Almost always referred to as “local saffron”, kasubha is almost certainly NEITHER. Kasubha (carthamus tinctorius) is used mainly to color dishes and it is accompanied by an ever so slight flavor/fragrance that is almost irrelevant, depending on its use. Personally, I like it when a restaurant brings a dish with a pile of pale acharra, a sign that it is made relatively fresh and without artificial coloring. I don’t cook my acharra, FYI. But the fact remains that 90+% of diners prefer or are bamboozled by color (hence the popularity of yellow rice that is mostly made with food coloring rather than turmeric, or pile on the most outrageously icky vegetable oil as long as it is colored with achuete) so they think a pale acharra isn’t a good acharra. Go figure.

We make tonnes of acharra every month. And since we started our restaurant, we have used kasubha to help naturally color our papaya pickles and formerly to add color to our arroz caldo. I always assumed it was a locally sourced ingredient (as you would think most tinapang galunggong is locally caught, but it’s not…) and I had visions of helping local folks who raised safflowers and dried the flowers and sold them seasonally, hence they often disappeared from market shelves at certain times of the year. Banish the thought. BANISH IT. These are most likely imported, possibly from China, maybe as far as India or Kazakstan, for all I know. At any rate, old habits and recipes die hard, so we still need to keep the ingredient in stock. The last time I found it in bulk, I bought enough to last over a year (storing it vacuum packed containers in the freezer). And that stockpile was running low. So I headed to Divisoria the other day and visited a spice store I first discovered over 20 years ago. I forgot about it until a reader (OB Kwin) mentioned it a few posts back, so I am doing this post for the odd reader or two who MUST have kasubha and just can’t find it in their neighborhood grocery or market.

RGSL Grocery is located at 809 Sto. Cristo St., Binondo, Manila 1006. Telephone number is 242-6247 or 241-3319. Kasubha was PHP1,000 a kilo the other day, a relative bargain, I have had to pay up to PHP2,000 per kilo for this retail or semi-retail. We bought several kilos that should be good for another 6 months or so. We got to the store just as they were opening, so I didn’t see much of their other spice offerings, but they did have Chinese dried chili flakes, peppercorns, etc.

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The market seemed unusually clean, almost antiseptic. It’s odd that I would find that a bit discombobulating, but I did. There we were, in the middle of downtown Yiwu, China, some 4.5 hours southwest of Shanghai, in a town that was essentially one massive wholesale market, and here we were in this gleaming, odorless, sterile market with some of the most amazing looking produce on offer. But it didn’t seem right.

Probably some government initiative to set up a very orderly clean market space, but I was pleasantly surprised, having just come from a chaotic street market just steps away…

Square islands with display counters all around them were rented out to vendors who stayed inside the square. Up top, a wonderful selection of chilies and spices…

…preserved and/or pickled vegetables, various kinds of seaweed, etc.

More preserved or pickled vegetable concoctions.

I’m not even sure what these are, but they looked like young shoots of particularly thin bamboo, but I could be wrong on this.

Lotus root.

Various greens that just looked too pristine. Isn’t it odd that I find that unusual to have near perfect greens in the middle of China?

Again, I wasn’t sure what these were, but something mustardy popped into my mind. No one seemed to speak any English, and my chinese is limited to 3-4 words, so I wouldn’t really know for sure.

Overall, a pleasant 10 minute walk through this market but I would have been a lot happier and knowledgeable if I had had a guide or someone who could translate with me…

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My mother visited Fernando Amorsolo’s atelier in Malate several times during the 1950’s and 60’s. She was often tasked with touring foreign female spouses who were visiting or had been recently transferred to Manila, their husbands were either business colleagues of my Dad, or members of the diplomatic core. Mom would later express some wistful regret that she never purchased any of Amorsolo’s paintings from what turned out to be near the zenith of his career. His paintings were, even then, a bit more than her budget would have allowed, and my dad wasn’t interested in art at all. Instead, several of her guests had purchased paintings, impressed with the bucolic scenes, vibrant use of color and the masterful use of “light”… They also probably thought it was rather PC to have a local painting hanging in their expat home. Today, their heirs (in all parts of North America) are probably pleasantly surprised (if not shocked) that the native scenes with mangoes, riverside maidens and carabaos are easily worth a small house in a rural American town. I happen to like many of Amorsolo’s pieces from the 1950’s and I suppose I was channeling Amorsolo during our recent visit to the Catmon hills….

One of the reasons we headed to hills was to hunt down kabog or millet. But I figured we would kill two birds with one stone and also check on the “backyard pig suppliers” that represent the backbone of Zubuchon’s business. One of our scouts is based in this area, and she is responsible for consolidating pigs that are brought down to Cebu by truck. We pay a premium for “backyard raised pigs” but I sometimes think a few of our suppliers are either intentionally or unintentionally supplying us with some pigs that are raised in more piggery/pen style conditions.

So off to the hills we go. Amidst beautiful countryside settings, verdant from weeks of early rains in Cebu, an Amorsolo-esque scene greeted us at nearly every turn on the twisting hillside roads and paths. Nearest the main road, a pile of traditionally made charcoal was being assembled for us, and we in turn give business to several dozen makers of charcoal in this area. They don’t clear cut healthy trees for this, rather they forage fallen branches and trim some trees. It’s not the most environmentally sound fuel source, but it is traditional, it is made as it’s been made for centuries, and it provides income directly to those who make it, with few middlemen involved.

We found several pig raisers who had 6, 8 or 10 pigs in their backyards, literally, and that was just amazing to see. A simple bahay kubo or cement home, and nearby was their equivalent of a bank account of say PHP20-30,000 worth of pigs. When the pigs reach the right size, they are brought to our scout and transported to Cebu. These pigs are not strictly “organic” and we have never claimed them to be so. They are fed a combination of natural and pellet style food, but more importantly, have more room to roam, play in the mud, and live a more “natural” life before we unfortunately or fortunately, roast them to a crisp.

I was so happy so see most of the pigs eventually headed to Zubuchon were indeed in real “rural settings” and generally happy (or as happy as a fattened pig is that he will soon come to meet his maker). But more importantly, it was nice to see the REAL effect of our strong corporate belief that the way we source our ingredients has a direct impact on our community and environment. Here you could see that the community made money from their pigs, from raising corn and kabog, making charcoal in the off-season, and it was not high populated at all with only a few homes scattered here and there, and everyone looking healthier than city folk…

Some of the pigs were untethered, while most had a leash (residents said it wasn’t a joke to go hunt them down an hour after they decided to wander off). They always seemed to have a shady spot (they sunburn easily) and again, I thought they looked pretty darned happy and lively. Even when penned up, they were in bamboo staked pens, often on dirt (they like mud) and covered with a nipa roof or tarp so that they could remain cool. When do I get curious about the particular source of a particular pig? Commercial piggery raised pigs often have more fat, their meat is incredibly pale or white almost, and there is less muscle build up. And if you are buying lechon de leche in Manila, the vast majority of them are neither true lechon de leches nor locally sourced (they are imported from places like Vietnam frozen)…

Some 98% of our restaurant clients probably don’t realize the difference between going out of your way to find pigs raised like this, versus the pigs raised in commercial piggeries in tight cement quarters. But we do. And increasingly, I hope they (the customers) do as well. This is direct flow down to the grassroots, not trickle down through a large corporation. This is knowing the hundreds of people you end up helping out, and just as you are dependent on them, they are likewise reliant on us. It isn’t about the 250+ people we directly employ, it is about the thousands of people we indirectly impact through purchasing policies for our basic ingredients and materials such as charcoal, wood, pigs, vegetables, grains, etc. I was really smiling widely by the end of the visit to the Catmon hills the other day. But also apprehensive that there is a finite amount of pigs sourced this way, and I dread the day we run out of supply. But this setting in Catmon just all seemed right. So right.

And that Amorsolo moment? Around an hour into the hills, we turned around a steep bend, and this vision of green on my right made us abruptly stop the car and get out. Bamboo trees, verdant plant growth, nice morning light. A male barako or stud in his Presidential “suite” where he serviced the neighborhood maidens and ladies. Nearby were some females and their piglets in deluxe nipa accommodations. If Fernando Amorsolo were still around, I am sure he would have been happy to paint this scene in his unmistakable style. And I would be willing to pay a minor ransom for that painting, and I suspect, my mom from her perch wherever, would smile with amused approval. :)

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I don’t think I have ever come across freshly made buckwheat noodles before. The only posts I have on soba are here (worth going back to to read the comments, they are vintage marketmanila.com reader banter that often adds more to the discussion than the original post) or here. I assumed buckwheat was a type of wheat, but I was wrong. It turns out it’s actually “a fruit seed that’s related to rhubarb and sorrel” according to this site and it goes on to talk about how darned healthy it is.

I have always liked soba noodles and now that I know how healthy they are, I really should eat more of them! But coming across (first) this beautiful basket above filled with balls of fresh buckwheat and later in the market these incredibly long and beautiful looking noodles was a real treat and revelation.

It seems the noodles are a dark brown when relatively freshly made, and still damp. As they dry out, they turn a lighter color, such as these in the basin. Apparently preparing and eating wet vs. grocery dry buckwheat are experiences that are world’s apart, but I’m not sure how, since I didn’t get a chance to have them this fresh anywhere we ate, or at least I wasn’t aware of it. Btw, noodles are a BIG deal in this part of china, because rice doesn’t grow abundantly in these parts… They have lots of winter wheat, hence the abundance of heavy dumplings and other noodles, rather than rice.

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Our wonderful guide Ruixi had been previously advised that Marketman was big on markets, so she made sure that a market was on our itinerary that day. After the fried pancake and hearty bowl of lamb meatball soup, we needed a short break from the eating. The market in the Muslim quarter was bustling, and we only managed to see a small fraction of it, but it was totally worth the trip. As soon as we got out of our tuktuk, we were greeted with this abundance of freshly picked strawberries. Wow!

Dried lotus seeds…

…goji berries…

…black raisins still with their stems…

…green or golden raisins (a personal favorite, so I bought a kilo’s worth) sourced straight from the farms…

…oddly shaped nectarines…

…mulberries, or I think they are mulberries…

…dressing a chicken (why do they say that, when Undressing the chicken is probably more descriptive) or is it a pigeon?…

…lotus roots…

…various green chilies…

…fresh water chestnuts…

…the most incredibly intense red dried chilies I have seen in a while…

…and crushed or ground as you pleased…

…sichuan peppercorns and star anise…

…seeds of all kinds, melon, squash, etc.

I can’t remember what these were, but if I had to guess, seaweed of some sort.

Tons and tons of apples. One forgets when you are conditioned as a child that all red apples are from Washington state, that they probably grow more apples in China than anywhere else on the planet. In fact, China grows nearly half of all the apples commercially sold on the planet, or a whopping 8x the apples grown in the U.S.!

And finally, walnuts and dates. If we weren’t headed to another city and we weren’t so limited by minimal luggage allowance, I would have filled a box with things we saw that day. More market finds in the next few posts…

The post To Market, To Market, in Xian, China appeared first on Market Manila.

We have been in New York for the past week, and we’ve noticed that retail is not doing particularly well on this coast at least. The increased propensity to shop on-line is the death knell of bricks and mortar shops. Perhaps flagship stores like Macy’s and Saks need one or two showcase locations, but ultimately, much of their sales may be coming through on-line orders. At any rate, there is a sluggishness to retail here (and lots of recent shop closures), and I don’t know if it’s just me, but the merchandise all seems to look the same, despite the store. And there is a notable absence of edible goodies in large department stores, lightyears away from the London experience at about this exact time. These photos of our visit to London are a year old, but I have no doubt shops in London are teeming with holiday goodies, prominently displayed on the first floor, just about now…

Peeled chestnuts, fresh walnuts, clementines and fruit are just some of the goodies in the Harrod’s food hall. What follows is a jumble of photos, all of them from the same food hall on our first night in the city after arriving from Paris. I am always in awe at the holiday packaging, the bright tins, the beautiful hampers, packaged boxes, etc. in London and the U.K. You just want to buy everything in sight. I realize it’s mostly packaging, but boy is it attractive packaging…

Chocolates and fruit pastilles…

Figs, kumquats and passion fruit along with quince and other more typical fruit. The variety in one place was just stunning.

Flowers.

Teas.

Stilton, some of them in ceramic jars…

…and a cheese selection that would make a cheese lover’s mouth water.

Ready to eat pies and scotch eggs…

…still more chocolate…

…and just a fraction of the tinned biscuits, fruitcakes and candy on offer in a maze of distractions filled with locals and tourists alike (more of the latter apparently). It was like a disneyland for food lovers.

Another display of chocolate…

…and beautiful strawberries dipped in three kinds of chocolate!

Caviar of all types.

Festive tins of goodies…

…and more tins in that classic Harrods olive green color.

Candy canes.

Biscuits.

Dried fruit.

A selection of plump dates.

And they even made the ginormous shallots look wonderful. The food hall takes up a huge portion of the first floor of Harrods, and judging by the shopping bags people were filling, they must do a phenomenal business in that space. I know of no equivalent at a New York department store that comes even close to this…

The post Harrods Food Hall for the Holidays… appeared first on Market Manila.

A few weeks after we returned from our South African Safari mid-2014, I was speaking with Gejo Jimenez of Malipayon Farms when he dropped by to make a delivery of greens, and I mentioned that I had noticed so many pea shoots used as a garnish on snazzy dishes in Cape Town. I asked why we didn’t have it as it must be pretty easy to grow, and he promised to look into it. Tom Yao are another stage of pea sprouts as well, but much “younger” and they are on offer in several groceries, so a few days older version couldn’t be so complicated…

…so fast forward a few months and Gejo dropped by the house again, this time bearing some of his first few pea tendrils, lovingly grown from very expensive peas. They were fantastic, redolent with the flavor of peas, just a bit stronger than those grown in cooler climates. I was amazed and just tickled pink to have them just fresh off the farm. I immediately asked him if I could write about them, but he asked that I defer until he had a steady crop, so he might have a headstart on competitors and be the first to offer it to his restaurant clients. I agreed, then promptly forgot to ever do the post.

But if you had sharp eyes, you might have caught the pea tenrils on this appetizer plate I put out last Christmas, with bone marrow, tripe and oxtail marmalade. A guest or two commented on the pea tendril salad, and I just smiled and said I had a “special source”… so competitive, these dinners. I am KIDDING. I had made Gejo promise to supply me with pea tendrils for the holiday dinners, in exchange for raising the idea with him. But I paid for this order.

The next day, for a chef’s nibble (SANDWICH) I put lots of leftover crabmeat with mayo onto a section of french bread and topped it generously with the pea tendrils. It was delicious. But what was really amazing is that an idea just months before, taken up and run with by Gejo, had yielded a bit more choice in the local produce scene. I have since spotted the tendrils in various restaurants in Manila and send Mrs. MM knowing looks about the likely source… Thanks Gejo for growing this stuff, and if I find anything else that is of interest, I will let you know!

This kind of collaboration is something that makes maintaining this blog so incredibly rewarding. And it is not necessarily “commercial free”. Gejo sells this stuff now, but I was pleased to help bring the idea to market in my little way, without any gain intended. And it’s my pleasure to inadvertently make the blog a venue for restaurateurs to discover the produce so he can grow more and sell more. You cannot imagine how many purchasers for restaurants, hotels, airlines, etc. contact me per month with the most (often) ridiculous requests, I now ignore most of the idiotic ones, but help others when I can. Several chefs have also mentioned they find new stuff on the “pages” of this blog, so I am happy to be medium…

The more I see what different folks “in the know” put on their blogs, or more recently, instagram accounts, which I discovered late, the more I realize so many recommendations or “mentions” are tainted with a commercial aspect that is possibly unsavory. No one mentions if they were paid to mention an item, or if it was given or eaten for free, etc. As a good discerning friend said to us lately about a peer, “have you seen xxxxx’s blog/instagram account, has he/she sold out or what? It’s so blatantly filled with xxxxx…” Once you sell out, it’s almost impossible to back pedal. Impossible. :(

The post Helping to Bring Something “New” to Market… Pea Tendrils! appeared first on Market Manila.

If you bake a lot, curious about all things ingredient wise, just like food shops or are into sweets, this is one shop you SHOULD NOT MISS when in Paris. G. Detou is relatively small, but chock-full of the finest stuff you can imagine. From blocks of varying qualities and intensities of chocolate, to nuts, marron glaces, sanding sugars, etc. it is a FABULOUS store to visit.

Unfortunately, it’s so small and so crammed with people that I was too embarrassed to take photos inside the shop. But trust me when I say you MUST VISIT G. DETOU at least once in your lifetime. You may be surprised how small the place is, but size isn’t everything and what they do have is everything you want to buy and put in your own pantry. I could have filled several balikbayan boxes at this shop in less than an hour, but alas, I bought just a few items to take home in our luggage.

And prices here are just a FRACTION of those elsewhere in Paris, so it’s easy to go overboard. But enough of my raving about it, for better posts on the shop, visit David Leibovitz’ s 8 year old post and C&Z’s 12 year old post for more details. Believe me, in 2015, the shop is as good as ever.

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If you told me ANY patisserie and caterer had managed to last 285 years in the same storefront, I would have guessed you were bluffing. Seriously, this place has been selling nibbles of the most royal kind since 1730 on this same street in Paris! Yowks! That’s really amazing. Really amazing. Stohrer has photos of Queen Elizabeth II who paid them a visit several years ago, probably one of the few upscale foodshops she has ever popped into on trips abroad…

Suffice it to say that the delicacies, appetizers, cakes, pastries on display were all rather fancy looking. I suspect they don’t really make their living from retail sales, but rather from catering big events. Having said that, there was a steady stream of tourists popping into the shop all day long. I had heard of Stohrer before, but didn’t really know much about them, and certainly not their impressive longevity!

We didn’t go into the shop this time around, but perhaps the next time I am in Paris, we can pick up a nibble or two, if only to pay homage to a food institution that is likely to make it to it’s 300th anniversary in 15 years time… :)

The post STOHRER Pâtisserie Traiteur, Paris appeared first on Market Manila.

One of the snazziest meat shops I have EVER come across. I thought Lobel’s on the Upper East Side in New York was pretty out there on the snazzy scale, but running across Polmard in Paris on our way to dinner at Semilla quickly changed that opinion (and another chance walk-by with a snazzy butcher in London a few days later really had me reeling…). If I hadn’t taken a closer look at the Christmas specials posted on their front door, and went around the corner to peer into the space, I wouldn’t have guessed this place sold meat!

Éleveur-Boucher or literally “breeder and butcher” means they raise the cattle themselves, and sell the premium meat in this shop. The shop had just closed when we passed, so we didn’t actually step into the store, but you can pretty much see what’s on offer from outside.

It’s like the Cartier or De Beers of beef! Visit their website here and see what I mean. Wow!

The prices for Christmas goodies seemed rather extreme, but I haven’t tasted their meat, so I wish I get to do that at least once on a future trip to Paris…

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