MANILA PEN FEATURES 4 CHEFS IN CHOCOLATE-INSPIRED DINNER

The Peninsula Manila’s restaurant Old Manila will feature its own chef de cuisine Allan Briones, executive pastry chef Xavier Castello, The Test Kitchen chef Josh Boutwood, and Gallery Vask chef Chele Gonzalez in an exclusive eight-hands, six-course Auro Chocolate-inspired benefit dinner on Dec. 3.

The event, dubbed “Beyond Bean-to-Bar: Chocolate-Inspired Dinner,” is priced at P5,000 (inclusive of taxes).

Dinner guests get to adopt an organically-grown criollo cacao tree in Davao and help a small community of retired marines who have traded in their firearms to farm cacao trees.

With dishes celebrating the versatility of premium Davao Auro Chocolate, the six-course menu will have its sweet as well as savory side, offering a richness, profundity and complexity that makes it an ideal dinner companion.

Pioneer country

The Philippines is one of the first countries in Asia to grow the Theobroma cacao plant, whose seed pods are used to make cocoa mass, cocoa powder, confectionery, ganache and chocolate.

Out of the three main cacao varieties, it is the criollo that is the most prized, the most rare, and the most expensive in the world. It first came to the Philippines through the Manila-Acapulco galleon trade in the 1600s.

Since then, cacao has become part of local culinary tradition with the tablea or drinking chocolate, a tradition unique to Filipinos.

However, with the introduction of newer varieties, the cul- tivation of the criollo has lessened and, until recently, had been on the verge of extinction.

The benefit dinner will also serve as the launch of Auro Chocolate’s participation in crowd farming, a unique platform in Europe that promotes food sustainability by directly connecting consumers with the origin of their food and its producers. Peninsula Manila is at Ayala and Makati Avenues, Makati; call 8872888 local 6694. Visit peninsula.com.