By Jojo Dass
For Food Trip Magazine
The Filipino diaspora has turned overseas Pinoys into “food ambassadors,” and nowhere is this more apparent than in Dubai, an international expat city in the region where restaurants have opened, rolling out Philippine cuisine on the spread to the delight of the locals and people of other nationalities, Alejandro Castro, executive head chef at OSH Restaurant in La Mer said.
“The migration of Pinoy nationals is something that has happened for a long time, and I bet there is no single country where there isn’t a Filipino community. That’s a way of exposing your cuisine, your flavours to the rest,” Chef Alejandro told Food Trip Magazine.
He added: “About three years ago, I got to know about kecap manis, (which is) Indonesian in origin, but is widely used in homes and kitchens in the ‘Pinas.
“Recently, Mang Tomas was a revelation for me, and a new tasty way of saucing your ‘bellychon’, rather than a pre-made apple sauce. In the city, many Filipino restaurants are opening, or have been open for years.
“The next step lies in the hands of brave individuals to take this to the global scene.”
Diverse
On the other hand, Chef Alejandro said Ecuadorian cuisine is “so diverse, that it is so
difficult to define it.”
“We have 24 different provinces, and the cuisine from each is unique. It’s like having 24 different kitchens within a restaurant. They vary in altitude, type
of vegetation, weather, microclimates, products. It’s undefinable.
“I’m 35 years old and probably have tried just 35% of what my country has to offer in terms of food,” he said.
Meantime, Chef Alejandro, who had worked at different Hyatt properties in Dubai for more than three years, said that while there are “cool” trends “to dig into since they educate you about new products or techniques,” there are also those that are “just marketing stunts to make noise.”
“And I’d rather do things that make sense, not noise,” he said.
Journey
Sharing his life’s journey, Chef Alejandro said he “didn’t know very well” what he wanted to do when he finished high school.
“I just knew that an office job, though comfy, wouldn’t make the cut. I remember to always be interested in the cooking shows on TV, but wasn’t much of a cook. My grandma and my dad are great cooks, but never saw it as a career option,” he said.
“Eventually I went to the university, where I studied for four years only to be bored and frustrated by a lot of the classes (that have proved to be super useful now). The fun started once I started working, first in a couple of restaurants in Ecuador, and then Australia was the wake-up call that showed me this was what I wanted. Finally, 3 1/2 years with different Hyatt properties in Dubai and now OSH.”
Hard work
Chef Alejandro said he saw a chef’s job as a “’fun’ activity to be paid for.”
“Eventually you realize that’s not all fun and games, but very hard work, planification, imagination, coordination, building people skills, empathizing with your colleagues, really caring about each of them, keep learning, and
staying humble while being proud of what the team has accomplished.
“All of that inspired, and keeps inspiring, me,” he said.
Plans
Chef Alejandro said OSH will be having its winter menu with a lot of new vegetarian options, “not because of market trends, but because we have been able to create some delicious dishes that happen to be vegetarian.”
“There will also be a lot of fish and seafood that I hope our diners at OSH will appreciate. We are entering the festive season, so we need to create our December menus, and our classic New Year’s Eve Gala Dinner set menu. Next year is full of work and exciting things to come,” he said.
OSH is authentic restaurant and lounge with a modern twist of Central Asian and contemporary Uzbek cuisine.
Mang Tomas is an all-purpose sauce popular in the Philippines for roast pork or lechon. Bottles of Mang Tomas are readily available in grocery stores across Dubai and its neighboring cities.