How time flies! Has it already been a year? Were we not only dreaming about a food blogging event dedicated to Filipino food? Well, apparently we started a good thing.

Mike over at Lafang gave us Filipino food bloggers an anniversary gift by writing a feature about Lasang Pinoy for What’s On & Expat, a weekly publication for expats in the Philippines.

Stef’s and my blogs are displayed prominently on the page. If one reads the feature it sounds like we were interviewed at length. The behind-the-scenes story is, I forwarded previous unused interview material to Mike and he wrote it up. It included, with equal treatment, other LP pioneers and was supposed to have a screen capture of their blogs too. Due to space constraints however, the final edited version came out still excellent though a bit shorter.

To read the full text, visit Mike’s Celebrating Lasang Pinoy’s First Anniversary.

Food Memories from Childhood as the theme for Lasang Pinoy 10 is most fitting for me. I always say that what I know about cooking has much of its foundations in my childhood. My appreciation for the intrinsic values of traditional cooking methods was born from that period and is in no small measure learnt from my grandmother. Today, 31 May 2006 is her 20th death anniversary. She may have been gone for two decades, almost two-thirds of my life but the seeds that she planted have grown and bloomed. After all, I am writing about it, am I not?

We had many rules about cooking and had as many about eating. Aside from table etiquette, there were rules about serving food, specific platters or bowls were used for corresponding viands. There were many unspoken rules such as what we ate for specific meals and how many times a week we were supposed to have meat.

Since my grandfather had a botica (pharmacy) until after the Second World War, we have a relatively health-conscious family. My grandmother was strict about having vegetables and fruits at every meal. Fish was preferable over meat. Chicken was next while pork and beef were served twice or thrice a week at most.

We never felt meat-deprived because it was accessible to us anytime - stored raw in the freezer, or cooked in clay pots. Of course if the aroma of the cooked meat was ‘calling’ us and it was irresistible, we could always ask for a bite but no more.

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When talking to our town’s renowned cooks, I ask about how long they have been cooking and who taught them to perform magic in the kitchen. Some took cooking seriously very early, some as young adults but to a person, each one had kitchen duties as children. Everyone remembers receiving methodical instructions from their mothers, fathers, grandparents or relatives who were also accomplished cooks. It seems as if they spent years of apprenticeship in the informal setting of home kitchens.

Iska’s theme for Lasang Pinoy 8: Kusinang Bulilit, Lutong Paslit! has made me realise that I would love to explore the topic of informal apprenticeships in the future. For the meantime, I’ll have to remember how I started cooking as a child since the only juvenile I have around is a gigantic kitten who perches on the kitchen bench as soon as I start with prep work.

Pampanga has a long tradition of trade, arts and crafts long before the arrival of the Spaniards. Pre-colonial society had a system of apprenticeships where the youth got to learn their craft from the masters. To a certain extent, I still feel vestiges of this practice when I see and remember how children are sent off to “help out” relatives during fiestas and other special occasions. In many traditional families, it does not matter if one is poor or with a house attended by servants. Each child, whether male or female, is expected to help out with household chores.
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