Sinful adobo

In many events that they have covered overseas, sportswriters seem to have developed the tradition of raiding restaurant kitchens after they’ve forged friendships with their foreign owners.

The stories are the same whether they went to cover a single event, or the multi-event Southeast Asian Games, the Asian Games, and yes, even the Olympics.

Sportswriters — ehem! — are usually loyal. They stick to one food corner of their liking and fancy, and they never leave.

They are usually tired souls at the end of each day. Multi-events usually run for 10 days or more, enough to get to know the waiters, the restaurant manager, and eventually the owner, whom the Filipino scribes usually put under their spells.

He/she would give the restaurant’s key to them if they would ask for it.

They usually do. Sportswriters start to end the day with bottles of beer, before trying the local dishes that they consume with gusto until they get tired of them after the third night.

It’s usually on the fourth night when they miss the food

“Why bother finding a standard when there is none?

back home.

That’s when Jun Lomibao, sports editor of Business Mirror, would take out his chilled big pack of adobo —a regular part of his welcome baggage, and once a sumptuous serving of which the group had failed to defrost for three days in cold Busan, Korea.

We did not have a microwave oven in our hotel then, but the friendly restaurant had one. That was when the kitchen raid started.

Years after in Incheon, also in Korea, it was this rubbernecker’s time to cook adobo at the kitchen of our favorite restaurant whose owner claimed to have the best bulgogi on the block.

So, off I went cutting up pork and chicken, tossed them in the frier, and removed the bunch from the heat when they turned golden brown.

Garlic was abundant in that kitchen; the lady owner told this writer to get all he wanted. “Oh, gimme some onions, too” and she happily handed a big bulb.

Like magic, the adobo was ready in a jiffy. The soy and vinegar were mixed in heaven.

She picked the adobo over her bulgogi, and she vowed to include a Filipino dish in her menu. An instant fan of sinful adobo, that lady was.

The Filipino adobo is everywhere.

I was served adobo in Sydney. We ate it like hell in Vancouver.

An Indian family prepared what for me was one of the best versions of adobo in New Delhi. I had adobo in Singapore, Thailand, Hong Kong, Taiwan, and they all taste the same but different.

That’s the beauty of adobo. Each Filipino family has its own version of the staple dish but there is always something unique with each serving of it.

The Department of Trade and Industry’s proposal to make a “standard” adobo just won’t cut it.

Rizal’s family from Laguna cooked adobo with the same soy brought after a long travel from Binondo to Biñan, and it was unique from the adobo prepared by the Del Pilar family of Bulacan.

So, why bother finding a standard when there is none?

Even the Korean bulgogi differs from the other skillet. No hamburgers are alike. Sausages are not the same in tables in the United Kingdom, Australia, Germany and France. So, don’t touch my adobo.

It’s sacred. I worship it. Make your own, then consider yourself the god of food.

“Like magic, the adobo was ready in a jiffy. The soy and vinegar were mixed in heaven.