MANILA, Philippines – Pursed lips, a delicate wince, and that acquainted asim (sourness) that wakes up the palate. Everyone knows the expertise of suka (vinegar).
As Filipinos, we love our vinegar: it’s that bitter kick that contrasts our richer, meatier dishes, and the brightness to our kinilaws and ensaladas. Not solely is it the very best associate to dried fish, however it’s the savory-sour basis of our adobo, and extra.
And this love isn’t new. “Vinegar has been round since pre-colonial instances,” culinary guide and chef Bettina Arguelles advised audiences at November’s Terra Madre Asia Pacific Pageant, the Asia Pacific area’s largest sustainable gastronomy occasion, held in Bacolod for the primary time.
Due to our tropical local weather, she mentioned, our ancestors relied closely on vinegar, salt, and different souring brokers to season and protect meals whereas touring or working the land. What was as soon as a easy preservation approach has helped form the flavour profile of Filipino meals at the moment.
Nevertheless, whereas vinegar stays probably the most generally used components in Filipino kitchens, most of it’s commercially manufactured. The artwork of creating our oldest types of vinegar — historically made, laboriously fermented, and naturally sourced — is quietly fading away.
From the ‘palm’ of Marcelino’s hand
Making Bulacan’s sukang sasa (nipa palm) is tedious and time-consuming. Chef Angelo Comsti, founding father of Offbeat Bistro, recounts his award-winning story of Eddie Marcelino, a 75-year-old artisan who’s been making the normal vinegar for nearly half a century.
Marcelino’s each day routine begins at 5 within the morning in Pabongbong, Bulacan, lengthy thought-about the capital of sukang sasa.
Earlier than dawn, he rides a wobbly bangka (boat) by way of the 1,500-square-meter marshland swamp his grandfather as soon as owned, along with his trusty picket sinisikaran, a device wrapped in rubber, searching for nipa bushes.
As an alternative of kicking the trunks, as previous observe dictated, he faucets the stalks of the nipa palm fruit for weeks to extract the sap; this technique is much less bodily taxing and doesn’t “damage” the tree as a lot.
When the fruits are prepared, he cuts the bunch, ties a bottle beneath the stalk, and lets the juice seep slowly into the container. He religiously does this for 3 consecutive weeks.
“Dapat huwag isasagad,” Marcelino advised Comsti. “Dapat itigil na kung paubos na ang katas. Huwag iyong simot na simot.” (Don’t max it out; it’s best to cease simply earlier than the sap completely runs out.)
If you happen to drain it an excessive amount of, the tree weakens. Give it six months to get better, and the tree can produce sap once more.
He pours the murky white liquid right into a tapayan, a big earthenware jar used to retailer liquids, and covers it up with rubber tires. He reserves some to drink as tuba, the normal nipa wine, which his loyal clients normally order.
Marcelino lets the liquid ferment till foamy (“like beer,” Comsti shared) and pungent for 2 weeks, then transfers the vinegar into reused five-gallon containers. On an excellent day, he produces about 5 buckets. However when it rains, his output is much less.
He sells the sukang sasa for round P100 every — “a measly quantity for the load of labor it requires,” Comsti mentioned.
A intermediary transports the vinegar to the general public market in Calumpit or close by cities, the place it’s bought at the next worth.
The job requires quite a bit from Marcelino, whose physique is getting old, however he doesn’t complain. He mentioned that he prefers this work to the sweltering plastic company job he as soon as had in Manila. He doesn’t have to reply to anybody, and his earnings have put his 5 youngsters by way of faculty.
“Sarcastically, sending his youngsters to highschool has made him conscious of professions past the farm and has consequently curbed their curiosity in taking up their father’s job,” Comsti shared.
The youngest of the brood, the one one who lives with Marcelino and his spouse Angelina, is just not “at the very least one bit inquisitive about what his father does.” However the septuagenarian artisan continues the legacy his grandfather and father left him.
Nevertheless, the generational hole isn’t the one downside. Air pollution is worsening, and nipa groves are disappearing. Plantations have gotten fishponds, and hectares of palm bushes are being cleared to turn into swimming pools of breeding fish; these present greater incomes.
“The chances are in opposition to Marcelino,” Comsti mentioned, however he’s not prepared to surrender his household’s long-standing custom that simply. “He guarantees that so long as there are patches of nipa in his yard and God permits him to take to the streets, there can be sukang sasa.”
The vinegar he produces is not like any business bottle: it’s clear, easy, virtually cider-like in aroma and style, barely creamy in consistency, and could be sipped by itself. Its fruity acidity is stringent however not sharp; it sings on the tongue however doesn’t sting.
“To put it aside, we have to devour extra of it, to understand it, and to acknowledge it,” Comsti mentioned.
Versatile and vibrant
“It’s necessary that we’re in a position, as cooks, to maintain this heritage in an impressed approach,” Arguelles added. Other than cooking with native components, telling these tales retains the cultural legacy alive.
Understanding the historical past of an ingredient reminds us of its significance. Earlier than the kitchen, vinegar was used for each day life: as people drugs, disinfectant, herbicide, and even a cleaning agent.
Vinegar proves that our areas are adaptable. Throughout the archipelago, communities developed distinctive sorts based mostly on what was plentiful round them — coconut (sukang tuba), cane, nipa, kaong palm (sukang irok), and extra. In Ilocos, households cooked down their vinegar into lamayo for preserving fish.
“We’re #TeamAsim!” cooks Arguelles, Comsti, and Tina Legarda of Bamba Bistro cheered on stage.
Legarda gushes over vinegar; it’s as necessary to her as salt. Rising up, her household saved a whole closet devoted to completely different vinegars in previous jars, and her “bitter journey” has helped mould how she conceptualizes her dishes.
“What I like about our delicacies is we’re considerate sufficient to think about methods to steadiness the entire meal out,” Legarda mentioned. Vinegar is used for pickling or buro; fruit and veggies like papaya, mango, radish, and mustard greens are used for atchara, a refreshingly tart facet dish finest eaten with our fried dishes.
Many get pleasure from vinegar as a condiment, and that’s Legarda’s favourite approach, too. “It’s very private,” she mentioned — like how a complete desk goes quiet when everybody begins mixing their very own sawsawan (dipping sauce) for hen inasal.
Some households like their suka with onions and chili; others add cucumbers. It’s a customizable ritual based on one’s personal desire. There’s no proper or flawed approach.
Saving ‘suka’
Heirloom vinegars require quite a bit. Time, ability, sources, and endurance for fermentation — issues that this new technology could not be capable to supply as a lot. “It’s a really laborious endeavor to have the ability to produce it,” Arguelles mentioned, however that’s precisely why we have to hold the custom alive.
Supermarkets carry the quick, business varieties labeled as “imitation vinegar.” It has a shorter processing time and makes use of cheaper chemical compounds to permit mass manufacturing.
However what these cooks need Filipinos to expertise is the distinct high quality homegrown vinegar has to supply — it tastes completely different, provides a singular depth to dishes, and helps hardworking Filipinos who respect nature simply to supply the cherished and versatile product.
“We thought that it was necessary for the youthful technology to rediscover our indigenous and native components and the way these tastes,” Arguelles mentioned.
“They’re usually getting taken as a right as a result of it’s such a humble or easy ingredient that we see in our pantries day by day.”
And as Eddie Marcelino continues to until the land and supply for his household, for the cooks at Terra Madre, the decision is straightforward: Use extra native vinegars. Discuss them. Create with them. Have fun them. Share these tales on-line. Convey them exterior of their areas and into extra properties, markets, meals festivals, and restaurant kitchens. Custom doesn’t should die, so long as we don’t let it. – Rappler.com
