Documente Academic
Documente Profesional
Documente Cultură
Clinton PalancaWORDS
Raxenne ManiquizILLUSTRATOR
Nobody expects the Spanish expedition. Certainly not us, the Filipinos, who before the colonial period
were enjoying not just the bounty of indigenous species but spices from the southern trade routes.
Additionally, cooking techniques and ingredients from the small boats that traded with the Chinese
mainland. While Magellan himself brought little of immediate culinary value, those who came after
him brought bounties of both the old world and the new.
Spain, and the rest of Europe, were undergoing a culinary revolution at the time. While the potato,
tomato, corn, and chilis were at first regarded with suspicion in European court, succeeding generations
of botanists and agriculturalists were able to realize their potential. The first record of a potato being
eaten in Spain was in 1573, in Seville. It is hard to imagine Spanish cuisine without its frittatas made
from potato and tomato, or its paellas fragrant with bell peppers and paprika. The colonization of the
Philippines coincided with the biggest change in agriculture and culinary habits around the world,
known as the Columbian Exchange. Although it bears the name of the man who discovered the new
world, much of it took place in the century after his ships landed in America. What we came to
understand as Spanish food was actually a cuisine in transition.
It is impossible to overstate the importance of the French court during those years. Marie-Antoinette
wore a garland of potato flowers on her soon-to-be-famous head to celebrate and popularize the potato.
The dishes that we think of as archetypically Spanish evolved during this time in Spanish homes while
the courts were dominated by French influences. The Spanish peninsulares ate their favada stews at
home (made with beans from the new world) and taught their Filipino servants how to make it for them.
But the most lasting influence that the Spanish colonial period had on Philippine cuisine was the
introduction of new domesticated animals: the European pig, cow, and chicken came to dominate the
indigenous species.
In the Philippines, Spanish food has a special place in the minds and stomachs of the upper classes, but
it is an old-fashioned idea of Spanish food. Just as Italian restaurants had to escape the image of the
quaint trattoria with a candle stuck in a Chianti bottledispelling stygian gloom out of which was
equally likely to emerge a cream-laden carbonara or Uncle Vinnie with a shotgunSpanish restaurants
are slowly shedding the image of the taverns that heaped huge servings of comfort food: heavy, oily,
long-simmered stews and roasts. Pintxos and tapas bars, creative restaurants like Vask and Donosti, are
changing the way we see Spanish food. People are looking up at it for the right reasons: not because its
the cuisine that the colonial master eats, but because its one of the most brilliant and exciting cuisines
in the world today, reinventing itself as light, flavorful, playful, and versatile. This is the second
coming of Spanish cuisine in the Philippines, and this time its changing the local culinary landscape
for all the right reasons.
http://www.pepper.ph/coming-to-the-philippines-how-the-spanish-invaded-our-kitchens/
Clinton Palanca