The Pilgrim's Pots and Pans

Welcome to this incompletely restored food blog The Pilgrim’s Pots and Pans, a heartfelt return to all things tasty!

For those who happen to drop by just now, a short introduction: This food blog is a journey in itself. I started it twenty (20) years ago to have recipes I am always asked for in a public space. These were mostly for friends abroad and had lots of ingredient substitutions. Then I got questions from young people outside the Philippines, who ate Filipino food but were already disconnected from the context of the cuisine. This made me write down short introductory notes on the dishes and personal anecdotes to give a more cultural perspective. 

In time, food blogging made me want to know and write more about our daily fare, the food that endures. I realised that featuring celebration food – what we usually serve during fiestas and other special occasions – is good, but we should also give more attention to what we eat on ordinary days, when there is nothing special happening. This is the food that sustained us through the ages, what nourished a nation that is still in search of its identity and value.

So started my adventure into documenting food traditions such as how lacatan malutu turns into duman (part 1 and part 2). When I wrote that in 2005, it was mainly to capture what does not appear in news and feature articles. Duman-making just could not be confined into some column space. It needed to be told in all its glory, which included the process and the roles that the farmers play in making it. 

Several other posts were more like eureka moments, such as investigating why we call a Capampangan bread sopas when it’s not even remotely soupy. There’s also pisto which we knew had Spanish roots but how so? Then there’s our town’s humba which is cooked very differently from the more popular Visayan variety. These and other posts made me dig through books and articles on history, food anthropology, and other materials I wouldn’t have touched if I wasn’t blogging. 

This was happening as I was also working and active in community activities that were not related to food. There were months and even years I had no posts due to the schedule I kept although I get requests for articles for some publications. Then, between 2016 and 2019, ironically when I was working in mainstream media (the Archdiocesan radio station), I was not able to write anything substantial and archived my blog. I thought it had been final.

However, recent discussions on food and culture found me unearthing articles I had worked on. There is a need for accurate information on Filipino food and culture. We who have it must be generous. It does not matter if the posts go viral or get noticed by just a handful, but the information has to be out there. It has to be accessible.

And so I resurrect this blog. The posts are coming in trickles because of several challenges:

1. There are different versions – the original posts, which I prefer because they capture the initial curiosity and the updates that go with them as comments (not up yet) add to the discussion; and then revised for SunStar column – my posts were printed for the publication’s street copy and had to adhere to space limitations. These were shorter but since they were published much later, they had updated information. Reconciling the originals with the updated columns can sometimes take time, especially if there are things I don’t want to take out of the older version. In any case, it has to be done, so revisions are there;
2. Most of the old posts capture the interaction within our community of food bloggers. However, many of us have moved on doing other things, our blogs moved domains or have also been archived. Many of my posts then contain broken links. I check these one by one. Those that are still on the original sites are retained. The broken ones are either deleted or redirected to the Internet Archive;
3. There are missing photos. Although the most important posts have them, a few don’t. Some are also too blurred to be useful because almost 20 years ago, I was using a less than 6MP point-and-shoot camera. With today’s culture, one needs to be visual. So I need to unearth everything from my electronic baul to find appropriate photos. If I really cannot find any, for non-critical posts (if I only need a visual idea), I generate one using AI. If it is a critical step and it has to be done in person, I defer the post till it can be done myself, or when I can borrow from friends who share the same cooking techniques. In any case, if you see AI-generated photos here, those are temporary.

In the meantime, I will also be keeping this blog current. For one, I will practice writing using old or new food items that I find interesting. I have written a few papers and have had discussions about food with many people that have excellent knowledge on the topic. I may post about those, too. Do let me know if there is something you wish to talk about.

It has been a long and arduous journey to get to this point, but I am grateful for the opportunity to rebuild this food blog. I would love to see how this proceeds. 

Thank you for joining me on this journey!