My Guide To Unbelievable Seafood

The Philippines is a country of over 7,000 islands, so it makes sense that it has a lot of fantastic seafood. My culinary guide to the Philippines was Bobby Rufino. Bobby was a true gourmand and when it came to restaurants in Manila, he was an expert.

The tradition in the Philippines is that when a Filipino returns to Manila, a crowd of family and friends meets them at the airport. In 1985, I was living in the San Francisco Bay area when I first travelled to the Philippines. I thought that there couldn’t be any Filipinos left in the Philippines because so many lived in Daly City California. Consequently, I was shocked when I came through customs and was greeted by a huge crowd. They had grandstands set up to accommodate what seemed like thousands of people. A devious Bobby Rufino, had hired two beautiful girls to greet my travelling companion Vince Cuile with flower lei. When the girls approached Vince, The crowd starting chanting: “Give her a kiss, Give her a kiss”. I can still see Bobby Rufino watching the scene unfold and laughing his devious laugh. Bobby’s laugh has always reminded me of the cartoon character Muttley. That first experience was the first of the many laughs I shared with my friend Bobby.

Click to hear Muttley’s imitation of Bobby’s laugh

Bobby introduced me to the Philippines culinary world. Early on, he took me to a Chinese restaurant. He explained to me that in the Philippines, you could get Chinese-Chinese food. Not the American-Chinese food we get in the states. Chinese-Chinese food is fantastic and so different from what we know in the States. Sushi is also great in Manila. I can remember enjoying Nigiri (Raw fish) in a Makati restaurant and Bobby casually asking me: “You have had your hepatitis shots, haven’t you?” As you can imagine, that took some of the enjoyment out of that meal because, while the Chinese food is different in the Philippines, so is the bacteria and it can be dangerous. I got hepatitis shots before my next trip.

Where Bobby’s expertise came to the forefront was at seafood restaurants. The Philippines is famous for restaurants that offer a wide array of live fish ( in tanks), amazingly fresh fish on ice and a cornucopia of fresh produce. You roll through the market side with a shopping cart selecting what you want, then bringing it to your personal cook who prepares your fish to order. Picture this, a diminutive clerk wrestling a 3 pound spiny lobster that you selected. I actually worried that the poor guy would lose the wrestling match and fall into the tank. Bobby would pick out a variety of fish and other ingredients and then direct the cook. I can still remember a marlin in black bean sauce, a grilled lobster with a toasted garlic butter and a crab dish with lobster sauce. The combination of fresh ingredients, great cooks and Bobby’s masterful instruction was magical.

Click here to take a video tour of a seafood restaurant like Bobby’s favorites

Bobby was an amazing guy. He is one of those people that would not respond immediately to a question. He would pause to think, and then explain with insightful logic. In the late 1980’s during the coup that ended the Marcos era, Bobby lived off of Makati Avenue a main thoroughfare in Manila. One night he called telling me that the night before he woke up to a rat-tat-tat noise. He thought his air condition was on the blink. Come to find out that it was machine gun fire from tanks in the military coup. I pleaded with Bobby to leave Manila and get to the safety of the housing compound at our San Pablo plant 60 miles away. Bobby said not to worry, the tanks are firing in the opposite direction and that his wife didn’t want to leave Manila. The next morning he left for San Pablo.

Another time, Bobby was in the hospital recovering from a heart attack during one of my visits. In his hospital bed, Bobby penned out lengthy instructions for that night’s meal at the seafood restaurant. He detailed what to buy and how to have it cooked. The meal was great, but it wasn’t the same without Bobby.

When Bobby came to the States, it was all about the beef. Bobby had lived in Texas for a few years early in his career and he had a passion for his red meat. For Bobby, the seafood was great in the Philippines, but when he came to the U.S. he loved his steak. I once took him to Smith and Wollensky’s in Manhattan and then to see the play Phantom of the Opera on Broadway. We had seats up near the Orchestra and when the Phantom threw the flames in the final scene, a jet lagged, well fed and startled Bobby, literally jumped into my lap. Machine gun fire didn’t phase him, but the combination of steak and the Phantom got to him.

Bobby was my guide to the Manila Culinary world and many life lessons. He is no longer with us, but the memories of him live with many. If you ever get to the Philippines, enjoy the seafood.

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Note: The featured photo is of Bobby in 1985 with my daughter Jennifer, then 14 months old. Below is a recent picture of Jenn with her boys Max (5) and Dylan (2) at a maple syrup sugar shack near Ottawa Canada

Gougères With Ham, Cheese And Prosciutto

It is great to have an appetizer that you know will be a winner. Our neighborhood wine club has turned into a “Bring An Appetizer” competition. A Gougère that combines all the food groups: cheese, ham, butter, eggs, flour and milk is guaranteed to delight your friends.

I have been a fan of Gougères for years. We had them at a party and I got the recipe from the cook. When I first made it, the result wasn’t up to expectations. Some time later, I saw a recipe for Gougères in Rosso’s and Lukins’s Silver Palate Cookbook and realized that the cook who gave me the recipe, had left out the egg-wash step. It is amazing what the addition of an egg wash does to the flavor and texture profile. I am not saying that the person who gave me the recipe left it out on purpose but…

Gougères are a French Cheese Puffs. The basic concept has been around for hundreds of years and exists in many of the world’s cuisines. Working with Kraft in international markets, we quite often would offer cheese solutions to manufacturers of similar products. We probably made our customers mad by telling them the old Kraft advertising tag line of: How does America spell cheese: K-R-A-F-T! One of my favorites cheese puffs was the Brazilian Pao de Queijo. Brazil was a tough place to do business. Somehow using American cheese science in a French application to make a Brazilian staple got lost on the Brazilian market. Either we were stupid or just ahead of our time.

One of the things I love about Gougères is how adaptable they are. For our wine club last week I added a ham and cheese layer and then sprinkled prosciutto on top before baking. The resulting product disappeared in the flash. You know you have a winner when your appetizer is the first to go.

There are several ways to make Gougères:

As a ring on a baking sheet
Dropped like cookies on a baking sheet
Baked in a mini-muffin mold
Baked in cup cake molds

My current favorite is the cup cake mold. It adds definition to the cheese puff and works really well with additions.

Above: The Gougères Mise En Place

INGREDIENTS

1 stick unsalted butter
¼ cup shallots, finely minced (Optional)
1 cup milk
1 cup all purpose flour
5 eggs (4 for the batter and one for an egg-wash)
2 cups Parmesan Cheese (blends of Parmesan and Romano or Parmesan and Swiss also work well)
Pam cooking spray or a tablespoon of butter to grease the baking mold or sheet
3 slices of prosciutto cut into thin strips for topping
5 slices of ham cut into 24 1.5 inch squares
5 slices of Swiss cheese cut into 24 1.5 inch squares
1 teaspoon kosher salt

INSTRUCTIONS

Preheat oven to 400°.
In a medium sized pot, melt the butter.
Add shallots and sauté under low heat until the shallots become translucent (4 minutes).
Add milk and bring to a boil.
Take the pot off of the heat. Add flour and stir vigorously with a wooden spoon until flour and butter are combined.
Add four of the eggs, one at a time, stirring each with the wooden spoon until all four are incorporated.
Add 1 cup of Parmesan cheese and salt. Fold together into the dough.
Spray a non-stick mold or baking sheet with Pam or grease with butter
Place dough in a plastic bag and snip off a small corner of the bag. Then deposit a table spoon of batter into each muffin cup. Use a small brush to even out the batter in the bottom of the mold
Place a slice each of ham and cheese on top of the batter
Add another tablespoon of batter on top.
Using your small brush smooth out the top layer of batter
Scramble the remaining egg in a separate bowl. Brush each section with the egg-wash.
Sprinkle on the remaining Parmesan cheese and prosciutto as a topping.
Place in oven and bake for 25 minutes or until the puffs are a deep golden brown.
Remove puffs from the cupcake mold and serve.

Note: You can make these an hour in advance. Remove them from the cup cake mold, place on a ban and reheat in a 350° oven for 5 minutes. They are even great the next morning just heated in the microwave.

Give this recipe a try for a guaranteed winner!

Great Traditions Can Be A Great Excuse For A Party

We have started a tradition of buying very big (3 liter) bottles of Joseph Phelps vines for each of our grandchildren. We buy it in the vintage of their birth year and the plan is to have a party to celebrate their 16^thbirthday.

Actually, my buddy Tom Julian started the tradition. Our daughter Jennifer was born in California in 1984. Tom came out to visit and we went to the Napa valley as part of his visit. The Phelps vineyard has always been one of our favorites. It is in a little sub-valley in the Napa valley and it produces some excellent wines. Tom bought Jennifer a 3 liter bottle and we enjoyed it at a wonderful party in 2000.

Originally, we had planned on having it to celebrate her 18^thbirthday, but we got a little nervous about how well the wine would age. We kept it in the basement of Tom’s old house in Rye NY on Onondaga street. His basement was the perfect place to store wine. Fortunately, the wine held up very well. When we first opened it we were nervous. Older wines will change color slightly. This wine had a reddish tint versus the deep purple of newer wines. The taste of the wine was good at the start and as the evening progressed, it got better and better. Funny how that works…

(Tom Julian, Jennifer, Paul and Susan Kenny getting ready to open a 16 year old bottle of Phelps Cabernet in 2000)

Right now I have 3 liter bottles of Joseph Phelps Cabernet marking the 2013 and 2014 vintages. These bottles mark the birth years of our grandson Max and granddaughter Emma. Recently we ordered futures for a bottle of the 2017 vintage to commemorate the birth year of our grandson Dylan. Next year I will order a bottle from the 2018 vintage for our grandson Declan. With another grandchild due in July of 2019, this tradition will lead to some fantastic wine and great excuses for a succession of parties.

The good news as that I have parlayed the collection of large bottles into an excuse to buy a wine cellar. In Memphis we don’t have the luxury of cellars. My wine cellar is actually a large refrigerator. How large? All I can say is that when the truck delivered it on a pallet, it was too large to fit in our garage. With the help of my son Brian we were able to wrestle it into the house and our collection of large bottles of Phelps wines is aging comfortably. The tradition was a great excuse to buy the wine cellar. Lord knows that my wife Susan wouldn’t have let me buy it otherwise.

Again, there is nothing like a good excuse!

Note: The featured image pictures our then 3 year old granddaughter Emma with her 3 liter bottle of Phelps Cabernet