#GAAINMANILA was the hashtag last September 3 and 4, 2019 when Asia’s Best Female Chef 2019 Garima Arora’s Gaa restaurant in Bangkok took over Discovery Primea’s Flame restaurant– my events platform Cross Cultures’ first event back in the Philippines in two years! Special thanks to our partners Thai Airways and Moet Hennessy Philippines for helping us make this a reality.
The Gaa team– Garima, R&D chef Samantha Jumchai (she’s Filipina as well!), chef Manav Khanna and coordinator Teerana Hiranyakorn— arrived a few days before to prep, visit the market (we went to Asia’s Best Female Chef 2016 Margarita Fores’ family’s Farmer’s Market in Araneta) and dine at a few restaurants in the city. PS If you didn’t know already, Michelin-starred Gaa was the highest climber at this year’s Asia’s 50 Best Restaurants– jumping straight to No. 16!
And then, it was showtime!
For this particular event, we decided on a takeover rather than a collaboration, so the entire 10-course menu was by Gaa, paired with Veuve Clicquot champagnes and Cloudy Bay wines. In the two evenings, we served almost 100 people!
Here are photogenic snippets from the event. Thank you so much to the Gaa and Flame chefs, our partners our guests and everyone who supported and worked with us to help make this event possible! xx
The Chicken Liver and Longan on Toast has been a Gaa staple since day one. The frozen chicken liver sits atop of longan fruits and homemade crispy toast.
Corn is most likely the most loved and Instagrammed dish on the Gaa menu. This dish is inspired by Garima’s childhood during the monsoon in Mumbai where she ate a street food snack called bhutta or grilled sweet corn rubbed with lime, black salt, red chili powder. The Gaa version is grilled young corns seasoned with lime, black salt, red chili powder and yeast oil and served with corn milk dip.
Koji, Caviar— koji is cooked rice and/or soya beans that have been inoculated with a fermentation culture, aspergillus oryzae. It is the culture behind so many Japanese staples such as sake, soy sauce, miso and the list go on. At Gaa, they use our sweet white koji (made from Thai jasmine rice) to make bread. Koji at its sweet stage smells like banana/lychee, so we serve our koji bread with caviar and banana water. *For this special event, they used ossetra caviar.
Talangka, Khakra was completely inspired by the Gaa team’s time at Margarita Fores’ farmer’s market when she made us kinilaw right in the middle of the market. They topped their khakra (Indian flatbread) with talangka (Philippine crab fat) simmered in fresh coconut milk, red and green chilis and ginger. It is topped with a salad of red onion, mint and kamias.
Seaweed Bread, Soft Shell Crab was the Gaa team’s love letter to Manila. This dish is meant to be eaten like a taco. Fried soft shell crab was served on seaweed bread with mustard greens, cashew paste, custard apple, nata de coco and marigold flowers with a side of calamansi.
The Gaa team’s grilled Pork Belly, glazed in tamarind sauce, was served with coriander stems, red onions and tamarind.
At Gaa, they end the meal with a sweet version of betel leaf– Chocolate Betel Leaf. The dish is their take on paan, the Indian way of having an after-meal digestif/mouth freshener. They cover half in 85% dark chocolate and fennel sugar. It is topped with rose chutney and cardamom silver.
For more information on Cross Cultures, visit crossculturesbycheryltiu.com; for more information on Gaa, visit gaabkk.com; for more information on Discovery Primea/ Flame, visit discoveryprimea.com
