Felice Sta. Maria, doyenne of Philippine culinary history, referenced the Panciteria Antigua, established in 1866, on Plaza Santa Cruz, with Manuel “Po Kong” Bautista as the owner in her book “The Governor-general’s Kitchen” (2006). “Antigua” was so famous that 1940s...

Old Manila Walk food tours are the best thing to happen to Binondo since Rizal threw his tsinelas in the river. The Chinatown food scene is not only bustling, it can become so crowded on weekends that it is being killed by its own success. Almost all the shops and...

Historians read differently. While most people start with the so-called “Front Matter” (Title Page, Introduction, Table of Contents, etc.) historians usually start at the back of a book; checking out the Bibliography or the list of sources (manuscript, printed, oral,...

Concluding at Holy Angel University today is the first international conference on Kapampangan Cuisine and Food Tourism. I had planned to present a paper on cookbooks after digging into my files for all Manila envelopes marked “Food.” First item that emerged was...

Travel accounts of the Philippines are bread and butter for historians. Ranging from Antonio Pigafetta’s account of the Magellan expedition in the 16th century to racist ones posted in the early 20th century by Dean C. Worcester and John Foreman, one can find a lot to...

Attendance at an international conference on the Manila Galleon in Singapore (Not Taylor Swift) made me see and notice an object always packed in my hand-carried luggage with my medicines. It is a small bronze image of the Virgin of Antipolo, circa 1900s, presented by...

By all counts, Helen Calista Wilson was an extraordinary woman. In a time when women were born and raised to get married, stay home, and raise a family, Helen remained single and indulged in wanderlust and adventure. She spent five years in the Philippines and 14 in...

Online shopping, food delivery, tap cards, e-wallets, work from home, Zoom meetings, and even e-burol were some of the welcome responses to pandemic lockdown that have grown into part of everyday life. Sadly, not all the gains jumpstarted by the pandemic are...

When people ask why I look young for my age, they hope the compliment will entice me to reveal what expensive, imported face cream I use daily. Frankly, there is no secret: I have not sold my soul to the devil to look young, I don’t have a magic portrait in storage...

That Filipinos are separated from their past because of language, is not just about Spanish and the primary sources on the Spanish colonial period (1565-1898); this also covers books and manuscripts from the same period locked in other languages like French, Italian,...