Ilonggo Dreams

One of the things I’ve been reading avidly while here is the Lifestyle – Food Section of the Philippine Daily Inquirer.  There are often some useful tips on the food hotspots of Manila. On those pages, one image keeps catching my attention and that is, of the so-called Iloilo food fest that is being featured at Hotel Intercontinental’s Café Jeepney. Every time I read it, I wonder if it would just be some ritzy fanfare where one will be overcharged for some really bad imitation. But I keep wondering about these Iloilo native delicacies, which are somewhat hard to find in Manila—this so called alimusan adobo (catfish in coconut curry), the yema cake, the lumpiang ubod (heart of palm spring roll, so fresh because the palm is actually flown from Iloilo regularly). Well, yesterday (9/25), I decided to finally try it.  Admittedly, I hesitated going to buffet because I get very overwhelmed seeing so many choices and so much food. And when you are indecisive like me, this kind of spread can get very intimidating.  Buffets require a certain kind of consumption discipline.  In preparation for this, I remembered what my friend, Gayatri, said during one of our SSGS bbq foodfest—go for the good stuff and avoid the “fillers” (e.g., rice and soup).  Why not? I can have rice anytime and plus, eating this, along with anything too starchy will just make me full too fast!  In further reparation for this food fest and to make sure that I can get a taste of everything offered at this buffet, I doubled my work out the night before and then yesterday, I did not eat breakfast. With my tummy empty and my mind prepared to enjoy each bite, I headed to Café Jeepney, getting there right when the buffet started.  The “Iloilo Stop Over,” as the Café proudly boasts, was impressive.  I took their theme to heart and savored the journey one plate at a time.

1^st Stop-Over: I made my “appetizer” plate that consisted of items that immediately caught my attention: The infamous lumpiang ubod (these mini-egg rolls you see on this plate wrapped in plastic) are too die for!  It is usually served with some brown sweet sauce but this one was so flavorful that it did not need it.  The heart of palm was incredibly tender and all of it was seasoned so well that the sweetness and the garlic flavor complemented each other so well, with one not overpowering the other. The “pouch” here is called “deep fried panara pocket,” which is filled with sautéed been sprouts—but I found this a little bland to the taste. Then, I saw this wonderful feast of huge prawns, whose red sauce was simply inviting.  Labeled “lukon sa aligue,” they are prawns smothered with crab fat (yes, those pink crab fat you find underneath the crab’s shell) and drizzled with calamansi juice (juice from these tiny limes).  It seems that Ilonggos are quite fond of crab fat as I read that they also put this in fried rice. Those prawns were fresh and the crab fat just seemed to boost its flavor. Definitely one of my favorites. There was an assortment of sushi (tuna and salmon) and some maki (California roll and some with fish roe eggs), which I tried. The piece of tuna you see on the plate and the California roll did not disappoint.  There was also an interesting seaweed salad which I remember first eating when I was in Palawan and I just love it because of the crunch (very good with calamansi too).

2^nd Stop-Over:  For my first course, these red-sauced crabs were calling me. These “Aklan Crabs with Green Mango sauce and bagoong” were heavenly. I thought that the bagoong (fermented anchovies) would make it taste fishy but actually, the green mango sauce tempered it to make the crabs succulent.  There is no other way to eat these crabs but with your hands to pry off the meat. By the third crab, my fingers were covered with red sauce, 

which one of the servers saw so he handed me a bowl of clean water with lime so I can wash my hands on the table.  With my hands now clean again, I worked my way through the plate, which brought me to the lechon (roast pig) that came from this baby suckling pig displayed underneath a heat lamp.  The skin was not as crispy as I had hoped, but the meat was very tender and juicy. Somewhat buried in that plate are the very tasty “chicken inasal,” Ilonggo’s bbq chicken marinated in calamansi, 7-up, native sugar cane vinegar, and ginger and colored with achuete seeds and also giant squid stuffed with tomatoes and onions and grilled to perfection.  Of course, I had to have another lumpiang ubod and the fish roe maki with a heart-shaped piece of mango on top).

3^rd Stop-Over:  My third course consisted of Batchoy, a soup with miki noodles, topped with strips of steamed pork, liver, chicharron for the crunch, green onion, crispy garlic, and then drizzled with calamansi. It is eaten with a piece of her puto manapla, rice cake, which you see here has been steamed on a banana leaf.  This soup was delicious but I could not finish it and since I took so long to finish my second plate, it was not as steaming hot as it should be.  It was flavorful but I had a couple more stops to make.

4^th Stop-Over: At this point in this journey, my tummy was almost to its full capacity and I wish I could just take a nap for an hour and then come back. But no rest for the weary, as they say. This next course just featured the cat fish in coconut curry sauce that I had been dreaming about. Labeled “Adobo na Alimusan,” this is wild cat fish that is bathing in coconut curry sauce with achuete seeds (to give it the red color). Its taste was totally different, unlike any other curry that I have had. The cat fish was also very moist and just seemed to have been simmered long enough that it just starts to fall off the bone, ever so delicately.  The only way to do justice to what this delectable concoction looked like is to take a photo of it in its pot.

5^th Stop-Over:  Just having a little bit of room left, my last stop is the dessert table. There was a variety of sweets, including a halo-halo station.  I was tempted to make one but this is not what I was here for, after all.  I had to try the much touted yema cake (I don’t know how to describe this except to say that yema is a sweet candy made of condensed milk and egg yolks that have been mixed to acquire a certain thickness). This cake was layered with this along with some very light icing.  It was not sweet as I thought, and thankfully so because the next thing I tried was her famous butterscotch ice cream. I love butterscotch so this was a nice treat.  She also had butterscotch crème brule, which you see here is garnished with some tortilla-looking chip. But an unexpected twist to the crème brulee is the “food of the gods” (date and walnut bar) that she dropped in the middle of it, along with a much thicker custard consistency.  I enjoyed it, but I found it to be a bit dry and it might have been nicer if the custard consistency was a bit lighter. Then, I saw these bamboo contraption half-covered with a banana leaf. Labeled as “kalamay,” it was vaguely familiar.  Inside the bamboo is a purple and sticky dessert. Probably made with glutinous rice, it was not too sweet and made for a nice finish to this final stop-over.  Suffice it to say, this was one stop that I could not complete fully, as my happy tummy was just about to explode.

The mastermind extraordinaire for this wonderful feast is Chef Pauline Gorriceta-Banusing who I found wandering the buffet table, checking each dish and occasionally greeting the guests during the first 30 minutes of the buffet. She was the one who initially saw me staring at the panara pockets and read my mind when she told me they are filled with bean sprouts.  I wanted to introduce myself to her then but was a little shy. After this meal, I definitely had to meet her so I asked one of the managers roaming around to see if this was possible and just handed my business card when he asked who I was.  By the end of the meal, Chef Pauline was nowhere in sight but the manager kindly called her and informed me that she was on her way down from her room.

No longer dressed in her chef garb, as you see in this picture, she was actually on her way to take a two-hour break with her family before she gets ready for dinner.  She said she had been up since 5 am preparing the food but her energy surely masked this. “I think I’ve met you before,” as she shook my hand. “Really, I replied?”  She thought that I was her classmate at Ateneo (a university here) because she also knew someone of the same exact name while growing up. Turns out she also knows someone who is at the University of Illinois. What a small world. She kept wondering if I’m sure I’m not her classmate but after telling her my life history, she finally settled that it must be someone else. She was generous with her time and took me around the table to give me a brief overview of Ilonggo food. Chef Pauline adamantly expressed her disdain for fusion food and claims that she tries to stay true to her Ilonngo roots as much as possible. She showed me one of the dishes and how the uniqueness of Ilonggo food has to do with the ingredients that are native to Iloilo only, like this pork stew that is soured by this particular fruit called “batwan.”  When I asked why she seemed fascinated with butterscotch, she just replied that she comes from a region known for its sugar plantation so sweets are abundant. But more appropriate to my question, she also explained that she has had to “modernize” some of her delicacies to fit the environment in which her food is being served—hence the crème brulee and the butterscotch ice cream for this hotel.

She also showed me the assortment of fresh seafood that was available, which I did not get to taste—like the so-called vegetarian fish “managat” (mangrove jack), the gindara (blue and black marlin), and diwal (angel wings, which look like mussels but the shell is white). The latter she described as “near extinction,” after which I wanted to ask her why she would serve it if it is so.  But that is probably best left for another conversation.  I’m just now glad I didn’t take part in contributing to this near endangered species.  Chef Pauline also trained in Singapore and the U.S. and she said that that is where she learned the discipline required in food preparation.  I enjoyed talking to her and just happy that she entertained this foodie professor, an identity that I gather seems interesting but also puzzling to her.  She gave me her cell phone number and said to text her if I want to have this buffet again on Sunday.  Apparently, this is the day reserved for Ilonggos and that she can get people in for free who are from the “Press.”  I was flattered at the thought that this amateur food critic would join that table! It seems like a very tempting offer!  But for now, I’m a very happy camper. Who says that dreams cannot come true?