Boracay is rated as one of the best beaches in the world. No where can you find fine powder white sand and calm waters so clear that you could still see your toes waist deep.

The island offers a wide range of choices for accommodations, restaurants, spa treatments, activities, diving and waters sports. The nightlife makes it such a great place to party! Boracay is fun because there is always something for everyone.

My Boracay Restaurant Guide

Perhaps one of the best places on the island is the Shangri-la Boracay Resort. True to the meaning of the word “Shangri-la”…this place is no imaginary utopia but an existing paradise with the five star works.

The Shangri-la’s Solana bar is a peaceful and secluded hideaway. The cabana arranged for us had a fantastic view of the beach. This was also the best spot to watch the sun disappear into the vast ocean. It was happy hour so we had free flowing Sangria and the bar nibbles kept on coming. Chef S even sent us some wonderful tapas. The place was so romantic! The sunset was perfect. It could have been a dreamy magical moment If only….

Anyway Boracay is known today as the best kite surfing destination in Asia. And after a swim there is nothing like lying on the beach while reading a book and drinking ice cold San Miguel beer!! C’est la vie !

The event was good for the economy of Pampanga. Hotels were fully booked, casinos busy, the restaurants in Clark and Angeles were overflowing with people.

Here are some recommendations for places to eat: Pampanga Restaurants .

We were up before dawn to get good photographs. As early as 5:00 am traffic on the road was beginning to build up. At the air field I was even surprised to see people in tents! The happy campers spent the night to get a good spot.

The balloons need cooler air temperatures in order to travel. For this reason they are set-up and fly out early in the mornings and return late in the afternoons. There were around 26 balloons from all over the world. My favorite was the massive cake balloon.

Sabang in Puerto Galera is world famous for its dive sites and  hardcore diving community. I was surprised to see the numerous dive resorts that have mushroomed over the years. From afar the town looks busy and is bustling with tourists.  Our boat cruises slowly to a floating restaurant and picks up two more divers. They hop on board, then we travel to the the Alma Jane wreck  dive site along Small Laguna Beach.

The Alma Jane wreck is a cargo vessel that was purposely sunk to create an artificial reef in 2003.  I have done quite a number of more challenging wrecks, this one is easy with plenty of sunlight and lots of space to maneuver.  Depth is 30 meters and there are a lot of big fishes like snappers and bat-fishes to see.

I was diving with five Germans and was the only Filipina on board.  Jan our dive master from Dolphin Bay resort was giving the briefing in Deutsch. I could not understand so he had to repeat the instructions for me.  I told the group “ After all  you are the tourists here and this is my country!” Then one of them  jokingly replied “No! We live in Puerto Galera and you are from Manila. So you are the tourist here!” I just had to laugh at the new locals

Sitting on the edge of the boat in our complete Scuba gear, we all did a synchronized  back-flip into the ocean. Splash!!! I could feel the adrenaline rush as I was deflating to go deep down with the others. Cancer is home.  Happiness in being back in the water!

How to get to Puerto Galera Mindoro:

Bus from Manila to Batangas: Take the JAM liner or Star Express bus at the corner of Taft and Buendia. Take the bus that goes directly to the Batangas Pier. Buses passing thru CALABARZON or Star Toll  to Batangas are much quicker and cut travel time to one and a half to two hours only.  I paid P166.00 or approximately less than 3 Euros.

If you want it hassle free take the tourist bus Sikat Ferry for P700 ( 11 euros)

Batangas Pier to Puerto Galera Mindoro: At Batangas Pier you can purchase a ferry ticket to Puerto Galera. Cost is P220. The port terminal fee is P30 and there is an environmental fee of P50. The total cost is P300 or  around 5 Euros. You need to choose your port of destination before buying a ticket.

Which port to go to in Puerto Galera???

White Beach – is the inexpensive version of Boracay because of its accessibility. The locals like to come here to enjoy the white sands and to party. During peak season the beach can get a bit crowded…it is alive and busy.

Sabang – is most popular for diving. The diving resorts are side by side each other.   Diving is very cheap and there are over 40 dive sites to choose from. The place is also notorious for the nightlife and exotic girlie bars.

Muelle – is an enchanting harbor filled with yachts and sail boats.  The wharf has a row of nice gourmet restaurants and most of the resorts are secluded and private.  This is where I I like to stay because it is away from the tourists and peddlers of White beach.

Tips on the boat/ ferry :

• It is better to take the boat in the morning. The last ferry leaves at 4:00 pm or sometimes 5:00 pm. I do suggest taking a bigger boat when traveling late in the afternoons because the crossing could get rough.
• Wrap all your electronics in plastic and wear your bathing suit already. If the waves are strong you could get drenched.
• Sit in the middle of the boat to avoid the splashes of the waves.
• Also never put your bag on the floor because it could get wet.
• Threaten to report to the coast guards if they overload the banca.

Getting around the island:  Tricycle, motor bike or jeepney

What to eat: The freshest and yummiest seafood! From tuna, blue marlin, crabs, prawns, and lobsters!!!  Lots of  cheap barbecue stalls in White Beach.The port of Muelle has a nice row of restaurants.

What to drink : Mindoro Sling – Tanduay rhum, mango juice, orange juice, and grenadine

Where to stay: There are so many resorts to choose from: Dive resorts

Where I stayed :    Encenada beach has a  nice and quiet private cove. Rooms are very basic but the resort has that old rustic tropical feel. The food is good. Anyway divers like me skimp on the room but splurge on the dive.

Encenada Beach Resort

Luckily our country has been visited by some of these famous chefs. And here are some  celebrity chef sightings in the Philippines :

Alumna Michelle Ong with Anthony Bourdain during the filming of No Reservations Philippines

Chef Winnie Wong with Bobby Chinn

With Pastry Chef Anna Olson and Chef Mae Montalban

AFC’s Adrian Richardson visits us in class

Our students assist Chef Martin Yan

AFC’s Licence to Grill Chef Robert Rainford with Chef JP Landingin, Chef Mae Montalban, and Chef Joanne Trias

Chef Kristine Pascua Perez with her idol Ming Tsai

Sugar king Ewald Notter with Philippine sugar queen Chef Peachy Juban

AFC’s “The Boss” and the Philippine’s pride Chef Bruce Lim

The team with the woman and the legend who taught Filipinos how to cook Ms. Nora Daza

We appreciate Asian Food Channel for bringing in and giving our chef instructors and students the opportunity to work with some of their stars.

We are  also grateful for celebrity chefs who have uplifted the culinary industry by sharing their talents through television, books and other forms of media. They have influenced many young people to becoming aspiring chefs.

I just want to remind our students that the life of a celebrity chef is completely different from that of a line chef. Our showbiz chefs will agree with me that the  kitchen is not a glamor job and you will need a lot of passion and dedication to make it in this industry.

some photos from CHIP

12. I resolve to  give a 100% instead of my normal 110%
13. I resolve to smile more and remember names
14. I resolve to call my family abroad more often
15. I resolve to take time to make “small talk” with people of all walks of life
16. I resolve to always give my loved ones a kiss before parting
17. I resolve to date because discovering friends is fun
18. I resolve to spend less in fancy restaurants and cook more for others
19.  I resolve to take more time to  meditate, pray, or simply be
20. I resolve to love ALL my students, the good and bad all deserve a chance

During the Spanish time Simbang Gabi masses were celebrated very early in the morning so that the farmers could work on the land by sunrise.  Laborers needed strength to toil the fields and this is probably the reason why Filipino breakfast is heavy. A typical  meal would consist of  cured meat or dried fish served with fried rice and eggs.

In some churches today you will find a different kind of laborer…. They are the modern generation of outsourced young professionals and call center agents. They sleep during the day and are up at night.  They need to be awake during ungodly hours to work the timezones of different parts of the world. Unlike vampires however they can be found in church to attend the Christmas masses. They are also hungry and would like to eat a hearty meal after their shift.

Perhaps the best part following Simbang Gabi is the communal sharing of breakfast.  Traditional  Christmas food would be:

Bibingka – rice cakes topped with red eggs, grated coconut and cheese. They are cooked with charcoal in clay pots lined with banana leaves.

Puto bumbong – is purple rice cooked in a bamboo steamer. It is served wrapped in banana leaves topped with margarine, muscavado sugar and grated coconut.

Arroz caldo – Filipino rice porridge with boiled egg, garlic and spring onions. It is seasoned with fish sauce and calamansi.

In my younger days I had the energy to wake up so early. I would even walk to church to complete the nine day novena. Today the cold December breeze makes me want to stay in bed. I just hope after my alarm rings I won’t “snooze” too long and end up falling back to sleep.

Pictures by Gloria Salas

Sad to say there is no road etiquette when it comes to driving in this big city. It is “every man for himself” against fast bullying buses, inconsiderate jeepney drivers  loading and unloading passengers in the middle of the road, cabs that just cut you, undisciplined motorcycle drivers approaching from the blind side, and slow-moving tricycles or pedicabs (Filipino rickshaw) who like to occupy the fast lane.

To make matters worse a little down pour of rain can result to instant flooding and vehicular accidents can also cause hours of traffic jam.

There is just so much time wasted being stuck in travel. During a standstill I have found ways to be productive inside the car like learn a foreign language thru audio, play Angry Birds to de-stress, put on make-up on the move, eat, enjoy take-out coffee, and in the silence of the car meditate and pray to keep me sane.

During a major stoplight I notice there will always be beggars approaching. They may be blind, old, disabled, women with little babies and street children asking for alms.  Two knocks from the window means “no” and they go away.

Then there are also enterprising pinoys literally selling anything under the sun. Like the sampaguita (flower necklace strands) vendors and the “takatak” boys making clunking noises with their wooden boxes selling cigarettes.  Street hawkers of every kind peddling to vehicles products like rags, fruits, cold drinks and food. Street food in a funny way is the Filipino version of drive thru and  so you will never starve on the road.  Just honk and they will come running to you.

Sometimes annoying little kids with squeegees clean the windshield without even asking permission for a few coins.  I want to get mad but this is the harsh reality of poverty in the Philippines.  Often times I wish I wouldn’t be bothered but the sad truth is any money made in the streets will be food on the table for the family that day.

Sometimes in a bumper to bumper situation I like to ponder… Random thoughts like for those of us in the comforts of our air-conditioned automobiles having been blessed with more…. Do we keep our windows up and our car doors locked because we think it is not safe outside or is it because we choose to shut out the suffering of the poor around us?  Do we ignore beggars and street vendors because they are social nuisances or are we unable to look at them in the eye for the reason that we have become apathetic to their plight?

Perhaps being in traffic is an opportunity to do something good.  We can be generous with simple things like giving excess food from a Christmas party to help feed those living in the streets with nothing to eat. We can always reach out to the less fortunate.… all it takes is to roll down that car window to open our hearts and do a random act of kindness.

It is always a pleasure to meet chefs from other parts of the world. They are very curious about our food in as much as we want to learn more about their style of cooking. We made our visitors try our Filipino cuisine lesson which was pomelo salad, sinigang (tamarind based sour soup),  shrimp in coconut milk, grilled tuna, and other southern island dishes. The flavors were quite new to them and Luigi loved the sinigang. It  was funny how our foreign guests would make a big deal and take photos of rice wrapped in banana leaves, coconut juice served from the husk, and even go crazy over the succulence of our Philippine mangoes.

I told Ciro his amazement over our tropical fruits is likened to the feeling I get when I see a parking meter in Europe.  He gave me a puzzled look….We don’t have parking meters in the Philippines so it is a big thing for us. I go crazy and have my picture taken with a parking meter the same way Europeans cherish our mangoes.

( Huh?!? If you’re reading this and didn’t get the part about parking meters then you’re probably not from my country ! )

Anyway over the days Chef Ciro turned out to be a remarkable pastry chef as he generously shared his baking techniques and recipes to the students. Like  most pastry chefs he was patient, precise and

a perfectionist. He is over six feet in height and was too tall for the  demo room range hood. He also found the working counters too low.  Sorry they were made for little brown men and so I suggested we cut his feet off instead. Hehe! Initially he found the oven, weather and humidity in our tropical country quite a challenge. He was so worried about the fermentation of his panetonne (Italian Christmas cake) which I didn’t realize took days.  The bianco mangarie (Sicilian white pudding) had a difficult time setting because the climate was just too hot. In the end however he produce a beautiful array of delicious  pastries like panna cotta, “real” tiramisu, baba (soaked in limoncello – my favorite!), paradiso, amaretti, nougat, different kinds of brioche, and even made pastiera from his hometown Napoli.  He culminated his stay with a wonderful dessert buffet. Bravo!!

Thank you Ciro for sharing your talents with us and Luigi for always coming back to visit. Ciao and until next time!

If you are interested in further baking classes in Italy check CASTalimenti.it

This week we took over 200 hundred students to dine and sample their buffet. After their very long lunch they had a Filipino cooking demonstration  at the refurbished Constellations kitchen theater at the Sky Lounge.  Well respected Filipino master and executive chef Mel Taylo conducted the event.  He was assisted by his staff  and our alumnus chef Dekker Gokioco. They presented to us their winning entries which were modern  interpretations of kare-kare (ox tail peanut stew), chicken binakol (chicken in coconut juice soup) , and biko(sticky rice) with langka (jackfruit).

photos by Neil Jericho Ong

There are fourteen Japanese WWII shipwrecks  in close proximity found in Coron. Wreck diving is a challenge and always an adventure. Exploring the ship’s dark cabins and narrow passageways always give me an adrenaline rush. I did five dives for this trip. The first day was penetrating the wrecks of Kogyo Maru (29m), Tangat (30m), and  Lake Barracuda (29m) with  Danish Pasi and Dutch boys Ben van den Brink & Sebas.  Day two was Irako (40m) and my favorite the Olymplia Maru (25m). This time the group was composed of Isaac the Spaniard, Daniel the noisy Swede, and the Belgians….I did only two because of the no diving before flying rule.

Lake Barracuda is called such because of a lonesome barracuda trapped inside the volcanic crater that has now become a blue lagoon. This is my third time to visit the lake and only

my first time to get a glimpse of the barracuda. It is always hiding so they say seeing the fish brings you LUCK. And that is exactly what happened….it became a very lucky trip for me!!!

My second day diving we went to Irako the deepest wreck.  It is a 40 meter dive so at first I wasn’t sure if I wanted to do it.  My favorite pinoy diver master Jaime always takes good care of me and told me I would be okay.  He can sense my fear and knows how to give me a boost of confidence whenever needed underwater. So I did a line descent with a Belgian lady named Dora. I love maneuvering in the  dark and confined passageways inside the wreck but my buddy was a little afraid.  I was bit bummed that we had to go out of the ship while the rest of the group stayed inside.

Anyway Jaime was keeping a watchful eye on us girls when suddenly I saw a seven meter long whale shark slowly cruising by. I could not believe my eyes!!!! Jaime was looking at us and had his back turned. The huge creature was literally behind and dwarfing him. Jaime was oblivious to the whale shark’s presence and I was in shock!!! I was sooo excited that I swam, grabbed and shook him to turn around. He gasped upon seeing the animal !!! He immediately made an alarm by beating his tank with a stick. The other divers came out of the wreck and were astonished to see the creature. We chased the gentle giant and swam with it. The curious and friendly whale shark even circled us three times.  What an experience!!!

Whale sharks are an extremely rare sighting in Palawan. So I was very fortunate it came my way!! It was such a moment that I almost cried.  I wish the Dutch boys saw it too.  It is not everyday that something amazing and unexpected like this can happen…Maybe the Barracuda really brings luck. I can not describe the euphoria but this is probably one of the most unforgettable experiences in my life. My best dive ever!