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Text and photos by Ana Santos, Contributor
The prospect of eating authentic Chinese food while taking a
completely sensorial tour of Binondo—the sights, sounds and tastes
of what is probably the oldest China Town in Asia—can arouse
anyone’s wanderlust. Satisfying that wanderlust is exactly what
Old Manila Walks: The Big Binondo Wok Tour exactly aims to do.
The starting point of this walking and eating
tour is the Binondo Church. Erected in 1596, Binondo Church, which
has been re-named Minor Basilica of Saint Lorenzo Ruiz, is one of
the oldest places of worship in the Philippines. Only the bell tower
remains of the 16th century construction as earthquakes, war and
other natural disasters ravaged the original edifice. The water
fountain across the Binondo Church is still the original structure,
preserved over the years. Its water is even running which is quite
impressive. Sharing bits of trivia that give a peak at Binondo’s
place in history, tour guide—host Ivan Man Dy, says that Lorenzo
Ruiz, the first Filipino saint, was a resident of Binondo and that
Andres Bonifacio married Gregoria de Jesus in the Binondo Church in
1895.
Binondo was the main center for business and
finance in Manila for the Chinese, Chinese mestizos and Spanish
Filipinos, hosting a bustling banking and financial community,
insurance companies and other business institutions. Traces of this
business community can still be seen in the old and worn down
buildings surrounding the church. One can imagine what the area must
have been as Dy says that the plaza outside of the Binondo Church
was the Ayala Avenue of it’s time. During the financial crisis of
the early 1980s, Binondo earned the nickname “Binondo Central
Bank” for the rampant black marketing of US dollars, with volumes
so huge that it would often dictate the actual peso-dollar exchange
rate. The term “Binondo Central Bank” has survived to this day
and is still one of Binondo’s monikers.
Behind the church, along the side streets is the
first “taste stop”—an inconspicuous tsokolate tablea [hot
breakfast chocolate tablets] store. With only a few boxes of tablea
on display in a very small and narrow storefront, it is easy to
overlook the store itself. However, even if this stop weren’t part
of the tour—the rich luscious smell of chocolate would lure anyone
to this quaint tablea store.
This tablea factory is perhaps one of the few
remaining in Chinatown—a family-run business handed down from
several generations. The tablea is still made in the traditional way
with the freshly roasted cacao beans from Davao ground and cooked
into a thick chocolate paste that is shaped into the round tableas.
While sipping the rich dark chocolate, one can go back in history to
the era described in Noli Me Tangere when chocolate tablea was
served as tsokolat-e which is its purest form and therefore made to
be enjoyed by the rich, and the tsokolat-a or tsokolat with agua; a
diluted form that was meant for the lower class.
The next taste stop was the only themed
restaurant in Binondo dedicated to the Binondo Volunteer Fire
Brigade (to which the proceeds of the restaurant go). Fireman’s
hats and nuzzles make for wall decoration. Ang Sung’s
award-winning photographs, dramatically capturing the devastation of
the many fires that have besieged Binondo make the restaurant a
tribute to heroes. Gerry Chua, a member of the Binondo Fire Brigade,
is often seen eating at his restaurant. Gerry is also founder of the
famous ube flavored Eng Bee Tin Hopia. When Eng Bee Tin’s original
ube hopia creation skyrocketed to fame, he donated several fire
trucks to the Binondo Fire Brigade in the signature purple colors of
Eng Bee Tin. These purple fire trucks can be seen parked along the
streets of Binondo making one want to re-think the invention of the
widely used term “fire engine red.” Clearly, not all fire
engines are created the same.
This is the first of many food stops of this
two-hour walking tour where you can get a taste of authentic Hokkien
style meal comprised of fish ball soup and Kiampong (fried rice with
spring onion, pork adobo and adobo peanuts) cooked with bits of gac.
Gac (momordica cochinchinensis, also known as baby Jackfruit or
spiny bitter gourd) is a fruit of southern Asia traditionally used
throughout the world for its restorative properties. It is found in
commercially available products that help rejuvenate cellular
function and combats the common effects of aging. The refreshing,
slightly tart, deliciously sweet flavor of gac is a surprisingly
excellent complement to the authentic Hokkien meal.
The next stop is a tiny dour-table restaurant
owned and managed a “BS” (bagong salta or new migrants from
China) couple, was Binondo’s own little culinary secret—freshly
made Chinese dumplings and Chinese pancakes.
With an unpretentious functional utilitarian
restaurant set up of tables and chairs, the dumplings are freshly
rolled right there in the restaurant for everyone to see and then
steamed or fried to a crisp perfection.
Of course, any tour of Binondo would not have
been complete without daring to taste its exotic delicacies. For the
more adventurous lot, there is Binondo’s version of balut—chicken
eggs marinated in iced tea and soy sauce. The more faint of heart
can sample fried siopao openly cooked in a simple store with a wide
window opening. The hot-off-the-grill siopao is so tasty you don’t
need to put sauce on it.
The last stop is a restaurant neatly tucked
inside an art-deco building that serves authentic fresh vegetable
lumpia that is as delicious as it is healthy.
The Big Binondo Food Wok tour ends leaving you
with your tummy full and your wanderlust satiated. Truly, the best
way to discover a city is by getting a taste of it.
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