Try the boys for their ultimate taste test of Filipino food

Welcome to our Filipino food tour today We are going to two amazing spots in historic Filipino town to try some amazing dishes Maybe some Filipino snacks all sponsored by Fanta cuz we're looking for the best flavor match today I'm trying to become the next Fontana, but I want to be the pina colada one I mean you should be and my dress will be sheer We are here with our lovely wife Becky Becky's here with us, our quadruple Becky Matt, what do y'all know about Filipino food? It's like a melting pot food because there's a lot of different influences in Asia and there was they were conquered by Spanish for a while Yeah, colonial a lot of different flavors to kind of meld together I don't think I've ever been to a Filipino what y'all have never been before No, I don't think I have I think my only like real experiences with Filipino food are from like Jollibee I've only been I think a few times actually in my life. Yeah, this is gonna be a new experience for all Yeah, I know I have had some Filipino food here or there in different videos I've always loved it. And I also know we have a really rather large Filipino audience watch. Yeah. Hello, Philippines Americans and everyone around the world in the Philippines I certainly know more about the Philippines than Filipino food Like have you seen their reaction videos to when their girl wins a beauty pageant they? flip out Well, our first stop today is hi-fi kitchen, it's a fairly new spot It's been open for a few years in historic Filipino town, and I know they do some fusion So let's head there and find out what it's all about What's going on guys, my name is Justin I'm the chef and owner of hi-fi kitchen based in historic Filipino town. How would you describe Filipino cuisine? We make Filipino Angeleno food is what we call it. So basically Filipino food that's influenced inspired by the area I grew up in I feel like it's something that you can't really like pinpoint because there's so many Influences that come from so many different places you're touching on Malaysia Thailand stuff like that. So there's some like Muslim influence Chinese Japanese influence and stuff like that, right and then Colonized by the Spaniards for quite a while So there's a lot of like there's like European influence that cross-section of like cultures and that respect between the dishes is something that like We've really prioritized and so like finding the common thread between Recipes is like where we start and also hope you know, like after you bite into it you have like yo, you need to try this A lot of stuff out here. I think we're gonna start with these. What are these? So that's lumpia pork egg rolls. We make them in-house. We hand roll them They are my aunt's recipe the long name for these are called lumpiang Shanghai Chinese influence influence in there Just improved on we just Filipino eyes it looks delish Yeah, it's similar to an egg roll Very much to me in between an egg roll and a taquito and I love both of those things I'm gonna try this pina colada Fanta. Remember the soda ranking video I did. I didn't have the pink one This is like a different flavor, right? So I've never even seen that before Chicken adobo is always something that everyone does differently My dad taught me super traditional the first time soy sauce vinegar Bayleaves peppercorns garlic. We also do some cranberry juice kind of rounds out that tartness That's gonna go with the rice. The rice has an egg on it because if you liked it, you should have put an egg on it wonderful philosophy There's also some of the adobo jus on the rice That's pretty much like almost my favorite part is just like the jus and the rice is like amazing and it smells incredible So it smells so rich Whoa, the smell there is something else going on in there. That's like sweet and sort of like warming spices It smells really good. So this is the first Filipino dish I ever had and typically what? I think a lot of people order when they go to a Filipino restaurant They think I'm gonna get the chicken adobo because it's just so good. You can't go wrong with amazing chicken egg and rice, right? Wow It's just so tender and it kind of just falls apart in your mouth And it has a great acidity to it a lot of depth of flavor. I do this every day It looks like it would taste very like heavy or like thick but it's actually like very light Mm-hmm. Is it improper to drink the jus? Dude do it. I mean, I always dip my rice in it. That's like the move That's really good, it's so flavorful some some adobo I've had has been like really soy forward. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah this is a little more on the Sweet garlicky. Yeah, it's got like a sully to it, which I really like airs on the side of like teriyaki almost Like yeah the egg So it was like a perfectly cooked egg so that when you chopped it it just ran over everything Honestly, though it does pair well with Fanta because this is so savory and salty and this is like very sweet And the pineapple works really well. I'm excited actually have the pineapple with the tacos I think those are gonna be just perfect. We're gonna go with tocino al pastor So tocino is like this breakfast meat in the Philippines typically cured with pineapple juice and then we simmer it in the al pastor Spices and then we also have the potato taco there So we were like really mad that a very popular taco place took the potatoes away And like right, yeah totally and so like when they removed it, we're just like I mean we're just gonna do it ourselves I love pastor when I get tacos in LA. So this sounds incredible That's incredible it's like a it's like a sweeter al pastor. I don't know what it is about like Asian cuisines meeting Mexican cuisine Divided by an ocean, but the flavor combined like Captain Planet Typically tocino is served with a side of vinegar And so we make like a spice vinegar here. And so you you would dip that for breakfast So I would do the instead of like a lime wedge, right? I would do the vinegar. It's good vinegar Yeah I'll try this potato one And I'm very excited for the potato because I too was a big fan of the major chain that decided to discontinue their potato The texture is great. It's like crunchy and pillowy inside and the sauce on it is so good little spice at the end every single thing so far has had Such a density of flavor and it's tasted so different from the thing before like your your world of flavors here is remarkable How's everybody's pairing with their their chosen Fanta for today's meal? The pineapple for me is great because everything so far has had this like great acidity and the pineapples just melded really well with it I mean, I just love the orange flavor so much. It just goes with everything when you say it's a Fanta 5 now It's a Fanta 5 I noticed there's a lot of nods to music in your restaurant So can you talk about the impact of that before I became a restaurant owner? I was a professional b-boy breaker, yes that's kind of where I like discovered like my creative autonomy and The decor and then the nods in the restaurant are like kind of just a shout out to like my journey here This is the lying. It's like crispy pork belly. Yeah, so it's a crispy pork belly. We call it. It's traditionally known as Lechon kawali we call it talib kawali here. So lying is taro leaves braised in coconut milk super aromatic super similar in texture to like sog if you guys are familiar with like Indian food and We top it off with crispy pork and that's prepared pretty traditionally, you know with like the pork crackling and stuff like that So I'm gonna try to do a perfect bite. I'm also going for a perfect bite here. Cheers The taro leaf is like so creamy. Mm-hmm. The treatment is almost like a sog paneer. Yeah, it really is Yeah, you'll see like a chili oil on it What I love about the cuisine so far is the influences feel very pan-asian and even American because of some of these Mexican fusions So all these dishes just feel like I'm kind of hopping to a different country altogether in terms of flavor profile But it kind of comes together in a really harmonious way being Filipino is one thing being Americans one thing being Filipino American is Another thing, you know, and now there's a lot of us to have that upbringing. Oh, yeah, cool Like I like that too. So that's kind of what like high-five kitchen All right, Fontana's you ready to hit the next spot? Let's do it you ready purple I sure wanna that adobo was yeah Orgasmic and now we're headed to Park's finest But before we don't we'd stop off at one of these places that does outdoor Sort of skewered meat grilling and you basically go inside you buy anything you want you come outside. They have grills set up Oh really to choose what you want and grill it yourself. It sounds really fun. And also, you know, it's that's a very street food Thing I've never done outside grilling of my own food. I don't like a street place, you know, Keith loves grilling I don't know if y'all know I do love grilling. I've been grilling a lot in the past year You're maybe the most dad of the try guys right now. Isn't it? Does he have a mustache? Well, here's a beard that has a mustache. That's not bad. It's not the same. Let's dive in Yeah, I'm gonna try this chicken feet It's kind of tough and has like gelatinous flesh. You kind of suck the flesh off of the foot hot It's quite difficult to eat these feet Flavors good. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Honestly, the flavor in all this is really good. Yeah, it's not blood sausage. It's just blood Yeah, it's like very like livery That's intestines It's all Look these are quail eggs hot dog on a stick strawberry soda This is a fan five right here. This is like this is very like this is a very American experience, right? Yeah, it's and also like as a kid I definitely would have had this combo Well, I don't think we should get too full because we have one last restaurant. Yeah, this is just our snack We'll just save the rest of this for later. Save some for later So now you're headed to our last time of the day parks finest move well I hear if you're not full of meat yet. This is a barbecue spot. Oh boy That's what I hear protein today so before we get to our final place It's gonna be a gauntlet between Matt and Becky to claim. Who is the official orange Fanta girl? Okay, you ready? I think it's me. The question is where does the word orange come from? orange Orange which came first the color orange or the fruit orange the color the color. Yeah, you're both wrong Orange as a word or term didn't exist prior to the fruit It was always called like in literature in common language They would just call it like a certain red or yellow But after orange the fruit was was starting to be like mass cultivated They decided to use that name orange and make it the color name So on snapchat Fanta also has some cool new filters out right now for their flavors. I tell you what they look insane All right, so here we are Park's finest, let's go try it out Hi, I'm John Eric Concordia, I'm a member of the park's finest. I'm Christina Raquel Concordia I'm one of the co-founders of the park's finest. I'm an Padre mula I am one of the co-founders of the park's finest also part chef and I invented a cornbread bibingka I've already heard about this cornbread You're gonna taste it today At the park's finest we do American cuts of barbecue with Filipino flavor, you know the savory the sweet So we try to put everything together. It's what makes your mouth water Filipino food is the vehicle for you to remember a good time Wow Wow Let's start off with Mamalayas coconut adobo It's beef and it has coconut and vinegar that we stew for at least 24 hours It's a cooking process that reminds you of the Philippines But it's something very distinct to this block because it fed so many people that came through our home We're also gonna do some pork loin baby back ribs dry rub sauce on the side So each bite can be a little bit different The whole point about Filipino food is that we do not get offended when we give you a plate You already start customizing it so we have two different sauces we got our special the park's finest barbecue sauce so this is our tomato base and it has pineapple and coconut in there as well and Then this is our vinegar based barbecue sauce and vinegar soy Garlic pepper lots of spices in there and then last but not least the cornbread bibingka It's a pastry of bread that's actually baked on banana leaves and it's made out of rice flour Coconut milk It's beautiful. This looks like an appetizer and a dessert. It can be anything you want Wow Well, what should we start with in your opinion? I guess Well, thank you so much we're gonna dig in Now Thank you, it's the most moist. Yeah, I'm Brad it's almost like a cake Wow, that's really good. It's very delicious. You can really the corn flavor really comes through and the texture is really great. It's very moist Mm-hmm Banana leaf. I thought might be too sweet to all the sugar on top and no, it's so balanced and so Corny tastes very good. It's moist So much. That's a nice cornbread Wow for my birthday cake. Yeah Like I want to take back any cake I've ever eaten before we started the catering company back in 2009 and then in 2012 is when we opened our doors to the public when he found a space here on Temple Street Which has historically been an ethnic enclave for Filipinos in the United States culturally we embrace Everything Filipino that we can learn about we also Struggle with trying to be Filipino enough or American enough So there's that aspect of us constantly trying to just be us and that's what the park's finest Is it's us trying to just show what we love about both being Americans and also Filipinos Okay, let's go to the adobo. This one's a beef with a coconut cream. Just go hog wild go hog wild Yeah, yeah, that's I mean I wouldn't stop you yeah, that's what we're looking at right there Let's try of course You know, I thought it was gonna taste. Oh, wow It's got some spice in it, doesn't it? Well that was gonna be like really really coconutty and it's actually really quite balanced and that spice is so nice It really warms up the whole mouth. So the heat is yellow chilies California yellow. Okay. So we grew up eating Tommy's we grew up eating in and out So instead of using bird chilies that we traditionally use in Southeast Asia we use California yellow chilies There's a kick at the end. Mm-hmm, but the texture of the sauce is so good on the beef with the rice You know when I was hearing about this, I thought this would be a sweet dish, but it's actually very savory indulgent like Delicious feels like a Sunday night dinner with your family. Yeah, very multi layered and I just say We gotta finish a five right here It really is so good, but it's really cool to see how adobo can be different from one restaurant to the next Oh, yeah, just the sauce by itself would be a good good gravy I'd put that on some chicken fried steak. All right Let's move to the ribs because I will just continue eating everything else Barbecuing has been a part of our upbringing as sons and daughters of immigrants here in Los Angeles It's been something that's been a part of just what we do regularly in celebration So we wanted to be able to share this with the community That is a peppery, right? The rib is like fall off the bones melt in your mouth I mean you can see all the different spices and flavors on it. You add kind of that vinegary sauce on it It's just like hits the spot. It's so good. Both of these sauces are like nothing I've ever had so delicious and yet still feel very barbecued. We got something that's like real Filipino Street What could that be? Well, they prepared it special for us and it happens to be Fanta Fanta orange So It's my favorite map. There's enough Fanta for both of them. We want you to like experience a little, you know Street way of drinking Fanta orange in the Philippines. Wow. I've only ever had alcohol from a bag Like a liquor store like, you know little hole-in-the-wall stores if you ask for a soda They'll actually give it to you in a bag and a straw Wow, and then they'll recycle the bottles It's like a all your senses you could feel it you taste it you can hear it feels like being a kid This is a Fanta 5 The whole spirit of taking care of each other it's it's really unique to this place and and for us to be able to just advocate for the interest of the people who live Here and also we're from here. We live here building community is something that's been extremely important to us As well as meeting the needs of the people here today was so great We got to eat so much good food meet so many great people. In fact, they should come over We just have what you know This whole thing was about how everybody's together all the time feels like you should be together with us You fed us so well squeeze into her behind us just come and fill in back here You have shared so much of your food and your stories with us to anyone out there who's curious about trying Filipino food What sort of advice would you give them grab a beverage? Grab a plate and have fun with family. You're like we did that today get out there. Try something new Thanks to Fanta for sponsoring today's video and we'll see you next time. Bye We all are gonna need to take a bite of this together at the same time, oh wow, it smells so good Matt