Good Food, Bay Area Edition, Part I

I went home last weekend to see my parents. Our first food stop was Patio Filipino in San Bruno. An unassuming spot located on a busy street, I was pleasantly surprised when we entered and found candlelit tables, white table cloths, and tasteful decor. The menu, though hardly innovative, is full to bursting with some of the best that Filipino cuisine has to offer.

Patio Filipino serves dishes family-style, enabling diners to try many different dishes. We ordered the sinigang na Corned Beef, a beef broth-based soup made tangy with the addition of tamarind. No one seems to know for sure who invented this version of sinigang, with its overtones of Western culture evident in the corned beef, but it is a beautifully balanced dish. The sour of the soup, the saltiness of the meat, the savory creaminess of Japanese eggplant, and the clean crispness of radish slices all work together to create harmony in every bowl.

We enjoyed garlic fried rice with this and other dishes that night. One of my favorites to mix with garlic rice is the pork sisig. Traditionally, sisig is made with meat from the pig's face and bits of minced pig's ears. The Patio Filipino version thankfully reworks this classic by using crisped pork belly and minced pork chops instead. A sweet-salty-garlicky flavor combination, the pork sisig benefits from the addition of jalapeno to brighten up the overall taste.

Beef tapa, marinated and sauteed boneless steak, came with a vinegar-based sauce that cut through the soy sauce marinade of the beef. Perfect when cut into small pieces and mixed with the garlic fried rice.

I'm usually a huge fan of all things soft shell crab-related, but our order of sizzling soft shell crab failed to impress. The crabs themselves were fried in a delicate batter that ended up oily and soggy from the sauce that topped this dish. Called taba ng talangka, it is literally "fat of the small crab." Salty, fatty, and pungent, this delicacy typically makes any dish it adorns an instant winner. However, there seemed to be too much of it here. I guess one really can have too much of a good thing.

We knew we wouldn't be able to have dessert if we finished all of the food, so we packed some up for leftovers and focused on the real star of the meal: Buko con Seta, Patio Filipino's version of halo-halo. In this incarnation, a young coconut is opened, juice drained out, then filled with a layer each of sweet red beans (azuki, also used in Japanese red bean ice cream and other desserts), langka (jackfruit), coconut jelly, and coconut maja blanca (similar to a blancmange in French cuisine, but made with coconut milk), then topped with two scoops of ube (purple yam) ice cream. It tasted even better than it looks.

Patio Filipino
1770 El Camino Real
San Bruno, CA 94066
650.872.9888