VACATION DETAILS

Traveling Spoon

Giney is a chef and a restaurateur who specializes in historical, heritage and heirloom Filipino cuisine. Her cooking starts with exhaustive research – she describes herself as a culinary sleuth and is constantly hunting down heirloom family recipes that are at risk of being forgotten. She researches which ingredients would have been available at the time and imagines what was in the pantry as she perfects the recipe. She loves the way that food can connect you to the history and culture of a place, creating a visceral connection to the past and making it a continuing story, which includes you. She and her partner Beth share a great interest in Philippine history, heritage conservation, arts and crafts. The exterior of their beautiful home is covered with greenery and vines, and the inside is filled to the brim with Filipino art and artifacts. Arrive at Giney and Beth’s enchanting home in a gated suburb of Manila. Your meal will consist of a carefully curated menu of historic Filipino dishes (both common and uncommon!) from the 16th-19th centuries. The menu will showcase changing Filipino culinary traditions and cultural influences in Filipino food through time. Giney and Beth will also offer a brief tour of their home and its collection of folk, antique and contemporary art. For your meal, you might taste dishes such as cocido (a hearty stew with beef, pork meatballs, chorizo, beans and vegetables) served with roasted eggplant in a peppery vinaigrette, chicken relleno (roasted chicken with ham and Edam cheese which takes two days to prepare), or Giney's crispy pata (pork leg) with spiced vinegar dip. Your meal will end with a typical Filipino dessert, perhaps a silky leche flan (milk custard with a caramelized top) and a cup of Barako coffee, the iconic coffee of the Philippines dating to the 1880s.