03/07/2026
I was the pickiest eater in the family.
My mom couldn't get me to eat anything.
I hated vegetables.
I also hated a lot of textures in food.
Nothing unfamiliar.
Nothing that looked even slightly interesting on the plate.
There were even times when I didn't like the ulam, I would eat rice with ketchup. That's how picky I was.
Then one afternoon in high school, I wandered into the kitchen, opened the fridge and just started cooking from whatever was there.
No recipe. No plan. Just something in me that suddenly needed to try.
I still do not know what made me do it that day.
But something clicked. And it never stopped.
Culinary school. Then 15 years flying the world as a cabin crew for an international airline.
And in every city I landed in, I went looking for flavors that would make me stop mid-bite and go quiet.
London gave me one of those moments.
New York gave me another.
But Jamaican BBQ was the one that stayed.
Savory. Smoky. Spicy.
The complete opposite of the sweet BBQ we grew up with here.
I thought about that flavor for weeks.
So I went home. And I got to work. Not to copy it but to make it my own.
Food has always been my love language. Every city, every table, every flavor worth remembering went into this.
And every time someone takes that first bite and their eyes light up, that is everything to me.
Because when you taste my food, you are not just tasting the recipe.
You are tasting the journey, the story, the love I put into every plate.
Seeing you enjoy it is the whole point.
The picky eater became the cook.
The cook traveled the world.
The world led him here.
Come taste the journey.
See you! Every Friday, Saturday, and Sunday at Mercato Centrale Filinvest Alabang.
