THE heatwave is on, and the summer of 2022 is turning out to be quite a scorcher. For the past week or so, the temperature has been steady, hovering above 90 degrees Fahrenheit. Many families take this chance to make beach trips while others go to parks and have picnics. These warm and sunny summer…
Chef Angela Dimayuga wanted to explore Filipino food seriously as a professional cook but when she was just starting, she was told that that Euro-centric cuisine was the way to go in order to be seen. When she started to cook European food, she realized that the food she had at home growing up, the…
THE Philippine Consulate General in New York announced on Monday, Aug. 16 the resumption this year of Filipino Restaurant Week, one of its flagship projects that started in 2015. Filipino Restaurant Week, which was inspired by the New York Restaurant Week, was conceived to help promote Filipino restaurants, Filipino chefs, and Filipino food and ingredients….
CHEF Reina Montenegro is ready to continue her reign as the queen of vegan Filipino comfort food. Montenegro — a restaurateur who formerly operated three Nick’s locations in the San Francisco Peninsula — has opened a brick-and-mortar under her own brand, Chef Reina, along Visitacion Avenue in Brisbane, California. At the new storefront, which held…
FOR a limited time only, Magnolia Ice Cream and Treats is adding ube and mango boba ice cream to their menu. The exclusive menu item will be available in all Magnolia Ice Cream and Treats stores in Las Vegas, San Francisco and Honolulu starting April 16th. Magnolia’s two most popular ice cream flavors just got…
MEET the new Filipino American chef creating waves in the culinary industry. His name is Denevin Miranda and his latest claim to fame? He was recently declared as the champion of the Food Network show “Chopped” with its new season focused on “Meat Fight,” a glorious, carnivorous throwdown for gastronomy lovers. The new episodes focus…
FILIPINO American chef Jordan Andino shows viewers how to make two beloved Filipino dishes in the latest episode of “Selena + Chef,” the cooking show of actress and singer Selena Gomez on HBO Max. “Selena + Chef” is a show where Gomez attempts to cook different recipes alongside various guest celebrity chefs. In the episode, Andino…
THE unprecedented global health crisis brought by the pandemic has somehow forced many people to go back to their kitchens and either cook or bake and this presented an opportunity for some business-minded folks to come up with something new to offer the market. Meet the first-generation Asian American risk-takers who decided to move forward…
FOR small business owners, especially those in the restaurant industry, “pivot” was a buzzword of 2020 — whether it was making meal kits, embracing delivery services or offering online cooking classes — in order to survive during the ongoing pandemic. In the Bay Area, Filipina American chef Reina Montenegro knows the immediacy of having to…
PART II in series on Love-Infused LA Fil-Am Small Businesses In the Asian Journal’s previous Southern California midweek issue, I wrote about Max & Lucy’s ensaymadas, co-owned by Don Sagarbarria and Mike Zuñiga, which had exponential growth during the pandemic, entitled: “Love-Leavened Small Business.” Another business that fits the bill is Kuya Lord’s Pop-Up series,…
Though the past year has been challenging, the holiday season is an opportunity to show support for small Filipino American businesses and restaurants in the community, as well as to deliver some joy to family, friends, coworkers and others on your shopping list. Purchasing a gift card to your favorite Fil-Am restaurant, which likely has…
IT’S the season of the Filipino lolas. Disney UK recently released its Christmas video featuring a grandmother (lola) and the Filipino parol, tugging the hearts of Filipinos in the diaspora. Then a couple of weeks ago, “Blue’s Clues & You!” introduced Josh’s lola, along with yet another Filipino classic, the bibingka. But before these grandmas…
Excerpted from AMBOY: Recipes from the Filipino-American Dream © 2020 by Alvin Cailan. Photography © 2020 by Wyatt Conlon. Reproduced by permission of Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. All rights reserved. Serves 6 The first time I met Auntie Cita, she brought this dish as a gift for my parents. It looked different from any other bibingka…
Recipe courtesy of “The Easy Filipino Cookbook: 100 Classics Made Simple” by Roline Casper (Rockridge Press, 2020) Prep Time: 20 minutes Cook Time: 1 hour, 20 minutes Serves: 4 to 6 Pochero Beef was one of my favorite foods growing up, and I have since cooked it many times for my family. The recipe can…
In honor of Filipino American History Month, Queens-based online bakery KORA has created a special edition set of doughnuts in partnership with “Yellow Rose,” the award-winning, critically acclaimed film that was released by Sony Pictures earlier this month. “Yellow Rose,” written and directed by Diane Paragas, opened wide in 900 theaters on October 9 across…
WHEN his boss Ravi DeRossi told chef Raj Abat last September to come up with an idea for a Filipino vegan restaurant, he was a little hesitant. Growing up in La Union, Philippines, he knew for a fact that Filipinos love and adore their meats and seafood. He took it as a challenge though and…
THERE are some food items that automatically trigger nostalgic trips down memory lane for many, and that holds true for Filipinos who have lived abroad for a while now who have an earnest yearning to travel back home. Case in point: the long lines at Kabisera on Allen St. on Labor Day Weekend, where a…
Los Angeles just lost one of its beloved modern Filipino American restaurants with the closure of Ma’am Sir along Sunset Boulevard, its chef and owner Charles Olalia announced on Friday, August 28. Olalia took to Instagram to share the fate of his restaurant, which had occupied a 1,800-square-foot space in the Silver Lake neighborhood since…
LAST December, Alvin Cailan put a down payment on the former Chego spot inside Far East Plaza in Los Angeles’ Chinatown without the immediacy, or a defined concept, to occupy it. One possibility was a 12-seat steakhouse offshoot of his “Amboy” project — based on his childhood nickname referring to an American-born Filipino — with…
A COUPLE of weeks ago, the word “barkada” triggered a social media debate within the Filipino American community, later expanding to the Filipino diaspora. It stemmed from the news that four white men opened a wine bar in Washington, D.C. and used the name “Barkada.” No Filipino dishes or Filipino wines and spirits were on…
Four white men recently opened a wine bar along U Street in Washington, D.C. named “Barkada Wine Bar,” a nod to the Filipino word for a closely-knit group of friends. The name was the only Filipino part of it; they did not announce plans to serve Filipino food or drinks nor is it an establishment…
FILIPINO FOOD MOVEMENT’S ‘SAVOR FILIPINO’ SUMMIT WITH its goal to create a framework in order to innovate the business of Filipino cuisine in the time of the pandemic, the Filipino Food Movement held a virtual summit called ‘Savor Filipino’ on Monday, June 29. The meeting was attended by almost a hundred people across the globe,…
FILIPINO American chef Rodelio Aglibot died over the weekend of an apparent heart attack and tributes and testimonials continue to pour. He was a man who wore many hats: as a chef, restaurateur, TV host and personality, entrepreneur and food consultant. “Our hearts are broken. We learned yesterday that my big brother, favorite chef, best…
LOOKING to unleash your inner chef and finally master some Filipino dishes during this stay-at-home period? There’s a new cookbook with the premise of “easy” savory and sweet recipes from pork sisig to ginataang bilo bilo (rice balls in sweet coconut milk). “The Easy Filipino Cookbook: 100 Classics Made Simple” — released on March 24…
WHEN news spread that Filipino American chef Charles Olalia’s four-year-old Rice Bar was closing down in May, many loyal customers deemed it a loss for lunchtime eats in Downtown Los Angeles. But when one door closes, another one opens. The 275-square-foot restaurant along 7th Street was quickly taken over by Fil-Am chef AC Boral, who…
THE third time’s a charm for Filipino American chef Tom Cunanan of Washington, DC’s Bad Saint who finally won as Best Chef: Mid-Atlantic at the James Beard Awards held Monday night, May 6 at the Lyric Opera in Chicago. He was also previously nominated in 2017 and 2018. The awards, presented to recognize culinary professionals…
THE James Beard Foundation has announced the list of semifinalists in the running for its 2019 Restaurant and Chef Awards and three Filipino American chefs have made the list. The awards,presented to recognize culinary professionals in the United States, are sometimes called the “Oscars” of the food world. For the third year in a row, Tom…
THE Los Angeles Food & Wine Festival (LAF&W) this past week brought together dozens of renowned culinary personalities from across the country for five days of events. From Wednesday, August 22 to Sunday, August 26, the 8th annual festival occupied spaces around LA from Grand Avenue in Downtown to Barker Hanger in Santa Monica for…
NYC foodies are in for a treat as regional Filipino cuisine makes it to the prestigious James Beard House. With its goal to preserve, promote and develop Filipino cuisine, Filipino Food Movement and JBKollaborations are presenting this gastronomic event, which involves five chefs from across the United States. Filipino American chefs, Francis Ang (Pinoy Heritage/San Francisco), Lou Boquila (Perla/ Philadelphia), Carlo…
Driving through Los Angeles’ Chinatown, Far East Plaza on Broadway is one of those complexes that is easy to gloss over. But with curiosity awakened and judgments of its outdated exterior aside, the two-story shopping center encases a culinary haven with options so abundant that multiple trips may be necessary. Inside, you can find Roy…
