Aristocrat’s marker

Seventy-seven years ago, The Aristocrat started as a mobile restaurant which offered Filipino merienda to strollers in the Luneta. Later, it transferred to Roxas Boulevard, then known as Dewey Boulevard, and many of those to whom it catered were colegialas from nearby St. Scholastica College and students from De la Salle College. Innocent flirtations may have begun at the Boulevard with the young boys offering Aristocrat sandwiches and other native delicacies to the colegialas.

Through the years, the restaurant became an institution known for its exclusively native cuisine, as well as its sauces and seasonings meant to replace their imported equivalents and thus improve the country’s economy.

In March of this year, the Teresita “Mama Sita” R. Reyes commemorative stamp was issued by the Philippine Postal Corporations in recognition of the Mama Sita Foundation’s aim to preserve and advance Filipino culinary traditions.

Last July 4, the National Historical Commission of the Philippines (NHCP) awarded and unveiled a historical marker entitled “The Aristocrat” to the Aristocrat Restaurant. This was followed by the blessing of the Justice Alex Reyes Salas 1 and 2.

Accordingly, The Aristocrat Restaurant will be recorded in the NHCP’s Registry of Historic Sites and Structures in the Philippines.

After the unveiling of the marker, the Reyes family hosted a sumptuous merienda for scores of friends, admirers and long-time patrons of the restaurant.

The nation owes a debt of gratitude and appreciation to the patriotic and nationalistic Reyeses – up to the fourth generation! – for tremendously minimizing importation of food products and thus immeasurably increasing the country’s coffers.