Wazzup Pilipinas!?
In the Philippines, adobo is more than just a dish. It’s an heirloom of the soul, simmered in vinegar and memory, seasoned with survival, migration, and the enduring warmth of home. And in The Ultimate Filipino Adobo: Stories Through the Ages, artist, chef, and food historian Claude Tayag boldly declares what many of us have long felt—adobo is not simply a recipe, but a living chronicle of our nationhood.
Tayag’s book is not a typical cookbook. It is a multi-sensory feast, plated in essays, memoirs, cultural commentaries, historical fragments, and of course, a mosaic of adobo recipes that span from the prehistoric to the postmodern. The moment you crack open its vividly designed pages, you enter a deeply intimate but proudly public archive—one that validates every Filipino’s version of the adobo narrative.
The Flavor of Memory
“When you miss home and cook adobo, it smells of home,” Tayag writes. “You are transported back home—not just the physical home, but the memories of eating with your mother and grandmother.”
In this tender line lies the beating heart of the book. Tayag doesn’t impose a singular recipe. In fact, he breaks the myth of the “correct” adobo, making space instead for regional and even personal differences. Whether it’s the turmeric-tinged adobong dilaw of Batangas, the coconut-rich adobo sa gata of Bicol, or the soyless, vinegary Ilocano pinaklay or dinaldalem, each variation is an edible autobiography. Each pot tells the story of a province, a family, a survival strategy.
The boldest truth in Tayag’s exploration? That adobo is a paradox—a fiercely individualistic dish that still unites us as a people. It’s where grandmother’s secrets meet ancestral wisdom, and where invention is not rebellion, but ritual.
A Pre-Hispanic Palate with Colonial Notes
Long before Spanish galleons docked on our shores, pre-colonial Filipinos were already simmering their meats in vinegar and salt as a method of preservation. This proto-adobo practice was later layered with soy sauce introduced by Chinese traders, garlic and bay leaf from the Spanish kitchen, and even techniques from the Americas via the Manila-Acapulco Galleon trade.
Tayag walks us through this journey with the curiosity of an anthropologist and the flair of a poet. In doing so, he uncovers how adobo, like the Filipino identity, is a palimpsest—layered, evolving, ungovernable, and yet utterly familiar.
“The Only Correct Way to Cook Adobo…”
“...is the one you grew up with,” Tayag insists.
This radical inclusivity is what makes the book revolutionary. For centuries, elite culinary texts sought to pin Filipino food down, to structure it, to classify it. But Tayag does the opposite. He decentralizes the power. He offers the formula—½ cup vinegar, ¼ cup soy sauce, bay leaves, peppercorns—but then sets us free to riff, just like every Filipino cook does after one glance at Lola’s simmering pot.
Recipes as Resistance, Love, and Storytelling
The book contains dozens of recipes—some from Tayag’s own kitchen, others contributed by chefs and food historians like Angelo Comsti. One striking example is Comsti’s Salty Adobo, a rich blend of pork, chicken liver, and tausi (fermented black beans). It simmers with umami and heartache—the kind of adobo you eat after a long day, in quiet gratitude for survival.
Then there’s Tayag’s own Three-Way Chicken Adobo—a culinary performance that presents one dish in three textures: braised, fried, and glazed. It’s adobo as theater, as celebration, and as proof that this dish is both rooted and revolutionary.
Even a poem finds its place in the book:
“Ay! Ang adobo ni Inang… Mas masarap pag nagtagal.”
“Oh! My mother’s adobo… Like a heart that loves / Gets better when it lasts.”
Gastrodiplomacy and Cultural Assertion
More than a book, The Ultimate Filipino Adobo is part of the Philippine Foreign Service Institute’s gastrodiplomacy series. Following Pancit 101, this second volume aims to arm diplomats, overseas workers, and global foodies with a taste of our culture that no translation can dilute.
It’s our edible flag.
Whether gifted to foreign dignitaries or discovered on the shelf of a San Francisco bookshop, the book becomes an ambassador in itself—declaring: “This is us. We are diverse. We are marinated in history. And we are deliciously defiant.”
Why There’s No Digital Version—and Why That Matters
Curiously, the book is available only in print. No Kindle. No PDF. Just thick, full-color pages that demand your time, attention, and perhaps even a bit of sauce-staining. In an age of ephemeral scrolling, this permanence feels sacred.
Claude Tayag has given us something that refuses to be swiped past or skimmed. Like adobo itself, it asks to be absorbed slowly, returned to, reheated, and remembered.
A Call to the Filipino Table
The ultimate beauty of Tayag’s book lies not just in its content, but in its philosophy: That cooking adobo is an act of love. That eating it is an act of remembrance. That arguing over whose version is best is not divisive—it’s cultural continuity.
Whether you’re in Manila or Milan, Bicol or Brooklyn, this book invites you to the Filipino table—not to dictate how adobo should be cooked, but to remind you that wherever you are, you are home when the garlic hits the pan and the vinegar hisses into heat.
The Ultimate Filipino Adobo is available in National Book Store, Philippine Books, Lazada, and select global sellers. But its message is already everywhere: Your story is valid. Your adobo is ultimate.
Ross is known as the Pambansang Blogger ng Pilipinas - An Information and Communication Technology (ICT) Professional by profession and a Social Media Evangelist by heart.
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