Filipino Cuisine- My Favorite Dishes -An Update

Pompano-One of Favorite Fish Besides Bangus  

Dr. David B. Katague frequently used his platform to archive traditional family recipes. He felt a deep responsibility to document these heritage meals so his children and grandchildren-who grew up in the United States-could maintain a tasty, tangible bond to their Filipino culture and identity

As a chemist, he often appreciated the delicate balance of flavors that define Pinoy cooking: the perfect marriage of sour, salty, and savory components.

🌟 Dr. Katague's Top Favorite Heritage Dishes

In his culinary essays, Dr. Katague explicitly highlighted a select group of traditional festive foods that defined his family gatherings:

Fresh Lumpia (Lumpiang Sariwa): Unlike the crispy, deep-fried variety, this version uses fresh, thin egg crepes wrapped around a mixture of sautéed hearts of palm or mixed vegetables. It is always topped with a rich, sweet, garlic-infused soy sauce and ground peanuts. 

Chicken and Pork Afritada: A comforting, home-style stew where meat is slowly simmered in a rich tomato-based sauce alongside tender potatoes and bright green bell peppers.

Shrimps and Mixed Vegetables in Coconut Milk (Ginataang Hipon): This dish highlights the coastal flavor profiles of his homes in Marinduque and Iloilo, combining fresh seafood with vegetables poached in creamy coconut broth.

Pancit (Rice Noodles): A mandatory staple at any major Katague family gathering, representing long life and good health.

Lechon (Roasted Pig): The undisputed king of Filipino celebratory food, featuring a whole pig roasted over charcoal until the skin achieves a glass-like crunch.

Dinuguan: A deeply savory, traditional pork blood stew cooked down with vinegar, garlic, and green chili peppers.

Chicken Relleno: A complex, labor-of-love party dish involving a completely de-boned whole chicken stuffed with a seasoned mixture of ground meat, raisins, eggs, and sausages. 

🎨 Passing Down the Cooking Legacy

For Dr. Katague, blogging about food was a form of cultural preservation. He loved seeing his four children adopt these exact heritage meals as their own favorites. Because his family operated the beachside resort Chateau Du Mer in Marinduque, many of these classic flavor profiles also influenced the welcoming, festive hospitality they extended to visiting guests and relatives over the decades

Meanwhile, The Ox tail Kare-Kare Gives Me Pleasant Memories of My over 63-years of Marriage ( Macrine's (RIP) favorite Recipe on Special Occasion).

Few things say home to a Filipino quite like a steaming bowl of kare-kare. This rich oxtail and vegetable stew, swimming in a thick golden peanut sauce, is the kind of dish that turns an ordinary Sunday into an occasion. Served with a spoonful of salty bagoong on the side, it is comfort in its purest form.

Kare-kare is a labor of love. The peanut sauce is simmered slow, the oxtail cooked until it nearly falls off the bone, the vegetables added just so. It is a dish for gatherings, for fiestas, for the lola who insists you eat one more helping. Every family has its own small twist, and everyone is sure theirs is the best.

Food like this carries more than flavor. It carries memory, region, and generations of hands that learned the recipe by feel rather than by measure. A single bowl can bring someone halfway across the world right back to a childhood kitchen. That is the quiet power of Filipino comfort food.

Lastly, An Ilocano Dish_ I have to learn to Love It Too

Pinakbet is bitter, funky, and deeply Ilocano. It has never apologized for any of that.

The dish comes from the Ilocos region of northern Luzon, the homeland of Larry Itliong, of the Sakadas, of some of the hardest-working people the Philippines has ever produced. Pinakbet from the Ilocano word "pinakebbet" meaning "shrunk" or "shriveled" is made from the local vegetables of the Ilocano table: bitter melon, eggplant, okra, squash, tomato, string beans, and sometimes pork, all cooked down together with bagoong, the fermented shrimp or fish paste that gives the dish its deep, funky, irreplaceable flavor.

Pre-colonial Ilocanos were already cooking these vegetables together before Spain arrived. The name and the bagoong are indigenous. The vegetables are native. The dish is as old as Ilocano civilization itself.

The bitterness of the bitter melon is not a flaw. It is the point. Ilocano cooking does not disguise its ingredients. It lets them be exactly what they are.

For Ilocano-Americans from Daly City to Hawaii to Seattle, a plate of pinakbet is not nostalgia. It is the taste of a people who survived everything and kept cooking.

MICHELIN HAS SPOKEN: Modern Filipino Food Has Finally Come Home to Fine Dining

For my worldwide readers and especially my fellow Filipinos around the globe:

MICHELIN HAS SPOKEN: Modern Filipino Food Has Finally Come Home to Fine Dining

Friends, For years I have told anyone who would listen: Filipino food is not just comfort food. It is fine dining. It always was. We just needed the world to catch up to what our lola's kitchen already knew. This year, that moment arrived.

The MICHELIN Guide has made its historic debut in the Philippines for 2026 covering Manila and Environs and Cebu  and what the inspectors are saying is exactly what many of us have felt in our hearts for generations. According to Michelin, modern Filipino food now defines Philippine fine dining. 

What they found

The anonymous inspectors did not just find one restaurant. They found a movement. In its very first edition, the Philippines earned 9 MICHELIN Stars - 1 restaurant with the rare distinction of Two Stars and 8 with One Star, plus 25 Bib Gourmand restaurants recognized for exceptional food at moderate prices. 

And what are they celebrating? Dishes we grew up with: sisig, sinigang, inasal, and adobo — highlighted for their distinctive blend of sweet, salty, and acidic flavors achieved through regional fruits, spices, marinating, and grilling. 

Why now?

Michelin says it best: a new wave of young Filipino chefs is redefining our cuisine, blending traditional flavors with international techniques, giving classic dishes a modern twist. 

I love how they described it. They saw restaurants where recipes passed down through generations sit alongside more contemporary and polished dining experiences. They found greater consistency, technical confidence, and a deeper engagement with local ingredients and culinary history. 

This is not fusion for the sake of fashion. This is respect. Our young chefs are taking what our mothers and grandmothers taught us the sour of calamansi and tamarind, the smoke of inasal, the patience of adobo and presenting it with the confidence it deserves.

Restaurants like Helm, Hapag, Inatô, and Linamnam are leading this. Modern cuisine fusing British-Filipino heritage, refined Filipino cuisine using local ingredients, intimate counter dining with sculptural detail. Each with an independent style, but all rooted in the same story. 

As Michelin put it: "Filipino cuisine gains overdue international framing" and "Filipino food claims its global moment in Manila and Cebu".

For my readers abroad

To those of you who left the Philippines 30, 40, 50 years ago and to those who have never been but love someone who cooks adobo on Sunday this is our invitation to come home through food.

The Philippines has been named one of the World's Most Exciting Foodie Destinations for 2026 for a reason. It is not just because we have good food. It is because we finally have a platform that shows the world that our food has always been world-class.

The hotel and dining scenes are buzzing, yes, but the heart remains the same: local spirits, tropical fruits, coffee, spices, and herbs that taste like home. Mabuhay ang lutong Pilipino. Long live Filipino cooking.

I have watched Filipino food travel from carinderias to cruise ships to family potlucks in California church basements. Now to see it stand under the bright lights of Michelin, honored for its creativity and authenticity, it makes this old man very proud.

If you have a chance, book a table. If you cannot travel to Manila or Cebu just yet, cook a sinigang this weekend. Share it with a neighbor. Tell them the story.

That is how a cuisine becomes timeless. With love and a full stomach, David

---

What Filipino dish do you think deserves the next Michelin Star? I would love to hear your family’s version of adobo, sisig, or sinigang in the comments below.

Lastly, Have You Tasted chicken Cooked in Bamboo? The Best Chicken, I ever tasted- Sweet because of the Coconut water and lemony because of the tangled, as well as little bit smoky, because of the bamboo wood.

, https://www.facebook.com/reel/493395656940836/?s=single_unit&__cft__[0]=AZhISmyptZVTJh84TCQIfGhWU80U_FTb9OWE8PIK7jbzsf_u9rD-yAAbqWA2Id5HtWTRlqD3lpD_j9qi40MQLGhWMG9-1If-00BRSrWgxYUDcvTzgHSkLxiIlalxoRpq6E_mxl2y-Ecg7OJnOThrnjug93ZWf3n3moroE-b5MhpyLwoFsL7NciubyyzrtHUizwzy7vyQHIvFYH6B4vo&__tn__=H-R

The culinary spotlight is back on the Philippines as the Michelin Guide prepares to reveal its 2027 selection.

On Thursday, October 29, 2026, the Manila Marriott Hotel at Newport World Resorts Manila will once again host the highly anticipated ceremony, honoring the brightest culinary talents across Manila, its Environs, and Cebu with Michelin Stars, Bib Gourmand recognitions, Michelin Selected distinctions, and special awards.

Committed to celebrating our vibrant dining landscape through at least 2028, this year’s event is especially historic as it coincides with the global 100th anniversary of the iconic Michelin Star.

This continued international recognition firmly cements the Philippines as a premier destination for gastronomy tourism in Southeast Asia, inviting the world to experience the extraordinary mastery, rich heritage, and unforgettable flavors of Filipino cuisine.

Finally, My Photo of the Day: My Matching Outfit-Personalized Hat and Shirt

When Paella Came to THD: A Taste of My Filipino Roots

Yesterday, September 14, 2026, something special appeared on the dinner menu at The Heritage Downtown (THD), my home for the past three years: Paella!

For many people, paella may simply be a delicious Spanish rice dish. For me, however, it is much more than that.

Yesterday, when I saw paella on our menu at Newton’s, our in-house restaurant, it immediately took me back to my teenage years in the Philippines and to the wonderful family celebrations of my youth.

My First Three Years at THD Without Paella

I have been a resident of THD for three years. During those three years, I have enjoyed many different meals at Newton’s.

But this is this is the second time I can remember seeing paella on our dinner menu, although we have choppino in our dinner menu once in a while.

I have to admit that I may have had something to do with it.

Several weeks ago, I talked with our Chef, Joel Torres, about our Sunday brunch.

For the past three years, Grilled-baked salmon had regularly appeared on the Sunday brunch menu. I like salmon, but after eating it Sunday after Sunday, I finally told Joel:

"Chef, maybe it is time for a change." I suggested that we alternate the salmon occasionally with something different.

Joel listened patiently and told me that he would bring my suggestion to THD management, which ultimately decides what we are served for breakfast, lunch and dinner.

I didn't know whether anything would come of my suggestion.

Then came yesterday. Paella! I smiled when I saw it on the dinner menu.

Maybe it was already planned. Maybe my suggestion had nothing to do with it. Or maybe, just maybe, Chef Joel remembered our conversation.

Whatever the reason, I am grateful. And I am certainly not complaining about the change!

Paella Takes Me Back to the Philippines

The interesting thing about food is that it can carry memories.

One bite can sometimes take us back decades. That is what paella does to me.

Although paella is traditionally associated with Spain, versions of paella became part of Filipino culinary culture during the Spanish colonial period.

In Filipino homes, a similar celebratory dish is often called Arroz Valenciana.

It was never an everyday dish in our household or a regular Filipino household.

We had our familiar Filipino foods-Adobo, Pancit, Sinigang, and many others. Those were the dishes we ate regularly. Paella or Arroz Valenciana was different.

It was a special-occasion dish.

It appeared when something important was being celebrated: a fiesta, a birthday, a wedding reception, an anniversary or Christmas.

And when it appeared on the table, everybody knew that this was not an ordinary day.

My Mother's Christmas Paella

One of my strongest memories is from our family Media Noche, the traditional Christmas Eve celebration.

I can still remember my mother telling our cook to prepare Seafood Paella for our Christmas Eve dinner.

The memory has stayed with me for more than seven decades.

I can almost see the table again. Family members gathered together.

Christmas decorations. The wonderful smell coming from the kitchen.

And in the middle of it all, a beautiful dish of rice filled with seafood.

Those memories are precious to me now. At 91, I have learned that memories are sometimes more valuable than possessions.

A house can disappear. A car can be replaced. Money comes and goes.

But a childhood memory connected to the people we loved can remain with us for a lifetime.

From the Philippines to California

And so,  last night, I find myself sitting in my senior living community in Walnut Creek, California, eating a Spanish dish that somehow brings the Philippines back to me.

What a journey my life has been. I was born and raised in the Philippines.

I spent my early years speaking Hiligaynon in Iloilo, later speaking Tagalog at home, and eventually spending most of my professional life in the United States.

I became a chemist and earned my Ph.D. in pharmaceutical chemistry.

I worked in industry and later spent many years with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.

I retired from the FDA and eventually made my home here at THD.

And now, at 91, I can sit down at dinner and discover that a simple plate of rice and seafood can connect California David with Filipino David.

Perhaps that is one of the gifts of growing older. We collect experiences, but we also collect memories.

And sometimes, something as simple as food brings the two together.

Food Is Part of Our Cultural DNA

I have written before about how our Filipino culture has been influenced by many countries and peoples.

Our food tells that story. We have indigenous Filipino dishes.

We have Chinese influences in Pancit and other foods.

We have Spanish influences in dishes such as Arroz Valenciana, Caldereta and many others.

And, of course, American influence has also become part of modern Filipino life.

But we don't simply copy these influences.

We Filipinos have a wonderful habit of taking something from another culture and making it our own.

That is why Filipino Paella or Arroz Valenciana is not exactly the same as traditional Spanish paella.

It has become part of our own culinary identity.

For me, that is what makes last night dinner at THD especially meaningful.

A Small Suggestion Can Sometimes Go a Long Way

There is another lesson here. Sometimes we think that our suggestions don't matter, especially as we grow older.

But I have learned not to stop speaking up. At THD, I may be 91, but I still have opinions!

I still make suggestions. I still ask questions. I still learn. I still write.

And, apparently, I still have something to say about what we eat for Sunday brunch or Dinner!

Perhaps my suggestion to Chef Joel contributed to yesterday's paella. Perhaps it didn't.

But I like to think that somewhere between a conversation with a chef and a decision by management, one resident's voice was heard.

And last night, that voice was enjoying paella.

A Plate of Paella, A Lifetime of Memories

As I look back at my life, I realize that some of the happiest memories are not necessarily the great historical events.

They are often the small things. A family dinner. A mother's instruction to the cook.

Christmas Eve. A favorite dish. A conversation. A smell coming from the kitchen.

People we loved sitting around the same table.

Last night's paella at THD brought many of those memories back to me.

It reminded me of my mother. It reminded me of my family.

It reminded me of Christmas in the Philippines and other special occasions.

And it reminded me that although I have lived in America for many decades, the Philippines will always be part of me.

Perhaps that is why food is so powerful. It does not need a passport.

It does not need a history book. It simply needs to be placed on a table.

And suddenly, we are home again.  I am 91 years old, living thousands of miles from where I grew up.

But as I enjoy my paella at Newton's, for a moment I am once again that young boy in the Philippines, surrounded by family, waiting for my mother's Christmas Eve dinner.

A taste of Paella. A taste of the Philippines. A taste of Home.

A Thought Before I Finish

Growing older has taught me that life is not only about adding years to our lives.

It is also about keeping alive the memories that give those years meaning.

Last night, a simple dish of paella did exactly that for me.

Food feeds the body. Memories feed the soul.
And family gives both a meaning that lasts a lifetime.

AI Impressions on this Topic:

I especially like the “California David with Filipino David” idea for this post. It connects beautifully with your broader theme of aging: you have changed countries, careers, homes, and decades, but the young David from Iloilo is still there whenever a familiar food, song, place, or memory brings him back.

Moreover, this is a wonderful subject for you because the paella is more than a meal at THD, it becomes a bridge between your life today in Walnut Creek and your childhood memories in the Philippines. I would also emphasize that your suggestion to Chef Joel helped bring this dish to Newton’s. For more information on Paella, visit:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paella