Arroz a la Cubana - food from somewhere else

Arroz a la Cubana

You probably read the title and thought Cuba, right? WRONG! It's from the Phillipines! America isn't the only place that can reinvent other countries' cuisine! I have no way of knowing how this dish got named after Cuba there; I don't even (never having been to the Phillipines) know if people there think that this accurately represents Cuba, and for that matter I'll leave it to actual Cuban people to decide whether it does or not.

I don't know what about it makes it particularly Cuban (not that it couldn't be, I just don't know the rules of Cuban food), but I'd argue the crispy-fried garlic and the worcestershire/soy sauce combination argue in favour of its being Southeast Asian - and while I haven't been to the Phillipines, I've spent quite a bit of time in other Southeast Asian countries, having lived in Indonesia for a couple of years when I was little and having gone back to visit a few times. And, of course, when you spend time in a foreign area of the world, you get a taste for its food and seek it out where you can when you're home, so I feel like I have at least a little bit of a leg to stand on saying this!

Here's the recipe - it's a throw-everything-together recipe, pretty easy, and it keeps well, so you could double the recipe and make a big batch and eat leftovers for days if you want!

Discussion Question: Where's your "somewhere else"? Where do you know the food from, other than here? I'm not fortunate enough to have a family of recent immigrants (grandparents on one side, great-grandparents or farther back on the other), so I don't have "the Old Country" in my family dinners or holidays. I guess having lived abroad at a young age, this area's food sort of became my "Old Country"!