Monday, May 4, 2009

the face behind the secret chef


My love for food and cooking started as a very young girl, I grew up in a mecca of food! We lived in a compound with 4 other families meaning four other homes for me to eat meals from! So most meal time I would run from one house to another searching for the food I’d want to eat and settle there. Nice, huh. My Aunts and Uncles all can cook and my parents aren’t exempted. Being of Filipino/Chinese/Spanish descent as young as I can remember I had no fear when it comes to trying new stuff. I grew up in a third world country but I never felt hungry or poor and was fortunate enough to have food centre our life. Every birthday, holiday, marriage, birth, death and weekends there was always food, to celebrate, comfort, enjoy and share. The Filipinos naturally just surround themselves with food.

Every summer holiday we would spend with my Lola Pipay in my father’s hometown in Virac, Bicol and she was the best cook ever! Her stove was this ancient giant stone table top using firewood for heat, why nothing burn I do not know how. She was like a witch concocting potions of pots after another. In her kitchen there will always be meat bones boiling away into the most hearty flavorful brew, Steamed white rice, A stew of pork and oil for frying the freshest fish alive only minutes before. Everything back then was organic, she of course grew most of her stuff or we’d get from the neighbors! The meats worked the field, the pigs were fat and the chickens were tough and full of flavor! It was the best environment for a chef to begin her journey, from a woman who she loved and was so generous and showed her love best through her cooking.

That’s when I fell in love with food and began paying attention. Food is instant gratification! My Mom stayed home fulltime even if she writes part-time. To have her home was a blessing. Mom and her best friend Tita Dads would make delicious snacks, party foods and all sorts of dishes for kids. My Mom makes the best callos in the whole world and to this day I have to BEG her to make it for me because she only makes it twice a year, Christmas and New Year.

When I say I come from a cooking family I don’t mean I’m from Michelin star descent, but how many kids grow up with a weekly block party of food with relatives?

With my own plastic cooking set given to me by Santa, I cooked flowers, leaves, soil to mud pies, clay, stones and occasionally my mush lunch. It’s a miracle I don’t have amoebiasis now. Then when I was ten, I watched a cooking show called WOK with YAN and from then on I was hooked on cooking shows. For those who don’t know Mr. Stephen Yan is this amazing Chinese chef with wicked knife skills! Every week he would wear an apron with different “wok” puns “whistle while you wok!” He was energetic, funny and featured many Asian countries and cuisine in his show. I was fascinated! From then on, I waited for the show and my constant game of choice would be cooking show and of course I was the Star!

During one weekend I flicked on a different channel and boom! I was introduced to Mrs. Nora Daza and her cooking family. It was on Saturday mornings the same time as all the morning cartoons and unfortunately for my baby sister I woke up earlier so got to hog the remote and saw Ms.Daza cook on tv and prepare dishes from countries I recently learned in History or was it Geography class? Secretly I wished my mom had a cooking show instead of writing for an award-winning religious tv specials. Of course I was forced to switch channel after my sister threatened to throw a tantrum. Ah. Those were the days, when tv only had 5 channels and we were content.

Then as we got older, still in my High School, we were hooked-up to learn about the business of selling homemade products and homegrown veggies to our proud push-over parents and how to run a kitchen. Every senior had their turn to prepare lunch for the entire high school students. Everyone hated it and so I had to act you know unhappy too, but deep inside I looked forward to those days 1. I get off school work and the boring classes the whole day 2.I get to play with food and talk with my friends all day! Hello!? Yes you have to serve and wash the dishes, but nothing felt more accomplished than being able to say “don’t eat that, I didn’t make it!” Kidding.

So After High School like most kids I guess, I had no idea what to do for college, but had to go (wow I sound like an ungrateful brat) A few of my friends enrolled in a local culinary school and I spent so much time in their school I knew all their professors’ names and classmates than in my own university. Eventually, I ended up joining a group to open a bar/club eventually a bistro. Hospitality, Service and Food run through my veins, fed up with my failure to fit the corporate scene, I begged my Dad to allow me to study in New York. I went with my Mom to the Big Apple to inquire in June 2002 by some miracle and a quick interview and an essay after I was enrolled at the “Harvard” culinary school of the country, The Culinary Institute of America. I started my culinary journey that September.

Instantly, I knew I belonged among my own people. I swear I felt like Harry Potter in Hogwarts! The school was breathe-taking beautiful set by the Hudson River and it continues to be a magical place for me. In school, we lived, breathe, and eat food! I was in heaven. After two years, I received my Associates Degree in Culinary Arts. The time I spent there sealed the deal for me. I have found my purpose and food is my calling. It is truly such an honor to be an alumni and I have made lifelong friends I’ve literary shared blood, sweat and tears (chopping one too many onions) with. In New York I met my partner in life. Eric is a French man who is also in the hospitality business. So now based in Sydney I continue my culinary journey, passion for food shows and cooking as a secret chef waiting to be revealed. I like to think I’m the Asian Nigella, but that’s just between us. So now you know enough to trust me with food, let’s get cooking!