New takes on classic snacks

PANCIT palabok: deep-fried vermicelli with egg, chicharon, smoked fish flakes, squid and cream sauce.

Revered Filipino snacks such as kakanin, pansit and palamig take on an enhanced look with the Merienda Menu of Andrew Café.

Chef Jester Arellano, resident culinary professor of Hotel, Restaurant, and Institution Management at the De La Salle-College of Saint Benilde, together with his students, presents a new take of the food icons of the country.

The result of weeks of thorough research, experimentation, analysis, and food-tasting led to Andrew Café’s curated menu. The dishes are inspired by merienda fares, but are also perfect as hearty meals for breakfast, lunch, or dinner. According to the chef, the team did more than just tweaks and twists, they revolutionized the creations as they provided enhancements that would make it tastier while preserves the tradition.

The lumpia wrappers, which are made in-house, become a vessel for several local classics such as spring rolls in the form of piniritong lumpia, vegetarian favorite ube lumpiang sariwa, the spicy laing lumpia, the sisig lumpia, and shrimp sauce-drenched palabok lumpia.

For the main course, where all the noodles are made from scratch, the deep-fried pancit palabok is seasoned with eggs, chicharon, smoked fish flakes, squid and drizzled with shrimp sauce; the laing ravioli is dressed in chili-coconut-tomato sauce; and the bestseller sisig pasta is drenched in tamarind cream sauce.

For dessert, the champorado mousse cake blends tablea, rice crispies, pinipig-polvoron, and optional caramelized tuyo. On the other hand, the sapin-sapin panna cotta takes layers of ube and coconut pudding served with jackfruit coulis and coconut sauce.

Complement the meal with thirst-quenching beverages such as the refreshing langka samalamig, a serving of sago’t gulaman infused with hints of jackfruit, or the zesty house-blend sampaloc (tamarind) juice.

The merienda menu is available all day until August 4, 2018, at the Andrew Café, located at the De La Salle-College of Saint Benilde Taft Campus, corner of Estrada and Leon Guinto Streets, Malate, Manila. It is open Mondays to Fridays from 7 a.m. to 6 p.m. and on Saturdays from 7 a.m. to 5 p.m.