AS THE COUNTRY celebrates Independence Day today, a spread at The Grand Hyatt’s The Grand Kitchen with the “Lechon Diva” Dedet dela Fuente can be a way to celebrate the occasion yourself. The hotel’s collaboration with Ms. Dela Fuente will run from June 12 to 15.
Earlier this year, BusinessWorld sampled the Lecheng Sarap degustation on Ms. Dela Fuente’s own table at home (https://tinyurl.com/4rfatffk). For the Grand Hyatt shindig, she’s serving up some of the dishes from that dinner (which we rated as, so far, the best we’ve had this year), with a few extras. And, of course, lechon (whole spit-roast pig).
During a preview lunch on June 9 at the hotel, we again had the Crab Gulong-Gulong, her version of Mindanao’s Crab Alavar, with its sweetish-spicy flavor. In a nice place like the Grand Hyatt, it’s a bit of a hassle to eat, shells and all; but if you’re not as conscious about your clothes, dive right in. We also enjoyed the Hiplog, shrimps in a creamy and gritty salted egg sauce, and we found the cashew kare-kare (a stew of oxtails usually made with peanuts) milder, creamier, and more well-rounded than what we have been used to. We especially enjoyed the Balut Salpicao — usually, the fertilized and slightly aged duck egg would be enjoyed on its own, but she cooked it in a garlic and olive oil sauce. The result was very intense and deceptively simple; the texture, divine.
Who’s the Lechon Diva without the lechon? The binagoongang lechon was as lovely as we remember it, the roast pork flavoring the rice and the bagoong (fish paste) doing the same to the pork in a delightful synergy. This lechon was the first that she made, back when she trained under local chef Reggie Aspiras. We missed her breakfast lechon, to be served for breakfast at the hotel, which is stuffed with tocino paella with garlic and salted egg. However, the truffle rice-stuffed lechon, which put her on the path to fame (this was served to both the late Anthony Bourdain and Martha Stewart) was also served for lunch that day. It was cut with some ceremony, with her announcing that it would be served in exactly seven minutes, because it was her lucky number.
The truffle flavor was used elegantly: just a hint, but the hint was all that was needed. It was very fragrant, and the scent steamed out after she cut open the skin. It was perfectly moist, the earthy truffle blending seamlessly with the pork. Her Divalicious Sauce (when asked about the ingredients, she answered, “A whole lot of love”) cuts through the richness of the roast pig. We personally have a “no soda” rule, but the sense of indulgence was at its peak, so we, and other people who would have skipped the soda, cheated with glasses of Coca-Cola. That was just the first bite: we savored our second, leaned back in our seats, wondering which god we had to thank for bringing us here. It was THAT good.
We must also add that the dishes had a uniformly rich flavor, and we kept telling ourselves that we’d only eat sparingly, getting small helpings and thinking they were enough: however, we ate about six plates of the same things, over and over.
Ms. Dela Fuente said in an interview that this collaboration was for a comeback: she said she had been on a six-year break before the Lecheng Sarap dinner. While her lechon business continued, her private dinners and to-go menus were on a freeze during the pandemic, He had also moved to Canada temporarily while her daughter finished college there.
“I wasn’t sure if people still remembered me,” she said.
She doesn’t call herself a chef because she maintains that she was not classically trained (she learned how to cook from her mother and two local chefs, Ms. Aspiras being one). She was, oddly enough, eating a salad, while dressed in a sequined jacket emblazoned with pigs and a coronet, and the words “Lechon Diva” on the back. With some cheer after saying she wasn’t a chef, she did say, “Diva. There’s no one else in the world.”
This Independence Day spread celebrates not just the country’s independence but Ms. Dela Fuente’s own independence. Asked how she balances tradition and novelty in her dishes, she said, “Because I was not taught in formal cooking schools, I have no rules. That’s the reason why I can come up with all these things.
“Being a mother, and not a chef, I want them to know that you don’t have to be a chef to be able to do something like this,” she said. Countered by someone else that the culinary world is a whole lot more forgiving now, what with the celebration of the home cook and other unconventional figures online, she added, “You just have to have a passion for cooking, eating, and believing.”
Lechon Diva’s creations will be available for buffet lunch at The Grand Kitchen of The Grand Hyatt in BGC, Taguig, from June 12 to 14 for P2,188 net per person, and for dinner at P2,988 net per person. On June 15, Father’s Day, both lunch and dinner are priced at P4,288 net per person with free-flowing house wine and house lager as well as a special spread of oysters, Singaporean chili crab, Hainanese chicken, crispy pork belly, pork char siu, roasted Chinese duck, porchetta beef Wellington and more. Trolleys will be roaming the venue serving Australian beef pie as well as pan-seared Norwegian salmon. The signature tiramisu of The Grand Kitchen will also be available during this period. For inquiries and reservations, call 8838-1234, or e-mail manila.grand@hyatt.com. — Joseph L. Garcia
