Nastasha: Welcome to Exploring Filipino Kitchens. I'm your host, Nastasha Alli.
This episode we're gonna chat with Reena Gamboa, whose work with Slow Food Negros has been leading up to the Terra Madre Asia Pacific Conference. It's the first of its kind in Asia and it's a landmark event for the city of Bacolod. And honestly, to me, it's a little wild and fascinating to hear about how Slow Food communities, you know, across the Philippines have grown over the last decade.
I recently listened to another podcast interview with Tita Reena by none other than Ms. Chit Juan, who we spoke to way back in episode one about kapeng barako and the Slow Food Ark of Taste catalog. This event, the Terra Madre Asia Pacific Conference, it's such a huge deal because it draws international attention to the event's host city and the communities that set up the event as well. In this case, that's gonna be in Bacolod in Negros Occidental, and the event is happening from November 19 to 23, 2025. The theme for this inaugural event is called From Soil to Sea, A Slow Food Journey Through Tastes and Traditions.
They're expecting hundreds of people to attend from across the world, from different communities who have Slow Food chapters across Europe and Asia and South America. And it's just really exciting to realize that, you know, you're gonna have these people whose lives and work revolve around creating and supporting these systems to get good, clean and fair food onto more tables.
And if you think about the different professions and backgrounds and educational levels that all these people who are coming into Bacolod, they're bringing with them, you know, the perspectives, ideas, and experiences when they meet and talk with local leaders and community groups in Negros Island and in other parts of the Philippines too 'cause they're coming for the event. When they talk about farming and food production and gastronomy. All of this just sounds like such an amazing experience and especially to have with people who already know good food really intimately.
So I'm really excited for this interview. Let's get to it.
About Reena
Reena: I am Reena Gamboa. I am the spokesperson for Slow Food Community of Negros. I've been the spokesperson since 2018 thereabouts.
Nastasha: Could you remind us again, are you based primarily in Silay?
Reena: Silay City is located in Negros Occidental. The capital of Negros Occidental is Bacolod, but our official office is in Silay, although our members come from all over Negros Occidental.
Nastasha: At the start of these interviews, I always really like asking people about some of their favorite or formative food memories around Filipino food, which is usually really a point of interest for people in the diaspora as well, who may not be as familiar with different regions of the Philippines.
But I guess before I go into that, I'd like to ask a little bit more about your family connection to the region, because it is quite special. And so I was wondering if you can tell us a little bit about that in relation to how you came to this work.
Reena: Actually, I think, um, when your exposure to something has been there since your childhood, you just come back full circle somehow. And, growing up, my mother who is Tagala actually, she grew up in Tarlac, in Central Luzon. Her parents were also very much into food and she loved to cook. By the way, I don't cook.
So my, my mom loved to cook and she always loved to experiment, try new things. So we were always exposed to new things. But also, being new in Silay when she was newly married, she discovered a lot. Sometimes an outsider sees more than the local, right?
Because we take things for granted. So she always exposed us. Now, in addition to that, of course, those people of my age, I guess some of the younger people don't know her anymore, but the eldest sister of my dad, who I was named after is Doreen Gamboa Fernandez, and she was a food writer. Um. She always wanted to be just called a teacher. She loved to teach, but she excelled most in writing.
It was her husband, Tito Wili, who loved to eat actually. And Tito Wili just loved life, you know, he loved food life, anything luxurious, he loved. Somebody asked him to write about food and he said, I will eat and Doreen will write. So my Tita Doreen ended up doing all the writing and she ended up writing a weekly column, I think at the Philippine Inquirer.
Wrote several books about Philippine gastronomy and became recognized because of that even in the international scene. And we, her family are very, very proud of her that to this day, vloggers food writers who take their profession seriously still consult her books when they want to talk about something.
The funny thing is sometimes they ask me as if I'm the expert. I'm just named after Tita Doreen. I can only share with you my experience, but I am not an expert when it comes to Philippine gastronomy that was Tita Doreen's role. And since she had no children, she considered us, my siblings and I and my first cousins.
I only have seven first cousins, like her own children. So every occasion, which was somebody's birthday or of course Christmas, the holidays, it was Tita Doreen who would order the food that she had discovered for the week or for the month that we would get to eat at home in my grandmother's house.
And it was always a nice get together to learn. It was always a learning experience when Tita Doreen was around, she really was a teacher. She loved to share whatever she discovered with anyone.
A trip to Hong Kong
Reena: And at one point, I went on a trip with Tito Wili, her husband and Tita Doreen to Hong Kong.
And we just ate and ate and ate. Um, Tito Wili would discover from carinderias, little restaurants in Hong Kong that are like.
Nastasha: Like a little eatery.
Reena: Yes, like a little eatery with the cook doing the serving, the washing, et cetera. Or to a high end restaurant like, I forget the name of the restaurant at the Hong Kong Peninsula because my uncle loved staying at the pen. And he just appreciated any kind of food. It didn't have to be high end all the time. But the plan was always okay, for breakfast, we're going to this place and then meet you again at lunch.
We're going to eat in another place and then end up again for dinner in another area. And the most memorable part of the trip was one of their friends hosted us in a, um, exclusive country club or something. And, uh, the Chinese chef was demonstrating the drunken shrimps in front of us, the fresh shrimps with the wine, and then shaking it in front of us and Tita Doreen with her little notebook, writing notes, asking questions.
And that's when I really observed her passion in just writing about food. And it was so interesting.
Nastasha: Wow. Thank you for sharing that. I'm like transported. As someone who led food tours for about three years here in Toronto. It was really interesting for me to have that experience of being with guests kind of as they were tasting things and, you know, as they're being exposed to certain maybe cooking techniques or ingredients or just dishes for the first time.
And as someone who has worked in hospitality my entire life, you see firsthand the impact that food can have on somebody. And I will also say I'm certainly one of the many folks who have been influenced by Teacher Doreen's writing, um, and so.
I wanted to go back to one of the things you were saying earlier where perhaps when there would be a celebration in your family and everybody would gather at your lola's house to eat, I'm wondering if you could maybe share one or two of those, like foods or dishes that you remember a bit from those times.
Reena: Of course, lechon will always be there. But there's always a different version that we get, depending on what Tita Doreen discovers, but she had a favorite one. I cannot even remember who she used to order from. But lechon is a mainstay. I think even to this day, you know, every occasion, every celebration needs lechon. I don't know why. Maybe because it's also easy to feed so many people. Like, you know, in the Philippines there is no such thing as a RSVP, right? just appear and when you invite one, that one person will probably bring a relative or something, you know, so the best dish really to have is lechon.
Nastasha: For sharing it.
Reena: And the basic, some kind of noodle, pancit, and all I remember are the happy memories of eating, but I can't remember in detail what exactly we would eat. I remember one time that she brought ube puto , I think I practically finished the whole box that after that she would send me some all the time. Sad thing is, I can't remember where she got it from, so I never got to taste it again. But that was quite memorable for me.
What I remember more is when she would come visit Silay because uh, she would always order the food that she wanted.
The beauty of river eels
Reena: And there's this carinderia again, small eatery, a family eatery called Sir of all things because his eatery was across a school. So the name of his carinderia Sir, now it's called Ma'm Sir. Or Sir Ma'm, I'm not even sure. But until now, they still make alimusan, which is an eel, river eel. That they make into, it has batuan which is our soaring agent and just a little soup in it. But the souring agent works so well with the alimusan, and of course it has to be the head of the alimusan. When my grandmother was still alive and lived here, when Tita Doreen would come. It would be a competition among my mom, my grandmother and Tita Doreen. They would just eat the head of the alimusan with a little Rufina patis, which is not an Ilonggo, um, we don't really, use Rufina patis, but my grandmother in the Gamboa side actually is from Nueva Ecija, so she's Tagala also.
And my mom is also Tagalog. So they would put Rufina patis in it. And it, I would see them eat it, like going crazy over it. But at that time I wasn't daring enough. 'cause the eel has a big head and it doesn't really look, the first time you'll see it, you think it's like a big head of a snake, I think. The eel is also slimy. But when I did get the courage to try it, oh my god, it is good. And the head is really the best. Tita Doreen would always say the head of a fish has seven flavors. Don't ask me what that is. I have never distinguished the different flavors. All I know is the head of the fish is really the best, but with the alimusan, you have to like eat even the skin in between and the fat in between the jaw, let's say all the cheeks.
Oh, it is really so good with the batuan flavor.
Nastasha: That's what I was trying to imagine. I'm thinking of like a fish and like the panga, right? That there's a little bit of the collagen and a bit
Reena: Actually it's, yeah, the collagen is really good. And aside from the cheeks, it's really underneath the bones of the cheeks and in the head and the flesh on top of the head, which is very flavorful.
Nastasha: Interesting. I love that.
Reena: You eat with a lot of rice. There's no way you'll eat that without rice.
The manuglibud of Negros & Ilonggo kakanins
Reena: And for me, another memorable experience is really the manuglibud. We call them manuglibud because they make libud. Libud is the word for you're a vendor. You carry around your wares to sell. And every morning at 10 in the morning, our manuglibud in our neighborhood, whose name was Cha Juanita, would bring the same thing.
It's in a bilao covered with katsa, the katsa fabric that is used for flour. So that's how she would wrap it. And that was on top of her head, always balanced well, and she would shout that she was there and we would run out and choose the different Silay delicacies that are still existing, but getting lost now because not many people eat it anymore.
So that would be puto lanson, which is colored purple. But actually it's just a food coloring. There's no ube flavor in it. It's sticky rice with coconut milk. And then we have baye-baye, we like to call things, the names are always doubled. Baye-baye and there's inday-inday and they mean girls, right?
Baye-baye is made out of cassava and then inday-inday is also sticky rice, which in Tagalog they call it palitaw, but we eat it with muscovado, not with white sugar. We have ibus, which is sticky rice also, but wrapped in coconut leaves. Or but-ong, which is the same recipe as ibus, but wrapped in banana. We used to have also ibus mais, but nowadays I don't see it anymore.
And of course piaya. And when I say piaya until now, you know, it's my battle cry to always say, the real piaya is flat. It's not fat. It doesn't taste like hopia, it doesn't look like hopia. It's supposed to be flat with a lot of sesame seeds and muscovado inside. The modern piaya that's being sold now is, it looks like a hopa and it's mostly flour already.
It's not the old piaya that I grew up with. Although I have discovered one lady here who still sells it. And then there's lumpia. The lumpia from a neighbor was an over 100-year-old recipe.
Sad to say I never really took that much interest in food until after Tita Doreen died. And I tried to ask around, how did this manuglibud people come about? I asked an aunt before she had passed on, why do we have so much of these delicacies in our island in Negros Occidental.
We are a sugar country where six months is mostly for planting and harvesting and the rest of the six months is you wait for the plant to grow.
So there is not much work to do. And during the olden times, the prices of sugar were so high, you didn't really have to have an extra hustle. Sugar was your main thing. They earned so well that they could survive doing nothing for the next six months. So they would gamble, they would play mahjong or play cards, which we call panggingge. It's all gambling. Or well, for the men cock fights or play golf. Everything was kind of leisurely, or some would travel. Now for those who would gamble, they didn't want to dirty their hands. So the manuglibud would bring in food that was always easy to eat without dirtying your hands so much.
The story of the lumpia, lumpia is originally Chinese, right? And usually it had a sauce on the side. But this lady, she was a Montelibano and she had passed it onto her niece, and now it's to the children of Emma Lacson. They make lumpia out of heart of palm, and the sauce is inside. Then it has a stick of, um, onion leek, yeah. And that's what they would eat during their games. It was wrapped in wax paper. But later on it became our midday snack, either usually in the morning, just before lunch, or in the afternoon. The thing with all these kakanins is they are meant to be eaten right away, so you cannot preserve them.
That's why they would make it libud, bring around to the houses. 'cause you had to buy them and eat it right away. That's what I miss here in Silay. I mean, that was so characteristic of our city. It used to be a town and now it's gone. That's the sad part. There are some people that still sell it in the market.
And when I converted my house into a um, tourist site, and I accept private dining for either dessert or for breakfast. I support the manuglibud people and I buy from them because I think that it should be shared to everybody so that it'll be appreciated again and it'll be in demand again.
You know, one little panara, panara is mung beans sprouts inside, like an empanada wrapper. And it's only 10 pesos. How can you go wrong there and how can you not support them? Right. So I usually buy from them and that's what I serve.
Nastasha: Wow. Oh my goodness. The value of the preservation in that and being able to share that with visitors who come and also have that opportunity to be full circle as you're describing earlier, and support the traditional makers of these kakanin products and other foods, while also being able to provide an experience for your guests who come and stay with you and who show that interest.
And also, these are all things that I'm very interested in, just in terms of like, you know, food culture and what we can learn from that and how we can better support communities on the ground who are actively trying to raise more awareness for these types of products, which is something that has been happening.
Piaya of my childhood
Reena: Actually like with my search for the piaya of my childhood, I had my cook experiment. We've been experimenting to make the real piaya. Because what's funny is although piaya has been there for years, not many cooks know how to make it. So I just used a basic recipe and then every time she would cook it, I would tell her, this is not it.
So we would try again. And finally, we are close to the one that I remember, but still not. But I offer piaya making classes, because I want other people to try and experiment also, and try to do it in their homes so that it doesn't disappear. So I offer that also.
Nastasha: And can you remind, um, for listeners who are not as familiar, what are the basic ingredients for piaya?
Reena: It's muscovado, salt, flour. And you cannot use the top of the line flour. You have to use, they call it third class in the market. So it's third class flour, muscovado, a little salt and of course, coconut oil or lard, whichever is available. And sesame seeds.
Nastasha: Mm.
Reena: That is the most important because when you put it on the griddle.
Nastasha: Mm-hmm.
Reena: You toast the sesame seeds and that flavor that mixes with the muscovado is really what gives it flavor.
Introduction to Slow Food Negros
Nastasha: I'm getting hungry now for breakfast, but, um, all of these descriptions are obviously very, I'll remember the English word for it later, but nakakatakam in Tagalog, very appetite inducing.
And I'd like to I guess segue a little bit into Slow Food and the organization's advocacies and from this point, because you were talking about ingredients such as batuan, for example, which I know is in the Slow Food Ark of Taste list as one of those ingredients that as Ark of Taste kind of implies is a list of ingredients and foods and traditional products across the world in different areas that there are Slow Food communities where local communities and advocates for these traditional products are really kind of trying to make this more known to other people through documentation and research.
And kind of, you were saying, making it a bit more full circle so that it goes back into the hands of the makers and the producers, help them continue it if there's support for it locally, and all that.
I was wondering if you could tell us a little bit about how you came to Slow Food Negros and how that's slowly coming into the big festival that's coming up in November.
Reena: So actually, it's a funny story. The big guy actually in Slow Food Negros is really Chin-Chin Uy. Chin has been an organic farmer since he was young. Chin is around in his early forties. But he started, I think in his maybe early thirties that he became an organic farmer. He started just by making vermicast to sell to other organic farmers.
So he got so into it and he got introduced to Slow Food. I'm not sure anymore if it was my mom who invited him or he invited my mom. But anyway, my mom's very active in preserving culture of any kind. She is now the president of the Negros Cultural Foundation, and they take care of the Negros Museum.
And with that, I grew up always in an environment where art, culture, food, it's always something to be appreciated and something to be preserved. And she was the one having a meeting with Chin-Chin and I just happened to pick her up. And when I picked her up, they said, why don't you join Slow Food? Without knowing what Slow Food was, I said, okay, maybe it's also slow there, I don't have to be so active. Because at that time I was very active in my handcraft business, I was exporting, then I was running the farm, and at the time, my children were still growing up, so it's, you know, I can only do so much.
So I said yes, and we had a few activities here and there. And then mom slowly focused more on Negros Cultural Foundation in the museum. I ended up working with Chin-Chin and we had different presidents at that time, I would join of course. And then we ran out of people willing to be spokespersons because, you know, when you're in a volunteer organization, the president or the head will always end up doing most of the work. Um, that's reality. And usually there's no money. So you're doing it because it's an advocacy. You believe in it.
Slow Food in Bacolod
Reena: Before I knew it, everything just happened so fast and now we are holding an international event. And it's overwhelming, challenging, but it's something I believe in. So that is the driving force there. And wanting to put our island, Negros Occidental, and Bacolod City in the map of the world of gastronomy.
Because I noticed compared to other regions in the Philippines, we seem to be more particular about our food, wanting it fresh all the time. The flavors that we want in our dishes, it's different.
I think really we should be there, and push Philippine gastronomy as far as it can reach. We deserve that. The Philippines deserves that. We're always being stepped on by others, whether it be in agriculture, in tourism, in everything.
We start something, we do well and then it just goes down. It's sad, but I think now with us private sector working together with the public sector, in sync with this belief of Slow food, I am hoping that we will have more sustainability than the usual. I hope that it'll not just be a trend. I want it to be something permanent and something bigger, even if we're gone. So that's the goal.
Nastasha: That the structure's there and, um, may magpapatuloy in Tagalog, there will be others to continue.
Reena: Yes, that's, well now is to start it. And then the next assignment is to find people who will continue it and will make it multiply in the whole Philippines. Because with the advocacy of Slow Food, I think we can do more for our country in different aspects, not only food. Food is just the main attraction, but there's a deeper message.
There's a deeper mission in Slow Food that will I hope sustain our country and make it more comfortable for people, for our fellow Filipinos, that we can live in a beautiful place. We don't have to be the richest country, but definitely the healthiest. Maybe not only in physical form, but in our environment, our biodiversity and even education.
Nastasha: This is, I'm very affected as someone in the diaspora to learn about this stuff because, again, speaking from the perspective of knowing people in the Toronto region, for example, who have really made strides to connect with their cultural heritage a lot of the times through food.
So this year is going to be the first Terra Madre Asia Pacific Conference, the theme of it being, from soil to sea, a Slow Food journey through tastes and traditions.
I was wondering if you could tell us about one of the communities or one of the foods or projects that you've recently visited to lead up to the planning of this.
Reena: Every visit to a community is different, and we are still trying to spread the advocacy by visiting other places that want to form Slow Food communities, but don't know how.
A remote community in Sarangani
Reena: Traveling all over has made me realize that, you know, the Philippines is really not Manila. That is a big realization. I went to Mindanao just a month ago. And there's a place called Datal Angas in, where is it, Sarangani. It is two hours by car, because the roads now are fixed, but before it would take I think five to six hours because it was all just rough road and muddy. And the place is untouched. The community has not seen even the city of Sarangani. It looks like a small town abroad actually, where they
Nastasha: Sa may coast?
Reena: In the mountains and they are occupied by two tribes. It's called B'laan Tribe. And the Tagakaulod tribe. It took a long time for me to remember those two words 'cause it's hard. And they have preserved their music.
They harvest abaca from the forest, meaning it just grows there. The forest is rich, things just grow there. All you have to do is appreciate it and harvest it and take care of the place. So we had a two hour walk to the forest, which was muddy and of course I fell, but they have abaca all over the place, so they practically process it wherever they are.
So if they find abaca in a certain place, they'll just
Nastasha: Strip it down.
Reena: Yeah, strip it and then carry it down to their homes. They carry down the fiber already. They don't bring everything down. So whatever is considered waste is thrown back to the soil. So can you imagine how fertile that is?
'cause that's compost again. And they carry it in horses. They have local small horses where they load the abaca. It's so quaint. And so I thought I was like, in another world because really no invasion yet of progress. Of progress that we consider progress. Okay. Not the real progress.
And then the forest is rich with coffee trees. So they have coffee there, which is why we went there because we are wanting to form a coffee coalition, so that they can protect their coffee and the varieties that grow in their area. It was just so touching to see a place that has not been infiltrated by outsiders.
I mean, the culture is intact. We spent a night there and the office of the mayor had like a small celebration because the wife won as mayor, and the locals did not relate to the modern music that they were playing. Even the songs that the singers were playing, they, they could not relate so well.
The internet there is bad. They only were able to see town when the roads were fixed. That was just what, maybe in three years.
Nastasha: Recently, talaga. Mm-hmm.
Reena: And there were NPAs there, so there were rebels there, but because, uh, I'm not political here, but their story is they took president Duterte's word seriously that he would make sure that the rebels will be killed. So they all surrendered, all 200 of them. And now the mayor has made them into forest rangers. They all take care of the forest.
Nastasha: Mm-hmm.
"What do you eat?"
Reena: And so I started asking questions. Because when I go to a community, I always ask, what do you eat?
In Slow Food, our advocacy of good, clean and fair food for all means the first person who must not go hungry is the farmer or the fisher folk.
And one of them told me, camote. I said, really? Usually, when you ask them, they don't tell you right away what they really eat because they think that it's ordinary. They think it's too low, too meager, that it's nothing to be proud of. So like in the forest, I said, what can you gather here that you can eat?
At first he said nothing. But luckily, of course, I've been to other forests. So I said, how about pako, the fern, the young leaves of the fern? Then he said, ah, yes, yes, yes, we eat it. So I said, why did you say that you have nothing to eat. So for them it's nothing. But really it's something because that is the food that will nourish you.
So I had interviewed some of them, and you know what the irony is? They go down to the city to buy vegetables. I don't understand. I said, how come you don't plant in your area? No answer. So imagine, they have good land, they can plant vegetables there. But maybe for them vegetable meant eggplant, cucumber, garlic.
Nastasha: Mga lowland.
Reena: Vegetable can mean kangkong, alugbati, or any weed that is eaten but is not seen elsewhere. So of course, it's all the hype, social media, promotions that we all think that high-end food or imported food is what is food. It's not. It's what will nourish you and what is in the area that grows without effort.
Meaning it is perfect for that environment and it is part of that biodiversity. So it'll just grow naturally. Meaning you cannot go hungry 'cause those things grow there. And if you don't abuse it, it'll feed you. So these are things that, it's very difficult to make people realize the value of what they have.
It's always an outsider who will see what you have. And giving a two hour talk of Slow Food will not work. It's a continuous job. Even me, it took me maybe two or three years to actually absorb what is good, clean, and fair. To the point now that when I go to the supermarket, I really have nothing to buy anymore.
There's nothing good, clean and fair there. Even things to clean your house with, it's all chemicals. So yeah, I hardly go to the supermarket now. Maybe toiletries, but that's it.
Nastasha: It really opens your eyes.
"The farmer has no pride in himself"
Reena: Yeah. So, because of that, then the farmer has no pride in himself. He feels like he has no voice in society, like, even the dog is given more importance than that person who has a voice. So food is just the attraction, as I said, but there's a deeper message there. The importance of the person, the place, the environment, the biodiversity is not appreciated.
As opposed to one community here in Sagay City. Where the Maranon family have been in politics for the longest time, maybe 60 years. But they have identified early on the value and the richness of the sea in their area.
So they have always had ordinances to protect their environment. It is a marine reserve now, and you will now appreciate the richness. You can still see and enjoy sea urchins, big shells that you can try and eat. There are even a few stingrays there, that one you're not allowed anymore to touch. They even have colorful parrot fishes. It's so varied and so beautiful. It's still preserved. A community called suyak takes care of the mangroves, and then another community there does sea ranching where they just put old tires and wood, like a cage, and leave it there.
They don't put commercial feeds in the sea. They make the fish eat what they're supposed to eat, and after four months they harvest whatever they need. Now, those varieties or breeds that shouldn't be harvested anymore, like a puffer fish, is just thrown back to the sea. So this is a more sophisticated community naman, compared to that other one.
"We have to protect it now"
Reena: You can see that the Philippines is still so rich in all this, and the biodiversity is so varied. We have to protect it now. We shouldn't allow fast food and industrialization to come in anymore. If not, we will just be another America, and do we want that?
It's a lot of work. But if our small voice will not voice out, then who will? You know, rather than complaining and shouting, our way is different. We just do. As Nike says, we just do it.
So at least with what we're doing, some government agencies have appreciated it and are supporting us. So we just move on with whatever we have.
Nastasha: One of the, the main things that I recall when you talk about Sagay, is the story about kinilaw from one of, um, Tita Doreen's essays and Mang Enting.
Reena: Enting is the inspiration of the book of Tita Doreen named kinilaw. He was the inspiration there and I only found out last year, Enting told me that the first sales of her book, she had given the money to him. I didn't know. So that's how much she appreciated Enting.
Nastasha: And that value talaga of being able to recognize, I'm trying to think of a better way to put it, but like that really everything starts with the person who harvests it, who farms your vegetables and your food and the fisher folk. And very much admittedly from my perspective as somebody who grew up in Manila and really who did not have exposure to a lot of the process behind food. Kasi, growing up in the city for me in the nineties, everything was in the supermarket. Exactly. And that was my exposure to it. Like my family every week. Like I would go to the palengke, maybe if I visited my lola, but yeah, most of the time it would just be through the supermarket.
And, hearing from my cousins now and, you know, those who have kids in the Philippines, are still based in and around Manila. There's a bit more of a change now for sure, and that there's more awareness on these types of things. But as you're saying, obviously a very long way to go still.
The little things hopefully will add up and make a little bit of a ripple change. Even if we don't maybe see it right away, hopefully it makes an impact.
Thoughtful experiences over imported pasalubong
Nastasha: I guess what I'd like to ask you as a parting thought for people in the diaspora specifically, in terms of being able to support the Slow Food advocacy, even from afar, how do you think we might be able to do that?
Reena: Um, you know, instead of sending chocolates, commercial chocolates like Nestle, I mean, I used to love them too. Hershey's, Nestle Crunch. But those are candies. That's just all sugar. That's not real chocolate. Do you know that in Negros Occidental we have the top of the line variety called criollo?
So instead of sending imported stuff, some pasalubong, maybe once in a while buy from the local farmer and have them deliver it to your relatives and say, you know, this is more healthy. This is for them to appreciate the food again. Maybe it's a matter of saying it na, I miss kare-kare, for example. So instead of me eating it, I'm going to buy the ingredients and you cook it and eat it there. Or something to encourage them to appreciate it again rather than send all this processed stuff back here.
Instilling in your family, imagine if one person there has a family of 20 here that they send a message to or maybe send them here to do a Slow Food travel community experience for vacation, rather than, you know, treat them to I dunno where. To appreciate the Philippines and appreciate our food is, it's something different.
And it'll send a message of trying to remember who we are, appreciating ourselves as Filipinos.
Terra Madre Asia Pacific: From Soil to Sea
Reena: They can also come, I forgot to advertise, on November 19th to 23, our international event, Terra Madre Asia Pacific, because we will have exciting exhibits where it'll be interactive, where people will learn where their food is coming from.
That's the most important thing, 'cause if you don't realize where your food is coming from, then you just keep on eating the same commercial food, which you think is yummy but it's actually slowly, the reason why probably you have all these health issues. It's because you don't know where food is coming from.
So we will have activities where you will discover that, especially with the youth. Nowadays we have children like in their early thirties who need dialysis, for example, because of eating too much instant noodles, their parents probably are too busy that they buy noodles that all you do is put hot water. But that is a lot of salt. It has a lot of chemicals. You need to preserve it and the kids get sick. Nowadays, young children are fat, that kind that looks unhealthy, because of all the trans fat that they eat. All the sugar. When I say sugar, it doesn't mean literally sugar.
It can be in popcorn, it can come in fried rice. Candies, chocolates that are not real chocolates. So one time I attended a talk from a chocolatier and he showed us pictures of all these Hershey's, et cetera. He tells us, his first sentence, these are candies, these are not chocolates. So that's when I learned, yeah, you're right. They're not.
It's full of sugar, milk and very little chocolate. So that's not the real thing
And then we will have taste workshops where you can taste different flavors of local ingredients, how it was cooked before, or how it can be cooked now.
You can also, um, veer away from the traditional but still use the local ingredients so that farmers will still keep on planting it and it'll always exist in our biodiversity and environment.
And then we will have a coffee coalition area where you will learn from the coffee farmers up to the coffee baristas of the beauty of real coffee. 'cause we will have coffee from other countries also.
And then we have a new program called Slow Drinks where we will learn how to ferment or how to use fruits and vegetables and maybe even soup from the fish into a nice drink.
Then we will be also offering a post tour, and we will launch Slow Food Travel, which will be accredited by Slow Food International, where you will experience visiting the farmer, his place, eat with them, eat their food, learn how they process your coffee, for example, learn how far their farms are.
So you will see where your coffee's coming from, how it's processed, and then even learn, tasting it and being able to judge which is really the good coffee or which is the coffee that you really want.
So there will be a lot of exciting things. We have participating countries like Slow Food, Korea, Japan, Indonesia, Taiwan. Even Slovakia I think is coming. We have Afghanistan, we have Pakistan, Sri Lanka. So it's quite exciting to be able to share and realize how Asia and Pacific is one region and how our connection with each other on how we became to be different and how also we are one in certain things, especially with Indonesia because they're the closest to us, so it'll be very, very interesting.
Nastasha: Exciting. Just hearing, um, you talk about this, I'm like, I wanna book my flight.
Reena: Yes, please do.
Nastasha: Well, I'll certainly extend the invitation to those who are listening. Hopefully there are quite a few of us who may be able to come visit and experience
Reena: By the way, if they need help, for booking a hotel here, we have a logistics group. You can just message us in our website or in our Facebook and Instagram pages. We already have a Terra Madre, Asia and Pacific page, but you can also message us in our Slow Food Negros page for more information or for help, how to get here, information of how you can get to Bacolod City.
Nastasha: Fantastic. Thank you very much. And I'll include those links for the Facebook pages on the website as well, um, 'cause for me too, I guess I'll say that, it's one thing to like
learn about these foods and hear about them and hear the history, which is all very important, I think, in kind of helping appreciate na, what you're seeing, like, the food is never just what's on your plate. There's always a backstory and such a rich backstory. Really, if you take the time and show the interest to wanna learn about everything that happened, to get what it is that's in front of you, and be able to enjoy it and eat it, and in a kind of cheesy way, like be one with everybody else who helped bring that to your table, so to speak.
Reena: Yes.
Bamboo shoots in coconut milk
Nastasha: I guess my last quick parting question that I like to ask everybody is, what are you excited to cook or eat next? And that can be anything. Maybe that's for dinner, something this week.
Reena: Actually, what I do is I always check in the farm what vegetable I can harvest for the week, and then I plan from there. Because you can enjoy the full nutrition of a certain ingredient when it is freshly picked. Since I am blessed with that opportunity.
So I check first what is going to be harvested, and then I decide what to eat from there. Because even just sauteed kulitis with tomatoes for me is the best when it is newly picked that all the flavors are there.
Nastasha: Can you remind me for what's kulitis again? Is it a.
Reena: It's a local, wait a minute, it comes from the jute family.
Nastasha: Okay.
Reena: It just grows wild. I don't know. So, no, sorry, sorry. Jute is tugabang, K is spinach, I think. Yeah.
Nastasha: So leafy green.
Reena: yes, leafy green and it just grows wild in the farm. So if there is, or like. That's another thing. We believe in seasonality.
Now is the season for bamboo shoots. When I saw some the other day, I had them cook it with gata with coconut milk and other vegetables that are available and a few crabs and with rice, I'm good.
Nastasha: Yeah.
Reena: Yeah.
Nastasha: My warmest thanks again to Ms. Reena Gamboa for taking the time to chat with us for this episode. Head to the links in the show notes for more information on Slow Food Negros and the upcoming Terra Madre Asia Pacific Conference in Bacolod City. Again, that's taking place on November 19 to 23, 2025.
Our theme music is by Crowander with segment music by Eric and McGill, Blue Dot Sessions and Podington Bear.
Until next time, maraming salamat. Thank you for listening.