighs, cut into 1-inch pieces
1/2 lb large shrimp, peeled and deveined
1 can (13.5 oz) full-fat coconut milk
1 cup chicken broth
1 medium yellow onion, diced
4 cloves garlic, minced
1 tablespoon fresh ginger, grated
1 tablespoon fish sauce
1 tablespoon soy sauce
1 teaspoon turmeric
1/2 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes
2 tablespoons coconut oil or neutral oil
2 cups cooked jasmine rice, for serving
Fresh cilantro and lime wedges, for garnish
Salt and black pepper, to taste

Instructions

Season the chicken. Pat chicken pieces dry and season lightly with salt, pepper, and turmeric. Set aside.
Sauté aromatics. Heat coconut oil in a large skillet or Dutch oven over medium heat. Add onion and cook until softened, about 4–5 minutes. Add garlic and ginger and cook 1 minute more, stirring constantly, until fragrant.
Brown the chicken. Add seasoned chicken to the pan in a single layer. Cook undisturbed for 3–4 minutes until golden on one side, then stir and cook another 2 minutes.
Build the sauce. Pour in coconut milk and chicken broth. Stir in fish sauce, soy sauce, and red pepper flakes. Bring to a gentle simmer over medium-low heat.
Simmer. Cook uncovered for 12–15 minutes, stirring occasionally, until the chicken is cooked through and the sauce has reduced slightly.
Add the shrimp. Nestle shrimp into the simmering sauce. Cook for 3–4 minutes, just until shrimp are pink and opaque. Do not overcook.
Taste and adjust. Taste the sauce and adjust seasoning with salt, pepper, or an extra splash of fish sauce as needed.
Serve. Spoon over jasmine rice and garnish with fresh cilantro and a squeeze of lime.

Nutrition (per serving)

Coconut Chicken and Shrimp — The Flavor of Farewell at the End of an Alaskan Summer