It isn’t every day one attends a book launching held at a vast, lush garden, where a barrio fiesta atmosphere prevails late in the afternoon, with tokwa’t-baboy and assorted kakanin turning the banana-leaf-sheathed buffet tables into a groan feast, and taho and dirty ice cream are also made available in the merry grounds. Plus Glenmorangie 12-year-old single malt whisky among the offerings in the outdoor bar!
Yehey! For that alone this book gets an A! Buy it, show it around, disseminate it among friends! I mean, better yet, buy ‘em — oodles of copies — as it might go fast, like the orange-colored noodles of pancit palabok that kept disappearing last Saturday at the Espiritus’ spread in Ayala Alabang — but which thankfully kept getting replenished!
Authored by Marilen Nolasco Espiritu, the book is Wrap Them, Store Them, Peddle Them: The Filipino Way, a most charming addition indeed to Filipiniana shelves or coffee tables, with its detailing of the packaging art in our islands, from the pastillas de leche with its artful, lacy, papel de Hapon cut-out wrappers to the more esoteric regional delicacies such as the patupat, tupig, pakasiat, and that novelty of childhood that’s vanished except at the Baguio market, the sundot kulangot!
With excellent photography by the author’s own son, Johann Espiritu, the handsome volume prepared and published by ArtPostAsia should be a popular gift item now that we’re in the “ber” months of gift-giving. But I can’t really expound much on the book since I’m partly involved in its production. So suffice it to say that that was one great party last Saturday, especially for the survivors like myself who stayed on shamelessly for dinner of cochinillo, paella, and fresh seafood.
And of course for more of that Glenmorangie, while managing to insert ourselves in a distinguished table that included the author-honoree, the man-about-French-bistros (mainly La Régalade) Bobby Romulo, our former Ambassador to the UK Jesus Tambunting, the young banker and our colleague at the English Union-Philippines Luigi Bernas, and presidential daughter Luli Macapagal Arroyo.
I would have wanted to engage Ambassador “Chuching” Tambunting in a more intimate tête-à-tête regarding what he must now be missing from the Court of St. James, namely the rich array of single malt whiskies. But I just had to concentrate on the particular digestif offered that evening, perfect to wash down the patupat and kulangot that my fellow-Bedan guests, Frankie Casal and Tito Uyenco, were making a wrappers’ mess of on our end of the table. Well, call it an artful installation.
But as far as the art of making fine whisky goes, let us then segue into what must now pass for our seasonal inventory of single malts of recent privilege.
For one, we’ve been lucky to go through the NAIA turnstiles rather often these past months, so that every foray at the Duty Free section has yielded a TraveLite bottle, meaning to be picked up upon return, and another for that foreign hotel for three to four nights.
Thus, with recent trips to Singapore, Beijing, and Bali, our collection of single malt bottles — all happily consumed, of course, except for the latest pair, a one-liter Bowmore 12 and a Glenlivet 12 — has grown apace anew.
Several Bedan balikbayans have also been beating a path to Tiendesitas to get away from the financial meltdown, and to satiate themselves with oysters from Capiz that can be had for a song (at Marilen’s table, together with the scallops, they were for free!). And of course they retain the Galahadian graciousness to bring home a bottle — do I dare say it — fit enough to pour into a Holy Grail. Make that the Venerable St. Bede’s prized cup.
Jun Aspillera of San Francisco donated a Glenlivet 18 as is his wont, despite my repeated entreaties to make it two bottles of Glenlivet 12 na lang! Bobby Muldong, also from California, shared a Glenfiddich 15 — now vigorously passed off as a single malt, albeit technically it’s still a pure malt. Don’t ask me for the hairline distinction; you should go to Kipling’s cigar and single malt bar at Mandarin Hotel and hear it from the expert, Scotslady manager Barbara.
Then, too, our younger sis Agnes Arellano came back from London with a cute 350-ml. bottle of the same Glenmorangie we savored last Saturday. All these malts not only revivify our spirit, but bless us with fine literature, too, to wit:
“Here in the Highlands of Scotland, near the ancient Royal Burgh of Tain, lies the Glenmorangie Distillery, where malt whisky has been distilled since 1863. Glenmorangie (the toponym is from the Gaelic gleann mór innse or ‘vale of big meadows’) is a single malt renowned for its delicate taste and complex bouquet... A specially commissioned design for the Ten Years Old that takes its inspiration from the cartographer’s frame — an intrinsic feature of the Glenmorangie label since the turn of the last century. The cartographer’s frame has sixteen cornerstones, each symbolizing one of Glenmorangie’s craftsmen — ‘The Sixteen Men of Tain.’”
A recent rediscovery, at modest price, too, is the one-liter bottle of Isle of Jura 10 years, billed as A Unique Legacy (founded 1810). “Off the west coast of Scotland lies a magical island of soft sea breezes , freshly caught lobster and a bank that comes once a week. As good as life used to be.... Pure spring water, clean fresh air and generations of tradition quietly crafting a more delicate island malt. Visit the island, meet the people, discover the legacy.”
Of the uncommon Lancelot Original Reserve Scotch Whisky 12 Years Old, it is written that the whisky “shares its heritage with this courageous knight. Crafted in a spirit of adventure, by the pride and passion of distiller Cochrane Blair, it is a bold whisky, worthy of honoring Lancelot. Live the Legend.”
Talisker (from the Norse, thalas gair, meaning Sloping Rock), aged 10 years, is the Isle of Skye’s only single malt. “A soft, smoky nose introduces Talisker’s deep, sweet taste, rich in barley-malt. First enticing, smooth and golden, yet soon growing in intensity, this is a robust malt to enjoy from the outset, not to sip cautiously... Drink in all the rich, golden drama of a Skye sunset in this alluring, sweet, full-bodied spirit with a warming afterglow, so easy to enjoy yet, like Skye itself, so hard to leave.”
The popular Macallan, of which we’ve been a recipient not a few times this year, in particular the Macallan Highland 12, sports these Notes: “Colour: Rich Gold; Nose: Vanilla, with a hint of ginger, dried fruit, sherry sweetness and wood smoke; Palate: Deliciously smooth, rich dried fruit and sherry, balanced with wood smoke and spice; Finish: Sweet toffee...”
Of the Bowmore, the original Islay 1779 malt, it is written: “Colour: Warm amber. Nose: Subtle notes of lemon and honey are found together with the distinctive Bowmore smokiness. Palate: Warm and delicious with subtle dark chocolate and peat smoke; the finish is long and subtle.”
And of The Singleton, another good buy at a liter: “Every year, the leaping salmon returns to spawn in Scotland’s rivers, guided by nature’s invisible hand. Nature led the early malt whisky distillers to Scotland’s Black Isle just as surely. Fields of golden barley grow here in rich, dark soil. Water ‘from heaven and earth’ cascades down the White Burn from two mountain lochs, one fed by springs, the other by rain.
“Like his forbears, true to the family motto ‘I Shine, not burn,’ the Master Distiller carefully distills small batches of spirit in the traditional copper pot stills, using his skills to retain the rich simplicity of nature. After this, he lays the precious liquid to rest in a special choice of oak casks, to breathe pure air for at least 12 years. And so, simply, he creates the smoother, richer, perfectly balanced Single Malt whisky that we call, just as simply, the Singleton of Glen Ord.”
At Singapore’s Changi airport last week, having picked up a Bowmore (pronounced Boh-more), synchronicity weighed in with an SMS from Manila, from Boy Vinzon who runs Brothers Mustache. He had just passed those very same turnstiles the day before, with a Laphroaig that’s also from the Isle of Islay (pronounced “eye-luh”). We agreed to have a comparative taste test soon.
Of Islay’s malts, my favorite has been Lagavulin — which is why I want to meet and befriend the ever-dapper Atty. Frank Chavez. A common friend, Dr. Serafin “Boy” Hilvano, head of surgery at PGH, recently recounted how a Rotarian meeting of theirs wound up with a taste test of Frank’s collection, including a Lagavulin. Doc Boy said he didn’t much like it, found it too smoky. Well, Frank, I revere that peaty, briny, smoky complex of bouquet and flavor. Do I have to join the Rotary? No physical initiation?
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Back at Marilen Espiritu’s launch, another guest, Erlinda Panlilio, reminded us of her own book launching on Wednesday, Oct. 29 at PowerBooks in Greenbelt. Belonging: Stories of Relationships, an anthology she edited, is published by Anvil. Perhaps as an incentive, she said that her bartender had noted that the yet half-full bottles of Macallan 12 and Glenlivet 12 I had befriended at her parties might be trashed upon deconstruction of her home in Dasmariñas. She’d bring them to the launch, Erlinda promised.
Okay. Great book you have there, Linda. Great literature you lovely ladies keep producing!