A carinderia with a classy taste

MANILA, Philippines - Outside, Petra & Pilar looks like a classy restaurant. Inside, it has the feel of class mixed with some sense of the ‘commonplace’.

 Upon entering, there is a counter and shelves on the left by the glass door showcasing Spanish chorizo de bilbao, German schublig sausages and other delicatessen – definitely for people with taste and money. True, but not quite.

 Walk past the quite ordinary tables and you will find a self-service counter with trays of ready-to-serve food on display similar to what you’ll find in a carinderia. That’s because Petra & Pilar is a class of its own.

 It is a restaurant with a carinderia twist – or a carinderia with a twist.

 Adding a touch of class, Petra & Pilar is complete with outdoor tables on the veranda for al fresco dining, similar to what you will find at tony shopping paradises. But just like at a roadside carinderia, “al fresco” also means breathing in carbon monoxide from passing vehicles. Or, in street language Filipino humor, pinausukan (“smoked”).

 On the menu are familiar names such as adobo, binagoongang baboy, enseladang ampalaya, inihaw na baboy, kare-kare, porkchop, sinigang and the like. Prices are between at P80 to P180.

 The dishes, while they sound ordinary, aren’t that commonplace. For those who want to savor kare-kare but are allergic to peanuts, you may order one using cashew nuts. It’s one of chef Tristan Bayani’s creations.

 “It’s sweeter. It’s more Filipino,” says Katrina Ponce Enrile, the visionary behind Petra & Pilar, referring to the Pinoy taste for sweetness. Think of the Pinoy-style spaghetti.

 “Our food is something you won’t find in a true carinderia. You will also find international dishes with a carinderia style,” says Bayani, the culinary artist responsible for making Enrile’s ideas into reality. Their menu includes chicken teriyaki, fish fillet with tomato and cheese, tanigue pesto and chicken fillet with tausi sauce among others. Bayani he also puts forth his own ideas, of course. It’s a two-way creative culinary process.

 Enrile, a self-confessed foodie, makes it a point to tweak the menu and the recipes to constantly offer something new and discover new tastes. “We’re not departing too much from what Filipino is. Customers must always see the Filipino-ness in the food. Fusion is okay but sometimes it goes overboard that you get confused.”

 Enrile is her own best customer. It makes sense because she’s at the restaurant a lot of times. “As you know, as with any restaurant it has to evolve. You have to prune and cull the menu so that you have new offerings every so often because I have the same clientele and I don’t want them to get bored with the food.”

 While offering a perennial best-seller everyday such as fried chicken brings in customers, Enrile explains, it also has a tendency to make people go some place else if they know what you’re offering. Petra & Pilar makes it a point to offer a different menu everyday. Every day is a surprise.

 Enrile’s main idea behind the carinderia concept is to offer food with the feel of home or the turo-turo canteen (“turo” in Filipino means “to point”) that Filipinos are familiar with especially on the road. Travel by bus to far-flung provinces, eat at the carinderias where the buses usually have their stop-overs and you’ll get the idea.

 And if you prefer to order a la carte, you may.

 Adding to the carinderia concept is Petra & Pilar’s off-the-beaten track location. It is not at the malls nor even along a main road (Export Bank Road near the corner of Chino Roces Avenue in Makati City, a block away from the intersection of Gil Puyat Avenue and Chino Roces). It’s at the side of Jaka Building, which houses the headquarters of the Jaka group of companies.

 It also makes business sense. Enrile owns the space and she can do whatever she wants with it. The rental alone at the malls are enough to push the menu prices up to way above carinderia level. And she can easily come down from her office in the Jaka Building to maintain a hands-on management.

 You can also say that Petra & Pilar is Enrile’s tribute to her grandmothers and her way of sharing their cooking with others. On the wall to the right hangs a large monochromatic artistic portrait of her grandmothers, elegant and graceful.

 Petra is Enrile’s Ilocano side of the family and Pilar is her Spanish half. And just in case you’re wondering, Petra is the mother of Senator Juan Ponce Enrile, whose only daughter is Katrina.

 “I wanted a carinderia-type restaurant with very affordable prices. Initially that was the concept. But I also wanted to serve home-cooked meals coming from my lineage and melding the two together,” she says.

 At most, Petra & Pilar is a self-confessed foodie’s way of sharing her love of good food. And good food can come from anywhere, even from the most humble carinderia.

 “I want this to be a place where people will say the food is good and prices are very reasonable – and I want them to come back. That’s precisely why I didn’t put up a high-end restaurant,” says Enrile. “I want them to come and go with the feeling that they had a good meal.”