Soy Pinoy brings Filipino cuisine to post-Houston.
In a city as diverse as Houston, it’s no wonder the food scene reflects so many different cultures. From Mexican street food to Vietnamese local cuisine, you’ll find just about everything. But at least one of his dishes remained underappreciated until recently. It’s Filipino food.
Born in the Philippines and raised in Areef, Isabel Protomartil grew up in a family that cooked Filipino food. “I think she was really lucky that she grew up surrounded by so many other Filipinos and food back then,” Protomartil says. “Filipino food was especially homely.”
However, there were only a few restaurants nearby that felt like a second home.
Now the co-founder of Have a Nice Day, an organization that advocates for Asian American and Pacific Islander small businesses, she is helping restaurateurs, chefs, and bakers continue to popularize this unique cuisine. Together, they have seen the popularity of Filipino cuisine grow in Houston. cooking.
Soy Pinoy Chef Tom Cunanan grew up eating Filipino food cooked by his mother.
Tom Cunanan, menu consultant and chef partner with Paul Cui (fellow Filipino chef) at Soi Pinoy in Post-Houston, says that until recently, many locals were not familiar with Filipino culture. I think it was due to a lack of education and exposure. Mr. Cunanan, who won the James Beard Award for Best Mid-Atlantic Chef at his former restaurant Bad Saint in Washington, D.C., came to Houston to do just that: educate people about Filipino culture. Say.
“If you look back 10 years ago, Filipino food was still a question mark for many non-Filipinos,” Cunanan says. “It’s all about spreading knowledge and researching.”
Cunanan, who grew up Filipino-American, said he enjoyed a variety of authentic dishes on his birthday, especially thanks to his mother’s cooking. Herme’s, Cunanan’s new fine-dining restaurant opening in Houston this summer, is inspired by the seafood wet markets of the Philippines and is a tribute to her mother, who died of cancer 10 years ago. While his mother was undergoing treatment, he had his mother write down all her recipes in a Moleskine notebook. Hermes’ menu will feature many of the same recipes.
Soy Pinoy offers a variety of menu options for exploring the flavors of Filipino cuisine.
“Whenever I make her recipes,
This is how I feel when I think about her
Her spirit is nearby. ”
—Tom Cunanan, about his late mother
“She helped me find my true passion,” Cunanan says. “Whether she’s here or not, she guides me. I always think of her when I make her recipes, and her spirit is nearby and she tells me what to do.” I feel like he’s teaching me.”
Andrew Musico, chef of the Houston pop-up Fattest Cow and the upcoming Chikahan restaurant, says he grew up eating Filipino food, influenced by his mother. He continued to expertly create and explore Filipino cuisine under Qui as the sous chef at the now-closed Aqui. Due to the pandemic, Musico decided to delve deeper into cooking, but before he started making his meals, he first researched the history.
The Philippines and its food are a mixture of different cultures due to colonization. The country and its people were ruled by Spain for more than 300 years before gaining independence in 1946. After the Spanish-American War, it was occupied by the United States until independence, and during World War II, it was also occupied by Japan.
The Seafood City supermarket chain helps bring Filipino food to America.
This tumultuous past created the fusion of Spanish, indigenous, and Chinese influences that Musico grew up loving. Main Filipino dishes include suckling pig lechon. Adobo is made with pork or chicken and is often cooked with vinegar and soy sauce. Kare-kare, a type of stew made with a rich peanut sauce. Lumpia are basically fried spring rolls stuffed with a flavorful mixture of pork, cabbage, and other vegetables.
Musico also points out that what is less well known is that the Philippine island of Mindanao has a large Muslim population, so Filipino cuisine is also influenced by Islamic culture. For example, at the Fattest Cow pop-up store he held a few years ago, he served a curry dish called Beef Kurma.
“I always knew there were a lot of influences in Filipino cuisine,” Musico says. “I think it was interesting to find out.” [in my research] Something more subtle and small came to mind. ”
As for the recent popularity of Filipino cuisine, Cunanan credits social media platforms like TikTok and Instagram for the increased demand and knowledge. And while Protomartil says she can’t pinpoint anything specific, natural curiosity has played a role in the rise of Filipino cuisine, along with chefs who are communicating their native culture to a wider audience. I think there are.
Sugar Land’s Seafood City Supermarket just opened to the public in December 2023.
Musico echoes that sentiment, saying that while Houston’s culinary scene used to be a little behind that of other big cities like Los Angeles and New York, things have changed over the years as more young people have started becoming chefs. added.
“What’s happened is that our entire generation of Filipinos has entered the culinary world and now realizes the potential that it has to become as big as Vietnamese cuisine, Japanese cuisine, Thai cuisine. I think that’s true,” Musico says. “I think it’s all generational in a way, and I think Houston is already ready for that.”
Another reason for the emergence of Filipino cuisine can be traced back to the opening of Jollibee in the United States. The hugely popular fast food chain in the Philippines, known for its fried chicken, burgers and pies, first expanded to Texas in 2013. There are currently three of his stores in the Houston area.
Ube is a purple yam that adds a pop of color to Filipino baked goods
“Jollibee is the epitome,” says Cunanan. “It’s like the Popeyes of the Philippines. Now, with our expansion into the U.S., we’re taking over the capacity market here.”
Jollibee’s flagship store on Main Street near NRG Stadium is located in a neighborhood dominated by Filipino businesses such as Max’s Restaurant and supermarket Cherry Foodarama in Houston’s Little Manila. Florida-based Baker’s Son became the most recent addition, opening a store here in 2022. Ariosto Valerio, co-owner of Baker’s Sun, said Jollibee has contributed tremendously to the slow growth of Filipino culture and its cuisine. He said new Filipino restaurants are popping up everywhere as chefs increasingly find inspiration to create their dishes.
In Houston alone, Be More Pacific started as a food truck in Austin 13 years ago before opening in the Heights in 2020, serving classic dishes like adobe chicken, kare-kare, and halo-halo for dessert. Located in the Braeburn area, Filipiniana offers a traditional Filipino buffet. Other Filipino chains include Gerry’s Grill, and there’s also a small Filipino cafe inside the Mission Bend HEB.
Like Cunanan, Valerio also credits social media for increased Filipino representation among young people. The platform may also be behind the rise in popularity of ube, a purple sweet potato that adds a pop of color to Filipino baked goods. Industry watchers named Ube the “2024 Flavor of the Year.”
Social media may be behind Ube City’s rise in popularity.
Pop-up bakeries riding the waves of Ube include Salvaje and Ube Co., Ltd. HTX, which sell mini cheesecake tarts made with a variety of flavors, including calamansi, a citrus fruit commonly used in ube and Filipino cuisine, and ube tres. They serve leche, ube buco cups, ube buco cups, and more. Ubereche float etc.
Valerio said Baker’s Son’s goal is to continue educating the community about Ube. He says it’s more than people think and that it’s important to import yams from the Philippines to get the authentic taste. The Baker’s Son sells Filipino baked goods such as adobo pan del sal (meat bread), pan de ube, and sapan sapan, a sticky rice dessert layered with various flavorings. Protomartyr says when she steps into Baker’s Sun, she feels a little closer to home.
Ube’s growing popularity has made spots like Baker’s Sun a favorite among Houstonians.
“I love it,” she says. “When you walk in there, it’s like all the memories come flooding back to you, to be honest.”
Valerio said he was drawn to Houston because of its diversity and the interest of a younger generation in cooking. Fans of the bakery will soon have the opportunity to enjoy his second location of Baker’s Son, which is scheduled to open later this year inside Sugar Land’s Seafood City Supermarket. The supermarket will open in December 2023 and is a chain that caters to the Filipino and Asian communities.
Seafood City, in addition to other extensive Asian grocery stores in the Houston area, sells specialty items and fresh fish at the counter.
Looking to the future, these chefs say they hope one day Filipino cuisine will become as mainstream as other cuisines widely enjoyed in Houston.
“Sometimes I get goosebumps when I think about it,” Valerio says. “So far we’ve had Chinese food, and now we’ve had Indian food, Greek food, but I think we’ll soon see Filipino food as well. I think that’s going to be a big thing for our culture.”
Sugar Land’s Seafood City Supermarket is helping fill a gap that may exist in the Houston area when it comes to Filipino ingredients.
