Initially, the waitress refused to serve me. “This one?” she asked, pointing to a dark brown stew in a chafing dish behind the counter. “That one,” I said. We went back and forth like this for a while ...

When you sing praises of Chef Kurt Sombero's delicious yam ice cream dessert, he deadpans: "Yeah, we got that from Lucky Plaza." Needless to say, he's kidding. A native of South Cotabato, Mindanao ...