A foodie's bucket list

There are moments in my life when the world just stops, everything else melts away, and I am left alone in splendid solitude with an immaculate, palatable experience. The restaurant may be a dirty hole-in-the-wall or an incredibly chic temple of gastronomy — it may even just be on a street corner — but whatever it is that you put in your mouth brings delicate tears of joy and happiness to your eyes.

I recently just shared a moment like this with Ernest Hemingway. In my favorite book of all time, A Moveable Feast, he describes one of these ultra-precious moments in a Parisian brasserie: “As I ate the oysters with their strong taste of the sea and their faint metallic taste that the cold white wine washed away, leaving only the sea taste and the succulent texture, and as I drank their cold liquid from each shell and washed it down with the crisp taste of the wine, I lost the empty feeling and began to be happy and to make plans.” It’s that sublime moment he has captured, where everything was just right where it should have been. Having spent New Year’s Eve in Paris, Jonathan took me to one of the oldest seafood and fish restaurants in town: Vagenende.

A nonchalant façade opened to authentic Art Nouveau interiors; our table even had a small brass plaque stating “La Table d’Antoine Blondin,” a longtime regular who insisted on having the same table. In this temple of tradition, we feasted on a decadently simple lunch. Beautiful oysters squirming under just a squeeze of lemon, sweet shrimp dipped in homemade mayonnaise, sole meuniere swimming in an ocean of butter all washed down with a pale, dry Quincy white wine. I was overjoyed at the exquisite taste of something that was so fresh and untouched, the oysters were like one long, languid kiss to the sea. My eyes welled up with the sole. A simple sliver of delicate fish, cooked ever so perfectly, like this fish was forever destined and born to be on my plate. No frou-frous, no molecular cuisine, no fancy sauces: just purely amazing products handled with the utmost reverence and care.

For the New Year, I thought I would sum up 10 of my best gastronomic moments this year and share it with all of you as sort of a foodie’s bucket list. It may or may not be to your palate or taste, but for me these are some of those things that you have to try, even just once in your life.

Crelisse de foie gras from Claude Coillot: So delicious I wanted another serving and a straw!

1. Have bubbly for breakfast. This started when we found that a leftover bottle of champagne was still nice and fizzy, extra cold from having been left in the chiller. Nothing else will put you in a better mood than having that cool sip of delicately pétillante nectar. Nowadays there are so many options that need not be expensive: you have some delightful Cavas, Proseccos and sparkling wines that are reasonably priced. Personally I prefer Brut or Dry, and one of my best-kept party secrets is a bottle of Toso Spumante Prosecco under P400!

2. Eat a raw oyster and wash it down with a dry white wine. Yes, go on, take that risk. Make sure they are extra fresh, no need to steam or blanch, no sauce mignonette or scandalously covered in cream and cheese. Make sure they are so fresh that when you squirt lemon, the sides squirm and move a little. Eat it whole, chew once, swallow and drink up. A euphoric rush of pleasure as the taste of the ocean blends with the wine to combine in a nutty delight in your mouth.

My Hemingway moment: Delicate oysters and beautiful white wine at Vagenende

3. Have foie gras in a new way. Foie gras has been one of the most overused ingredients of the decade. Many times poorly or overcooked, it often loses its interest. I ate at Claude Coillot’s restaurant in Paris; an experimental but not molecular chef, he served us a crélisse de foie gras. It was part rich soup, part cream and part mousse, foie gras like a warm, thick smoothie. All I wanted was a straw to take it all in. Little condiments dotted the rim of the bowl and changed the depth and flavor of the dish depending on which one you ate.

4. Offal. Yes, try something strange and you’ll be surprised. My very first time this year to eat ris de veau, which are veal pituitary glands, was in Joel Robuchon’s L’Atelier in Paris. It was a total revelation and, to borrow words from Jack Kerouac, it was simply “satori in Paris.”

5. Splurge once in your life on a truly fine wine. I felt privileged to be invited to a Chateau Angelus exclusive degustation and the 1990 Chateau Angelus was something so extraordinary. Save up, buy a fine bottle, do some research and drink to appreciate, not to get drunk. Try to taste all the subtleties and depth. It’s a truly gratifying experience.

6. On the same note, don’t chug your beer, dégustez-la. Really taste your beer. My birthday was simple, with my family at Kikufuji in Little Tokyo. They have beer on tap. A nice, cold draft beer is something so spectacular that I have many times in my life refused champagne and preferred beer. Learn to drink it properly and try new ales, stouts, pilsens… The market is growing and there’s a lot to discover.

Tender escargot: When perfectly cooked, they are soft, buttery explosions of sheer delight.

7. Truffles. I had the most extravagant dinner at I Am Angus on Yakal Street, where this old Italian man who only spoke Piedmontese brought in more than a kilo of white alba truffles. I held one in my hands, so large I couldn’t even close my fist on it. It was shaved on generously and completely intoxicating. Among all the dishes, it was paired with a creamy baked egg that brought on all its erotic and heady musk. Nowadays, there are many options: go for truffle salt or paste instead of oil, because oil may sometimes be made with synthetic truffle flavor and the scent can disappear if not kept properly. Add to a little pasta or my favorite for breakfast — with a soft-boiled egg.

8. Try sturgeon caviar. Caviar, especially Beluga, Osetra and Sevruga, is extremely luxurious and expensive because for many years they had to catch the sturgeon fish in the wild. Nowadays, France, Italy and Spain have their own, more affordable versions of sturgeon caviar. In a grocery in France, we found a delightful product: 50 grams for less than P3,000. You could even find little tins of 20 grams at less than P1,000! At those prices caviar is truly worth trying. No condiments, just some crème fraiche and a soft blini… Those black pearls truly pop wondrous flavor in your mouth.

Divine: Shaved white truffles on a simple baked egg

9. Escargots. It is my little food fetish of the year. When perfectly cooked, they are soft, buttery explosions of sheer delight. I’ve had them this year in its classic French parsley and garlic butter; I’ve had it remixed by Chef Freddy Schmidt of The Peninsula served on a garlic mousse; and Luis de Terry’s joyous harissa and cilantro escargots for that Moroccan spice. I think I may start experimenting with our local kuhol to see just how far we can go with it.

10. Diwal. The first time I ever tried it in Bacolod, brushed lightly with atsuete oil and grilled, I kept asking myself, “Where, oh, where have you been all my life?” As much as I know about exotic foreign ingredients, I hardly know anything about our delicious local delicacies.

I want to try that special, tiny freshwater shrimp, or eat more things like pakô that are indigenous to my land. I will also stop looking strangely at the different varieties of fish and local vegetables we have, and start buying them and thinking of new things to do with these fresh local products. My New Year’s resolution is to explore my own country and leave no stone unturned, in hopes that next year’s top-10 list will have more Filipino experiences true to my heart than foreign ones.