Tag: filipino

I’ve had Filipino food exactly once before in my life, when I had the opportunity to sample the Philippine Food Week buffet lunch at the Shangri-La Hotel back in 2012. It was a fascinating introduction to a culture’s cuisine that I had never encountered before, and it certainly piqued my interest. For some reason though, in the (nearly) two years since I went to the Philippine Food Week buffet, I had never had the chance to visit a Filipino restaurant and try more dishes. Filipino restaurants seem to be few and far between in Sydney, and you really need to know where they are!

This has all changed with a new Filipino restaurant on my end of town. Pamana has opened up just across the road from my gym in Chatswood about two months ago and does a steady, if not booming trade. I’ve never seen the restaurant full but it’s also not struggling for diners. Interestingly most of the people I see dining there (as I walk past on my way to the gym) seem to be of Filipino origin, so I judged the food to be authentic. A visit was definitely on the cards!

K and I sat down in the restaurant on a night when only half the tables were full. The wait staff came over straight away with some water and a little bowl of complimentary popped fried corn for us to nibble on as we perused the menu. We definitely needed that extra bit of brain fuel as half the menu was written in Filipino and we struggled to understand parts of it!

This drink that we ordered was a prime example of how difficult the menu is to decode for people like us who have no previous exposure to Filipino culture, language or food. When we asked the waitress what “Guyabano” juice actually is, she struggled to explain it as a ‘melon’ before she ran off to the kitchen to pick up a can to show us what it looked like. For the record, guyabano is soursop which tastes like a strange mix of a melon, tropical fruits, citrus, and banana. Apparently it’s heralded as a natural cure-all for every ailment known to mankind, but I just know of it as a very sweet more-ish drink!

We ordered the “paksiw na lechon”, which was explained to us as being a real specialty of the restaurant when we were handed the menu as we sat down. It comes out on a sizzling plate with a raw egg on top and I allow myself only a split second to take a photo before we quickly break the egg yolk and mix it in with the delicious minced pork mix. With a squeeze of lemon on top, it’s a spicy and flavour-packed dish that verges on the overwhelming when eaten alone.

Luckily, the staff at Pamana are well-versed in up-selling their customers, so we didn’t have to have the “paksiw na lechon” by itself. When we ordered it, our waitress insisted that we order a fried rice as well, assuring us that it’s best eaten in combination with the tuyo fried rice, as the rice balances the strong pork flavours of the dish. Thankfully we took her advice and ordered an extra rice dish which did end up mixing well and dulling the intensity of the minced pork. The fish flakes added a little something special to an otherwise plain base dish.

In an attempt to order something a little healthier, we order the “sinigang na bangus fillet sa miso”, a fish-based vegetable soup. I savour the clear soup – possibly too sour for some, but I enjoy the cleansing taste of it as well as the medley of vegetables in the base. The milkfish is a bit too fatty for my liking, but it’s easy enough to remove the fat and just have the flesh.

Another of Pamana’s specialty dishes is the “crispy pata”, or deep-fried pork knuckle. It’s not a dish for the faint-hearted – you can really taste the salty variety of spices that’s been rubbed into the skin prior to cooking. I find parts of the knuckle too dry to suit my personal preference, but then again, other parts feature that delicious crunch of well-done pork crackling.

In a fit of complete mindlessness, we order an extra entree of “rellenong talong” even though there’s no way the two of us could finish five full dishes. It’s one of those dishes that I just had to have though, as I am a complete nut over anything that has eggplant in it – and I wasn’t disappointed. Unlike other dishes where you might get diced or sliced eggplant in bits, this dish offers you the full eggplant (stem attached!) encased in a delicious pork omelette. It’s a combination of three of my favourite food items – how could you possibly go wrong?

Even though we are full to bursting by this point, I am insistent on ordering dessert. As a creme caramel fanatic, K orders the “leche flan”, which comes out with delicious caramel sauce drizzled over it. It’s a touch more solid that I originally expected (it certainly doesn’t melt in the mouth!), but this actually lends itself well to a dessert that has more body and substance than a standard creme caramel.

Remembering my earlier liking of halo-halo at the Filipino buffet two years ago, I was tempted to order Pamana’s halo-halo dessert. However, common sense finally prevailed and I reasoned that at twice the price of all the other desserts, I was unlikely to be able to finish it on my own…it would have to wait until my next visit! Instead, I opted for the “brazo de mercedes”, a delicious soft meringue dessert with a hearty and creamy lemon curd. Equal parts light, fluffy and sweet, I could have very easily had another serve…or two!

Obviously you can tell from this summary that we ordered way too much for just two people – we ended up doggy-bagging two lunches worth of food, which K was very happy about as it made him and his lunches the envy of all his colleagues. Despite our over-ordering though, it was a very reasonably priced meal – at just over $80 for the two of us for dinner (plus two lunches), Pamana offers an affordable and unique Filipino dining experience that has no equivalent anywhere else in Sydney. We’ll certainly be back!

Pamana is located at 102/7 Railway St, Chatswood, a short walk from Chatswood train station.

I have a friend who’s currently spending a few months volunteering at a women’s shelter in the Philippines. A lot of her time is obviously spent doing essential, life-saving work with the local women who go to the shelter. But when she’s not there, she’s experiencing life in the Philippines, eating street food, swimming on pristine beaches, and other activities that make me green with envy when I see her photos on Facebook. I want to do what she’s doing, see what she’s seeing, and eat what she’s eating!

Filipino cuisine isn’t something I’ve tried before, which is why I was really pleased to be able to attend the Philippine Food Week buffet for Saturday lunch at the Shangri-La Hotel Sydney as part of the Crave Sydney International Food Festival. I did do some research beforehand to try and get a sense of what I would be eating as my only presumption was that Filipino food would make good use of a wide variety of spices, reflecting its position on the historical Spice Route.

When K and I arrived at the Cafe Mix at the Shangri-La, we were greeted personally by the hostess who took us straight to a table by the window. Within minutes of sitting down, our waiter came over to take our drink orders and to invite us to help ourselves to the buffet. I needed no second invitation!

I started off with the cold bar. There was a really interesting mix of ‘make your own’ meal options here (salad bar above, with four different types of dressings) and pre-made options. I tried a cold vegetarian spring roll which was actually made out of crepes rather than traditional fried spring roll wrapping. Delicious, especially with the variety of sauces that sat next to each dish. The fried eggplant was also a revelation – I was expecting a traditional oily fried eggplant taste and texture, but the flavour was very smokey, like it had been barbecued. It was so good that K went back for second helpings!

Other cold options included two seafood ceviches (scallop ceviche and mackerel ceviche), various pickled vegetables, a cold pork and bean puff dish, and a prawn and mango salad. I found the flavours of the pickled vegetables and pork dish very Chinese, while the ceviche was very European, and the mango salad more Malaysian. I think this variety really highlights the variety of food that the Philippines can offer, as their cuisine has been influenced by so many other countries over the years. I personally recommend the scallop ceviche and the prawn and mango salad.

If you’re the type of diner who prefers not to know where their food came from, you’ll be in for a nasty shock when you approach the hot buffet! Pork appears to be a Filipino staple, and the chefs stand at the buffet carving roast pork from a whole pig (head and all!) for you on request. It could be a bit confronting for those of us who are used to buying our meat from the butcher in a form that looks nothing like the original animal – but if you can stomach the sight of the pig carcass, then I can assure you that actually eating the roast pork more than makes up for it. It’s roasted beautifully and is a real treat when coupled with the various accompanying sauces.

When I first saw the steamed barramundi on offer, I highly doubted that it would taste any good. It was absolutely huge – easily the length of my arm, if not longer. From experience, I know that there’s a real art to cooking the perfect Chinese-style steamed fish, an art that is individual to the person (stovetop) and their tools (steamer). The space of a minute can turn a steamed fish from a perfect work of food artistry to a fish with overcooked crumbly flesh – and this becomes harder to judge the larger the fish.

I was proven wrong! Despite its size, the barramundi was actually cooked perfectly. K and I tried flesh from different parts of the fish and the texture and flavours of the fish were consistent throughout. The flesh was firm, yet melted in your mouth at the same time. The sauce brought out the flavour of the sea, without overpowering the dish. Delicious!

This was the one vegetarian dish on the hot buffet when we were there – sauteed mixed vegetables. It was a pretty standard and simple dish when compared to the excellence of some of the meat dishes on offer – grilled lamb chops (heaven!), different varieties of pork, and a delicious oxtail in peanut sauce dish. I wanted to try the mussels, however there were none left on the buffet in the time I was there! Those of you who know what a seafood fiend I am will understand my disappointment.

Onto the desserts, and I was astounded by how many of them seemed to be dairy-based! I think many Asian cultures tend to shy away from using dairy products in their cooking, largely because we are more genetically prone to being lactose intolerant. Filipinos clearly don’t have any qualms about this – aside from a handful of lactose-free desserts (e.g. sago), most of them included cream, or custard, or otherwise. This one in particular was really nice – rolled egg whites with custard cream. It was really deliciously light and fluffy, and melted as soon as it touched your tongue.

This was my last dish of the buffet – a do-it-yourself halo-halo dessert topped with purple yam ice-cream.While I’ve had similar desserts before (e.g. Malaysian ais kacang and Vietnamese three colour drink), it was the first time that I tried halo-halo and purple yam ice-cream. Beautiful. When I try ice-creams with unique flavours like this, I often find that it tastes more like plain vanilla than anything else – but this ice-cream really captured that yam flavour well.

I loaded my halo-halo up with some of my favourite sweet things – mango chunks, lychee strips, different jellies, and bananas soaked in a sweet rose syrup as well. Topped with shaved ice, then evaporated milk and the ice-cream, it really struck the balance between being crisp and refreshing, and sweet and tasty.

To accompany our meal, K ordered a fresh coconut juice, and I ordered a San Miguel beer. Both were personally-adventurous choices – his last order of coconut juice didn’t end well, and I don’t normally enjoy beer. Luckily, our gamble paid off – his coconut juice was young, sweet and fresh, and my beer wasn’t as bitter as some local beers can be, and had some sweet undertones that went well with most of my buffet choices.

The service at the Shangri-La was really incredible – throughout the meal – they regularly checked in on us, topped up our ice waters, took away completed plates and were generally just very attentive throughout without being overbearing. At no point were we ever left waiting for service.

Overall I rate the buffet an 8.5 out of 10.

The service was really excellent at the Shangri-La – more attentive than I’ve had anywhere else in recent months. I also really enjoyed the cold dishes and the desserts. If I was more of a heavy meat-eater, I’d probably rate the buffet higher as there was a great variety of meats. However, the smaller selection of hot seafood or vegetable dishes somewhat curtailed my eating frenzy!

Philippine Food Week is on at Cafe Mix at the Shangri-La Hotel in Sydney from October 20 to October 28 as part of the Crave Sydney International Food Festival. For reservations and more information, visit the website or call 02 9250 6206. 

Note: I attended the Philippine Food Week buffet as a guest of the Shangri-La for review purposes. My attendance was free of charge, but all words and opinions are my own.