“I want people to see cuisine differently”, told me Chef Renel, a young cook you learnt alongside Alain Ducasse, in France. “Here, at the beginning, people looked at me as if I was a weirdo when I put vegetable in the soups. That far, soup was only powder you were boiling with water”.

Apparently, Knorr, Maggi, and the other major food industry brands have quite damaged local cuisine customs, and Renel wants to bring his restaurant to the next level. “Alain Ducasse was always telling us that the important is terroir, terroir, terroir. I have that in mind. I want Filipinos to rediscover their cooking roots”.

Renel Dimacali  is a Chief at Ocean suite, a boutique hotel of Bohol located in Tagbilaran City. Next to a fabulous overflowing swimming pool, stands the Blood Compact site commemorating the friendship between the Philippines and Spain, when Sikatuna and Miguel Lopez de Legazpi mixed their bloods.

Chef Renal tries to maintain his French level by listening to songs. “I listen to classics”, he says. “The pinnacle is Edith Piaf, and I often listen to La Vie en Rose”.