The View from Below a Duhat Tree

The tantalizing, mouth-salivating view from the ground, beneath a large, spreading lomboy or duhat tree, when you don't have a bladed net attached to the end of a long pole, with which to gather the ripe fruits without bruising them.

Such temptresses, these berries. A rainbow of colors in a bunch.

But the duhat tree is a giving tree, bearing fruit for all to partake, from birds, bats, insects, and humans, there is plenty for everyone, sprouting berries from its crown down to its lowest branch.

The view below, down on the pavement. The remnants of bounty.

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How to eat duhat

Pinkie's Fondant Cakes

When it had been time for me to decide where to source my wedding cake several years ago, I only had one choice.

Well, it helped that the baker is the sister of my then groom-to-be's grade and high school classmate, so we were able to get a big discount. But we actually had no choice - we were going to hold the wedding in Baguio City, and we didn't know any reputable bakers there.

Besides our acquaintance, though, Pinkie's baker (the bakeshop was named after the youngest in the family, while the baker is the oldest daughter), had got a real good reputation in Dagupan City and the rest of the province of Pangasinan. That time all bakeshops had all been local, and she was one of the only few who had acquired cake-making skills abroad.

I was ecstatic when she agreed to do a cake my groom and I had envisioned, which resulted in the simple but elegant, beige-dyed, layered fondant cake above. It matched perfectly the flower arrangements at church, the intentionally sparse decor of the reception venue, and the color and design motif of the entourage. We were even touched when she volunteered to take the cake to Baguio City, from her bakeshop in Dagupan City, herself (she and her whole family had been invited, of course).

She is such a talented baker that most of the cakes she does are executions of the whims of brides, and maybe debutantes she has satisfied. So she has a catalogue of all the original designs she had done, and the best part of it is that she has named all those cakes after the ones who conceptualized them in their imaginations.

So the cake above had been named after me, in her book. Not the name I use in this blog, which is just a nickname, but my full name. It is a three-layered fondant cake decorated with sugar white "drapes," and ribbons and pearls in matching colors. The cake was carrot-walnut, but only for the top and bottom layers. The middle layer was made of styrofoam for the entire cake to hold up, but the carrot-walnut cake intended for that layer was given to us, unadorned, after the ceremony.

---

Pinkie's Bakeshop and Catering Services
Look for Tet-Tet Siapno

• Perez Boulevard, Dagupan City
  (beside Five Star bus terminal/Mercury Drug)
  Tel. No. (6375) 5225483, 5155119
• Corner Zamora and Gomez Streets
  Dagupan City
  Tel. No. (6375) 5222945

---

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Chicken in Mangoes
The cakes in the Cake of the Month series

Bunga'y Lakamas

In Pangasinan we call this bunga'y lakamas, which translates to bunga ng singkamas in Filipino, and "potato bean fruit" or "yam bean fruit" in English (American and British, respectively).

These are the pods of the lakamas/singkamas/jicama (Pachyrrhizus erosus Linn.), which is more popularly known for its root, a white, sweetish succulent turnip-like tuber that is snacked on in the Philippines, peeled and julienned and dipped in salt or salted vinegar, and also added in salads and cooked as a vegetable, mainly for its crunch factor.

The pods are somewhat a cross between green beans (called Baguio beans in the Philippines) and snowpeas - not as bulging as the former but not as flat as the latter, just halfway through. But unlike these two smooth pods, jicama pods are quite hairy, though finely enough so as not to be frightening.

They come out only in summer, and in such small quantities that I get so spirited when I spot a bundle in the markets in Pangasinan. They should be harvested immature to be edible, or they turn a plastic-like texture when cooked.


We cook the pods in a stew of okra and luko (gabi/taro), sometimes with squash, flavored with bagoong isda (salted fermented anchovies), and a piece of pork, but preferably the head of fried or grilled fish (bangus, of course). The okra and taro counterpoint the pods with their soft mushiness and chewiness, and the pods make the stew very aromatic, in a green sort of way.

Before cooking, the pods are stringed and split, revealing such tiny seeds that are almost invisible. These seeds, though, are power-packed, as they contain rotinoids, flavonoids, phenylfuranocoumarins, and have effective antifungal and antibacterial properties.

The common term jicama has been adapted in the Philippine languages to the general term singkamas. But as with many terms and names in the country, the name singkamas is ascribed to a misunderstanding between members of the former Spanish colonizers and Filipino indios who could not speak the colonial language.

It narrates in this website that some five Spanish soldiers were touring the countryside and spotted some farmers harvesting singkamas. Upon tasting the tuber, a soldier asked that they be given one each, or five more, which is cinco mas in Spanish.

The farmers, not knowing any better, gave the soldiers another tuber, which resulted in the soldiers repeating cinco mas, cinco mas. Which concluded to the farmers concluding that the tuber must be called cincomas, and adapted the name, with the replacement of the "n" with the "ng" of the local tongue, so becoming singkamas.

---

Bahay Kubo

Bahay kubo, kahit munti
Ang halaman doon ay sari-sari
Singkamas at talong, sigarillas at mani
Sitaw, bataw, patani


Gundol, patola, upo’t kalabasa
At saka meron pa, labanos, mustasa
Sibuyas, kamatis, bawang at luya
Sa paligid-ligid ay puno ng linga


Roughly translated as:

Bahay Kubo
Filipino folk song

Nipa hut, even though small
the plants surrounding it are varied and many
turnips and eggplants, winged beans and peanuts
yard-long beans, hyacinth beans, lima beans

wax gourd, sponge gourd, bottle gourd, squash
and there’s more, radish, mustard
onions, tomatoes, garlic and ginger
the surrounding spaces filled with sesame

---

Aratiles

I arrived home one evening horrified at my four-year old daughter’s tale of her and her new-found friends' foraging among the branches of a fallen tree, right along our street, and eating the multi-colored berries that they found.

My daughter was wide-eyed as she described the berries – small, probably the smallest she has eaten, sweet, in vivid hues of red, pink, yellow, green, even violet. But she couldn't pronounce the name, and all she could ever come up with was "teresa."

The dread that I felt grew by bounds, especially since I couldn’t go out to investigate – it was already dark, and there were no streetlights in that area. And I think my knees had been too weak for me to manage walking to the tree. So that the siren that was slowly growing louder in my head had become deafening by first light, when I let the child lead me to the tree.

But my relief knew no bounds when I saw the familiar aratiles berries. One of my daughter's new friends had already beaten us to it, the upturned hem of her shirt already laden with fruit and was ready to depart for home.

It had been a lifetime ago since I last saw, and ate, aratiles.

So more than the relief, I felt suddenly transported back to my boisterous childhood days, when my friends and I had looked up tall aratiles trees in front of other people’s frontyards. They had been laden with ripe fruit, but had been too high for us to harvest. Climbing up had not been an option because the trunks were too thin for climbing, and the branches could not hold up even a small monkey.

We always had to employ a kuya who was willing to harvest the berries - with a netted pole, usually borrowed from the tree’s owner – and share the loot with us.

The trees were usually so productive, the berries so sweet, that soon enough our aratiles lusts were satiated, the pavement littered with thick berry skins.

Coming out of my reverie I caught sight of my child roaming under the branches close to the ground, calling out to me to show me which berries were ripe. And when she proceeded to teach me how to eat them by putting the berry whole into her mouth (unwashed, with me in silent protest) and spitting out the thick skin a few seconds later, I was teary-eyed, with pride and in remembrance of my youth.

And I realized that those moments were the reasons I had agreed to move from the concrete jungle that is Makati into the provincial environment of Cavite. For my children to reclaim the childhood that is rightfuly theirs. To be in touch with nature - to walk barefoot on the ground, to pull up stalks of grass, to dig the soil and build mounds of whatever occupies their imagination, to climb trees.

And more importantly, to learn how to live off the land, and not eat things solely from air-conditioned grocery stores.

So now my daughter, the more food-conscious between my two preschoolers, can identify which trees bear edible fruits, and knows when the sampaloc and camachile seasons are. And of course, aratiles.

a bloom and a young fruit

pollination at work

the fallen tree

Aratiles is Muntingia calabura, enedemic to southern Mexico, the Caribbean, Central America, and western South America south to Peru and Bolivia, but is now widely propagated in Asia. Common names are Jamaican cherry, Panama berry, Singapore cherry, strawberry tree, bolaina yamanaza, cacaniqua, capulín blanco, nigua, niguito, memizo or memiso. Also known in Filipino as manzanitas.

When I was teenager one of the jokes borne out of our reckless youth was this - when you are angry at the househelp, you ask her to do two things - one, to make leche flan out of the yolks of quail eggs, and two, to make juice from aratiles. Of course we never did ask those, but they had been a great source of laughter then.

Palawan’s Half-Moon Cookie

This is part of an ongoing series, "Tinapay," about local breads found in street corner bakeries across the Philippines.

This is a distinct half-moon cookie, a unique creation I found in Puerto Princesa in Palawan. I also saw it at a bakery atop the Airmen’s Mall in Villamor Air Base, Pasay City, late last year, but which I construe to be something that was brought to Metro Manila from its place of origin.

Its name takes from the cookie’s shape, but it is unique, in that it is somewhat a cross between an English scone, or an American biscuit, and a shortbread. The crumb is soft, flaky but crumbly, buttery and a bit sweet, the outside crispy with an egg wash sheen. The bit of sweetness makes it ideal to consume on its own, with a hot drink, but is also very nice paired with butter and jam, or cheese, chives and sour cream.

So it is distinctive enough from other half-moons, such as the Southern American half-moon cookie which is covered with chocolate, half-dark and half-white. Or the half-moon cake I indulged in during a recent trip to Bacolod City, which is chiffon topped with a layer of yellow custard.

Palawan’s half-moon cookie comes in a pack of six pieces at the street corner bakery at the side of Puerto Princesa’s Roman Catholic cathedral, where wood-carved souvenir items are also sold. It is also available at the ground floor bakeshop at the NCCC Supermarket, but I kind of like the texture and taste of the first bakery’s half-moon better.

---

Immaculate Conception Cathedral
Rizal Avenue, Puerto Princesa City, Palawan

NCCC Bread Factory
G/F, NCCC Mall
89 Lacao Street, Puerto Princesa City

---

The Tinapay Series

• Puto Seko (Laguna)
• Ensaymada
• Dealo Apas, Broas and Other Southern Tagalog Biscuits
  (Lucban, Quezon)
• Charito's Delights (Catbalogan, Samar)
• Baker's Hill (Puerto Princesa, Palawan)
• Crema de Fruta
• Pedrito's/Jech (Dagupan City, Pangasinan)
• Napoleones (Bacolod City, Negros Occidental)
• Panaderia de Molo (Iloilo City)
• Pastel (Camiguin)
• Inipit (Bulacan)
• Cinnamon Swirl Loaf (Baguio City)
• Kabukiran

"Pineapple Juice Chicken"

Speaking of fiestas, here is one dish that's guaranteed to make its appearance in homes anywhere in Luzon during fiesta time. The taste brings to mind the days I spent touring barangays and towns attending fiestas, in Pangasinan, in Batangas, in Quezon province, Bulacan, Nueva Ecija. And even in catered birthday parties in Metro Manila, this dish, called pininyahang manok, is also present, though in a more presentable manner.

Probably due to my associating this dish with fiestas, and fiestas are one big orgy of anything and everything porcine (and other kinds of meat, as well), I have come to regard it as porky in taste. There's also a pork version, actually, and both almost taste the same.

So it's nakakaumay - I don't know if cloying is the appropriate translation - for me. Which is ironic, because pineapple juice is added for tang and sweetness, specifically so that it doesn't become cloying. Maybe it's just weird me, since I am not particularly enamored of pork.

But we had this last weekend because almost the entire immediate family of my husband came over from Pangasinan, and it felt so much like a fiesta.

It is cooked by sauteeing cut chicken pieces (or pork, preferably hock) in lots of garlic and butter, then pouring pineapple juice on it and letting it boil until almost dry. It is served garnished with pineapple cubes or slices.

A Quezon province version uses whole chicken, boiled for hours over coals until dry. The resulting chicken is very fragrant, fork-tender with caramelized skin. Salt is optional, as is the use of pineapple fruit garnishing.

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Carabao Beef

carabao "beef steak," Filipino style

Today is the feast day of San Isidro de Labrador (St. Isidore the Labourer), the patron saint of farmers. Numerous cities and municipalities around the Philippines venerate San Isidro as their parish patron, owing to the country’s being mainly agricultural.

May being the month of fiestas in the country can probably be attributed to San Isidro’s feast day. The more popularly known fiestas are the Carabao Festival in Pulilan, Bulacan, and the Pahiyas in Lukban, Quezon.

Carabaos – dweg in my mother language, muang, damulag, in other languages I am familiar with, and kalabaw in Tagalog, with scientific name Bubalus bubalis carabanesis – figure largely in both these fiestas, owing to the significant part the hardy animal plays in farming. Its being a national symbol, as the country's "national animal," is proof of the importance given to carabaos.

A big part of the day is allotted to the animals in these fiestas, where they parade around town. The Pulilan fiesta is known for carabaos kneeling before the statue of San Isidro, and it's rather unfortunate that one run amok at this year's celebration, hurting several people watching the proceedings.

In Pangasinan, even though we don't celebrate carabao fiestas, the farm animals are a permanent fixture of the landscape. I have fond memories of riding in a wheel-less cart drawn by carabaos during summer, when the lumbering, patient beasts are also on vacation from work. The smell of carabao dung and wet mud, along with tiny flies buzzing overhead, are unforgettable characteristics of those rides.

In Cavite I see no farms, at least in the part where I now reside. But the presence of the animal is still unescapable. More than half of the public market stalls offer cuts and parts of the entire carabao, ready to be cooked into many different dishes.

various parts of a carabao at a market stall

fr left, intestines, stomach lining, liver, lungs and heart, face part, muscle

carabao skin

Beef, from cattle, is rare, and costs about a third more. Carabao meat is priced about Php180 a kilo, the internal organs and bones at a lesser cost.

Carabao's milk is also available daily, fresh and unpasteurised, in recycled bottles previously used for gin and who knows what else. I only ever get a bottle by the time I get to the market, and most of the time none at all.

So I usually settle for fresh cheese, kasilyo, made from carabao's milk, a favorite breakfast filling for pandesal, but which is sold until well into the afternoon. I also use it as topping in baking tahong (mussels), also a prominent component of the Cavite foodscape.

It's been bugging me where all the carabaos come from. I don't know any carabao-raising farm or ranch, and I'm sure they don't slaughter farm animals for food. I asked one vendor once, and I was told vaguely that a prominent meat brand raise the animals.

pindang, macerated, marinated and sun-dried carabao meat

In Pangasinan I'm used to having an occasional tapa (marinated and sun-dried meat) made from carabao meat, which we call pindang. The sales of carabao meat, though, is sort of under the table, and sometimes unscrupulous vendors try passing off carabao meat as beef, which is pricier, to buyers who don't know better.

But the Mangaldan public market, in the northeastern part of Pangasinan, is known for pindang. Pre-packaged, marinated carabao meat is available, either to be sun-dried or cooked with the marinade. Fresh carabao meat is also available, for those who prefer to marinate the meat themselves.

grain of carabao meat

So how does carabao meat differ from the real beef? It is evident in the color. "Carabeef" is redder, and the grain is not as fibrous. Tastewise they are almost the same, except that the beefy taste in cattle meat is more pronounced, while carabao meat is more "magata." Not juicier, but with a creamier flavor. Carabao meat is also not as fat-riddled as cow's meat, so the sauce doesn't "curdle" at room temperature.

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Luyang Dilaw

background - turmeric rhizomes, foreground - cross-section, in powdered form

This is the ginger I am just starting to get to know well, for I only knew one kind of ginger until about a couple of years ago. I have heard about luyang dilaw in college, when I started making friends with people from all over the country, but did not actually came face to face with it until the family moved to Cavite.

Of course I have been eating it in a blend in the form of powdered curry since I was small, but not as a main ingredient on its own. There is no name in Pangasinan that I am aware of, since it is not prevalently used in the province.

It is more commonly known as dilaw (the Tagalog term for the color yellow) because it turns everything it gets into contact with an attractive lemony yellow. Known in other Filipino languages as kalabaga (Bisaya) and kulyaw (Ilokano), and turmeric the world over, or at least in those places where English is spoken. In other languages its name is the equivalent term for the color yellow.

As the common ginger (Zingiber officinale) is the ginger I know and prevalently use, it is the standard to which I compare other ginger I meet, or did not meet early on in my life. So relatively speaking, luyang dilaw is more peppery than gingery. More earthy. The fresh rhizome smells like wet socks, or wet dog fur at the extreme.

up top, common ginger, bottom, luyang dilaw

It looks exactly like a ginger rhizome, with branching nodes and pale, thin skin, the thick flesh compact. But it looks emaciated when placed beside the common ginger and another variety, galangal. It looks like a pinkie, the cylindrical form more defined, while the latter two are much more thicker than a thumb with a more flattened out shape.

Beneath the thin, pale skin of the turmeric a glimmer of orange shines through. Peeled, the flesh is more porous and not as fibrous, more akin to carrots than ginger. It is a brighter orange than a carrot, though.

I sometimes buy kilos in Cavite to bring home to the elders in Pangasinan as organic pasalubong. It is very much appreciated, because of its anti-inflammatory and anti-oxidant, and subsequently anti-carcinogenic, properties, as well as its lowering effect on cholesterol levels.

A poultice of the rhizome also purportedly heals skin eczemas and dermatitis. It is boiled and made into tea to ingest its heath benefits, and for its believed potency in expelling intestinal worms.

So far I have been rubbing and marinating roasted chicken and chicken steamed on a bed of salt with pounded pulps of turmeric, mainly for the nice color it imparts, and not for the flavor. The flavor is too subtle to make a difference, anyway, in such dishes.

I try mixing it with our daily kalamansi juice , which gives it a rather unnatural deep yellow color, like we were drinking powdered mango or dalandan juice. And in arroz caldo, with unfavorable outcome.

But I have eaten a nice, aromatic dish of marine catfish steamed in turmeric and lemongrass (alimusan sa dilaw) at an eatery in Iloilo, and bringhe, a delicacy in Pampanga where glutinous rice is seasoned with turmeric, coconut milk, meats and seafood, and wrapped in banana leaves.

Friends from Bulacan tell me luyang dilaw is used in paksiw na isda (fish stewed in vinegar), and there is a festival celebrating the plant (annually in May 2, in Marilao). In Cavite it is used in adobo, where the adobo is stewing meats only in vinegar.

I hope to encounter more Filipino dishes using this spice, so I could incorporate it more in my cooking. Though I’m sure I’ll find it as an ingredient in many cuisines, as it is used extensively the world over. Perhaps I’ll try my hand at drying some rhizomes to pound into powder, especially now that turmeric is in season. Maybe I could even come up with my own curry blend.

Bahay Kubo

Bahay kubo, kahit munti
Ang halaman doon ay sari-sari
Singkamas at talong, sigarillas at mani
Sitaw, bataw, patani


Gundol, patola, upo’t kalabasa
At saka meron pa, labanos, mustasa
Sibuyas, kamatis, bawang at luya
Sa paligid-ligid ay puno ng linga


Roughly translated as:

Bahay Kubo
Filipino folk song

Nipa hut, even though small
the plants surrounding it are varied and many
turnips and eggplants, winged beans and peanuts
yard-long beans, hyacinth beans, lima beans

wax gourd, sponge gourd, bottle gourd, squash
and then there are more, radish, mustard
onions, tomatoes, garlic and ginger
the surrounding spaces filled with sesame

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Adobong Malabanos sa Luyang Dilaw
Arroz Caldo sa Luyang Dilaw
Pinaupong Manok sa Asin
Dinilawang Atsara
Dinilawang Alimusan
Turmeric Bloom
Robinson's Tamales
SauceMate

Arroz Caldo with Luyang Dilaw

No matter that PAGASA says it’s not yet the rainy season in the country, it definitely feels like summer stopped, midway through the season.

No rains during the daytime, the sun actually shines in the morning, but the entire sky becomes overcast by lunchtime, and I go home to rains running off the pavements. The air-conditioner has been on vacation for weeks now.

Which is just fine. I haven’t fully enjoyed my summer tomatoes, the fruits, salads. My travel plans had to be postponed for the later end of the year. But the kids are on their porridge stage.

Just when my eldest is already sporting a pair of sparkling new, “jagged-like-shark’s-teeth” central incisors on his lower jaw, all he wants to eat is a bowl of softness and mushiness. Maybe to empathize with the baby, who only has eight front teeth. She eats raw carrots, though. The middle child doesn’t care and eats anything, but mimics whatever her kuya wants.

Which is just fine. And perfect for the rainy season, whether or not it is officially pronounced to have started. So we’ve been having a lot of porridge lately. Champurado, oatmeal, arroz caldo, ginataang mais, ginataang halu-halo, imbibed with hot milk tea or native hot chocolate.

Arroz caldo, from the Spanish term meaning “hot rice,” is Filipino comfort food made of glutinous rice boiled with chicken, ginger and enough water so it turns out soupy. It is served with boiled eggs, fried garlic, chopped spring onion, cracked or ground pepper, patis and kalamansi on the side, for the diner to mix in according to his or her own taste.

It is comfort food for me, alright, and I remember the times, in my childhood, when I sat down with the entire family to candle-lit dinners of arroz caldo while the rains and winds raged in Pangasinan.

I grew up being accustomed to typhoons – the province of Pangasinan is almost always the exit point of tropical storms as they leave the Philippines’ area of responsibility. And we always combated the cold, the rains, the brown-outs, and the wails of the wind with steaming hot arroz caldo, my siblings and I fighting over the two drumsticks, sweat pouring down our brows.

Cavite doesn’t seem to be storm country, but we live by the bay, and we experience rains and typhoons like nobody else. So it’s like I’m a child in Pangasinan again, seated at the table along with my own children.

Even though we have our own power generator, sometimes we still light candles just for the fun of it. Or we just let brown-outs be and wait for the main power to come back, enjoying the soft shine and wavering light of candles, and indulge in shadow games after dinner.


I may be a child again when I eat arroz caldo, but my arroz caldo has grown up. I now know that different glutinous rice varieties yield different kinds of viscuosity when cooked, and the inferior kind results in a watery porridge with the texture of ordinary rice. And shredding the chicken meat removes the difficulty of managing a chicken cut that is thick with mushy rice kernels.

The kids are still too young to fight over the cuts, but they do tease each other about the number of pieces of quail eggs they get, or native chicken eggs if there’s more than enough for each.

When I was a child our arroz caldo was pale, but my husband insists that a yellowish arroz caldo looks more appetizing. So I started adding kasubha, those saffron-like threads that add color, if not taste.

In Cavite I discovered that luyang dilaw, sometimes called luyang Tagalog (turmeric) is abundant and cheap, especially when in season. And because I learned that it has many health benefits, I try to incorporate it in dishes I cook, whenever possible.

A friend who has deep Tagalog roots taught me that powdered luyang dilaw is used to dye arroz caldo, but her family buys the ground kind all the way from Quezon province, where they know the producer and they are sure it is pure and not diluted with additives or extenders.

Turmeric powder is available in the Cavite public market, but of course I have no way of knowing the extent of its purity, and even possibly its authenticity. I asked the vendor if it was okay to substitute with fresh ginger when using in arroz caldo, but I was told the taste would be affected.

Oh well, I can be stubborn, and I had to find out. So I used fresh turmeric, thinking a ginger is a ginger, and ginger is one of the main component tastes of arroz caldo. The more pronounced the taste of ginger, the better.

So I had a beautifully dyed arroz caldo, appetizingly pale yellow, but it had notes of curry. For the baby it was fine, since she probably does not remember well yet what arroz caldo should taste like, and she ate bowlfuls of it.

The two kids had difficulty finishing theirs. Even the other adults at home. A big pot of arroz caldo doesn’t last a day in the house, as it is eaten breakfast, lunch, afternoon snacks, dinner, and even after dinner. This one, though, lasted three days, with me eating more than half of it.

So I’m not using fresh ginger again. I’ll try the powder next time. Whatever it contains won’t probably hurt if I use just a pinch of it.

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Hot Soups
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Food For the Rainy Season
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Champurado
Ginataang Mais
Kineler
Milk Tea
Tsokolate

Becky's Brownies

cherry walnut brownies

I may have lambasted Becky's cakes in my previous post, but that doesn't diminish my love of and devotion to her brownies.

They are the softest brownie ever, full of good things one can ever dream of. A fruit and nut tandem, the cherry-walnut brownie is my favorite, for the contrasting combination of mushily mild acidity and crunch, enrobed by an almost pudding-like, chocolatey crumb.

Available in indiviually wrapped portions or hefty bars in a box, it is a heavyweight brownie. In the office we love to pair it with vanilla ice cream for a dreamily luxurious desert. No need for a shot of insulin - the brownie is lightly sweetened, just enough for the cherries to shine through.

It also goes nice with coffee or hot tea, which is apt for the current weather. It's divine, though, on its own, to better appreciate the silkiness of the crumb, and the contrasting flavors it is filled with.

Becky's Kitchen
1061 P. Ocampo corner Bautista Street, Manila
Tel. No. (632) 5251648, 5234245