Gaita: The inspiration for many

You could easily forget that she comes from Manila’s old rich family because while she had the style and the class and the proper upbringing, she was down to earth.

With all the tributes on social media and people digging up photos of their encounters with her, whether brief or more often, this makes you wonder how a person, so petite and unassuming, can reach the hearts of many – farmers, chefs and a lot of diners who grew up with her cooking and continue to bring their kids to her restaurants.

But that is and that was Margarita Forés. I had my first taste of time alone with her when we were en route to Turin, Italy for the Terra Madre-Salone del Gusto in 2014. I was invited as media and she would be the guest chef at our Philippine stand. As I was already a member of Slow Food then, we talked a lot about where to get ingredients that she could help revive the use of. One of them is adlai, a grain popularly known in Asia as Job’s tears. When we came home, she would call me to order adlai for wedding receptions or catering gigs she had. She helped popularize the grain by using them in place of arborio rice in risotto, among other innovations.

She taught me to try Foul Medames on the breakfast buffet at the Etihad lounge, and we relaxed before our flight to Milan to connect to Turin. We jumped at the offer of the counter staff in Manila to upgrade ourselves for a song, so we threw in both our credit cards to enjoy business class at our own expense. And upon landing in Abu Dhabi she was met by then Philippine Ambassador Princesa who walked with us to the lounge.

In Turin, she took then undersecretary Berna Puyat and our group to her favorite haunts, showing us her Torino: having marron glacé with cream at Café Grigio, coffee and chocolate at Bicerin and ice cream at Fiorio. We fangirled with Chef Jamie Oliver and have photos to show for it. It was also this time when the famous chef and Slow Food supporter Alice Waters was onstage with Slow Food founder Carlo Petrini. Truly an all-star cast and we giggled like little girls on the front row.

That was the Italy part of our getting to know her. Every other year we would go to Terra Madre and in 2018’s edition, she even brought me to the Presidia section of the fair to try colatura, an Italian patis that she swears by. She would always volunteer to cook and even write the descriptions on our “makeshift” labels written in her famous cursive script, sometimes using the back of paper plates or anything she could write on. She never complained when things were lacking, but just adjusted to whatever we could find and still present it with flair – be it champurrado in a palayok or adobo to be sampled by international guests who visited the Philippines’ stand.

In Manila we would always plan to have meals in Grace Park, a restaurant she conceived to showcase Philippine ingredients like diwal (when in season), tabontabon, sua and other souring ingredients. I would bring my family and friends to try our Philippine version of Slow Food dishes and she would sometimes be there and chat with us for a bit. She also always offered us her avocado pie which is homemade by her cook in her own home.

What she did between her many trips abroad was to travel around our own country to discover many other ingredients, even cooking equipment like palayoks (clay pots). She also would let us try new dishes at Grace Park of what was in season. Seasonality, local ingredients and a good hand are what make a good meal, and this she practiced at Grace Park. This is where diners could expect new dishes just because she found fresh tomatoes from a farmer or a new batch of vinegar or salt, even the most basic of ingredients were highlighted in her recipes.

She encouraged farmers to keep discovering our local produce, and she would use them in the restaurant and give homage to these producers by mentioning their names in her menu.

For her, it was not about just cooking her favorite Italian. It was cooking Filipino food, sometimes as common as adobo or as novel as diwal (angel clams) or river shrimps, which other restaurants would be scared to offer. For her it must have been like playing in the kitchen with recipes while honoring producers or farmers for their hard work. We also met young farmers who she inspired to keep growing heirloom tomatoes and local vegetables, which are getting harder to find.

She inspired both farmers and chefs and ordinary diners like myself. And that is an act that is hard to follow because teaching consumers is the most difficult part. Just as mentoring chefs and talking to farmers is not easy. But she goes from speaking English to Ilonggo and Tagalog to be understood with a sprinkling of Italian if needed. I was so impressed to hear her speak fluently at the Italian embassy when I tried to take my first Italian language course at the same place, many years ago. By that time, she was in Advanced Italian while I was just starting to count and say Good morning.

She left us at a time when she was at the top but she was always humble. Our job now is to find future chefs and food ambassadors like her or at least to follow in her path. She loved Italian cooking but she always looked at good, clean and fair food and brought our Filipino ingredients to the world’s stage. She definitely leaves a void but this must only inspire our youth, our young dreamers, to be even half of what she was – and we will be in a good place.