Living a life immersed in dessert is sweet at the very least, and sweetest at the very best. People who read this blog regularly know my intense – some would say dramatic – connection to the sweetest of all courses. There are those who’d regard a fine dinner with the most expensive ingredients as transporting, but if it ends on a low note (aka: dessert made with little thought) then I’ll remember the meal as just ho-hum. Dessert is my happiness, the defining point of the end of a meal in relation to its beginning. While it may seem that I like all desserts, judging from the superfluous often bordering-on-sexual prose that appears on this blog, it might surprise a few people to know that there are some desserts that I’d rather pass on. These are the sweet things that I’ll save my calories from and put them to more delicious use elsewhere. And if you’ve been observant, you’ll notice that I’ve never written about any of the following desserts on this blog. So, in no particular order, here are the desserts that make me want to bolt from the ...

Making the rounds of the bakery-cafés one weekend, I’m dismayed to see that pie is nowhere to be seen in the display cases. I see cookies, brownies, even the wayward biscotti, and lots and lots of CAKE. Bakeries are all about cake these days, it seems: layered, looming glories swathed in tufts of frosting or enrobed in ganache, all hiding a pillow-y crumb and a tri-level cache of assorted fillings. Pretty, yes, but definitely disheartening.“Well, cakes are much easier to make than pies,” states one friend. “You just beat the butter and sugar to death in the mixer, alternate the addition of the wet and dry ingredients, pour into a prepared pan, bake, and there you have cake!”“But sometimes I just want a pie,” I say, my lament a dirge for all the unmade pies in Manila. “Don’t you just crave for a good apple pie sometimes, or a banana-macadamia cream pie that’s so good you dream about it at night?”“Personally, I want pies with real crusts,” pipes in another friend. “Not cookie crusts but real crusts made with butter and flour that bake up smashingly flaky.”Pie is my passion. It has nothing to do ...

”The truffle is the diamond of cookery.” – Brillat-SavarinThis is the real deal – a black truffle staring up at me from its yellow and blue-rimmed plate. I’m holding my breath at the nearness of such an exalted delicacy. Not really knowing what to expect, I’m amazed at its rather incongruous shape and rough, bumpy exterior. Looking like an unremarkable clod of the earth, I jut my face closer to the truffle, squinting at its dense network of veins. It’s unlike anything I’ve ever seen or been so close to before.And then of course there’s its unmistakable aroma, a rich and earthy miasma hinting of musk and laurel. I’m now cheek by jowl with this black fungi and I inhale deeply. I’m not one to smell my food (at least not in public anyway), but I feel that it’ll be forgiven here. I shudder inwardly and feel my heart skip a beat. The smell is dark and earthy, a feral ability to inject sensuality in every dish it touches.“It looks like a burnt golf ball,” my friend Garch, says, breaking me out of my reverie. ...

It’s an Italian chef who sets me straight on the incontrovertible fact that gelato is NOT ice cream. As Maurizio Gibillini, chef-owner of Pagliacci at the Podium, Maurizio in Salcedo Village, and Gelatone in Greenbelt tells me, “Gelato is gelato and ice cream is ice cream. They are two very different things.” He wrinkles his nose, as if to prove his point and then adds, “The flavor in gelato comes out because of the composition of the ingredients, the harmony of the ingredients. The flavor is not just in your mouth, but also in your throat.”Gelato, which literally means “frozen” is the Italian word for ice cream. The Italian specialty has been around since the late 16th century with a history that’s complicated and at times obscure, but its invention is credited to Bernardo Buontalenti, the great Italian Renaissance artist for the court of Francesco de' Medici in 1565.Manila’s new disciples of gelato are Marilyn and Gwen Dee, sisters and co-owners of Angelati Italia. Currently available by order only and served in select establishments, it’s a product of inspiration galvanized by the gelaterias the pair saw in their travels. To them, ...

I’m breaking free from that habit of ordering “the usual” when it comes to what I call, “specific country cuisine.” To wit: sushi, tempura, and katsudon when ordering Japanese; kimchi and bulgogi when ordering Korean; dimsum, sweet and sour pork, and Yang Chow fried rice for Chinese; and the ultimate am-so-sick-of-this combination -- putanesca and Quattro formaggio pizza (or some such pizza-pasta combination) when eating Italian. Boring.So on my visit to Zao, Manila’s newest and only Vietnamese bistro, I tell owner Kay Alcantara, “I’d like to try something new please, aside from ‘the usual.’” When it comes to Vietnamese, “the usual” here are the spring rolls – either fresh or fried – and the pomelo salad. Kay seems relieved when I tell her my request. “On weekends, the kitchen sends out about 50 orders of the spring rolls, and that pomelo salad … everyone orders the pomelo salad. There are tables that are ordering the same things.” Again, boring much?Still, to embark on a ...