Although such feasts may be overly distended or seem incredible, especially in more civilized settings, there is a thin line between what may be gastronomique and what may be macabre; what may be creative and what may be totally oblique; or what may be in bad or even worse taste. But such are hilariously memorable yet deplorable meals that at least a gastro-naughty person has experienced one even if only it was once in his or her lifetime.

Let’s take the case of restaurants and their chefs. It can have all the fancy authentic names and gyp the supposedly "cosmopolitan set" with such things as a Michelin star chef that came to the Philippines and did not look at his market. The restaurant served something called vegetable terrine with red pepper coulis and it had the odor and redolence of baby barf (I would have named the dish "Le Awful" though I was restrained by my dining partner). The truth of the matter is there are just as many foreign cooks who can’t cook their own country’s dishes as there are Filipinos who do a horrible job in cooking Filipino cuisine.

At one hated dinner where the cheese was probably sliced about twelve hours before and when the plate was received, the boys in black ties started inverting the plates looking as if the morsels of cheese would fall. The portions were hilariously glued to the plate.

Or how about the wedding of a cousin, who was on a budget. One cannot see the logic of going elegant on a shoestring budget without any thought for the well-being of one’s guests, who wake up early in the morning and attend with rather heavy heads and sleepy hearts this ceremony of a lifetime. Breakfast was on the top floor with a panoramic view of Manila Bay but alas, the hot chocolate turned out to be one of those canned instas that made me feel like part of a kiddie taekwondo team or doing parallel bars in gymnastic tights or of Mr. Shortie who dunks-the-ball-against taller-kids-my-age-theme commercials.

There was also the sliced sweet ham, cold and straight out of the supermarket pack that was thawing on our plates. For about the same price, breakfast would have been memorable in a more austere yet reassuring place. (up to now, I still hate my cousin for sending us to Aristocrat sans barong after the reception).

Or how about the Korean restaurant in Mabini that folded up and advertised authenticity. A bowl of traditional cold noodles yielded a mound of hotdog mustard instead of the real yellow mustard for this dish. Or talk about the pulutan where the restaurant banks heavily on dishes such as deep-fried chicken behinds. On one occasion, a group mate got on his chicken rump a la Alexandria, that is – with a kernel of golden corn in it.

Even some mortals lucky enough in life to be members of the oldest gourmet club in the world are not spared.

The Chaine des Rotisseurs, which is one of the more famous gourmet societies in the world with a Philippine chapter, is not exempt: The Chaine has had its share of dreadful meals. At one grand dinner amical, the cocky chef was so sure of himself that he never gave a pre-dinner tasting for assessment of the Chaine board. I have never seen so many disgusted beings in black ties or barongs, all ridiculously capping the evening at the nearest pizza parlor. To this day, that seems to be the joke and remedy of the situation wherever the dinner is assessed by members.

Sometimes, the restaurant patrons, bring these unforgivable repasts on themselves. I’ve seen a guest at a Morato restaurant complain about a perfectly done Caesar salad with the rich, thick dressing coating the lettuce evenly. The man was so aghast at what looked like a dry salad, that he smothered the entire preparation with an extra order of Thousand Island dressing, Now that’s what you call Caesar Salad with Ten Thousand Island Dressing (you kind of wonder if he asked them to cut back on the garlic or anchovy because he was with a date…).

Then again there was that great promotion called "Caesar Salad – eat as much as you like." Gluttons would ask for thirds then wonder why they felt nauseous after having the equivalent of a small jar of mayonnaise running in their systems.

There is also the other side of the story, which brings us to the joys or disadvantages of being entertained at home. As chefs, we individually have experienced the trauma and worry when people have to entertain us, with our trade or craft in mind. People try to conjure cute or impressive recipes while we are only trying to escape from our kitchen to have a good and uncomplicated meal of homey and honest food.

I remember the rather Kurosawa-like setting of Manila’s bejeweled and smartly dressed socialites that came upon a cocktail in a plush home, where the drinks were paired off with escabecheng maya-maya, breaded pork chop and pancit bihon (the vodka tonic and the pancit bihon were a complex combination, since the twist of lemon was built in). Without batting an eyelash, the hostess even remarked about the freshness of the fish which eventually was fried (I wonder if it went well with the champagne.).

Even in country homes, our Filipiniana authors romanticize the pleasures of fresh barrio and fiesta cuisine. Well, try attending a day or two of a barrio fiesta where they heap your plate with all sorts of galantines, meat loaves and roulades that are slow cultures of microscopic action due to the tropical heat. One only needs a lighted match to spark the insides of the car or probably to give the fiesta attendee enough gas to inflate a few balloons for the evening dance at the plaza.

We’ve had the opportunity to be invited to the party of a chef-friend’s aunt who prepared a meal of "Roast Chicken Hollandaise". The dish turned out to be fried and topping the fried breaded chicken was a sea of mayonnaise and pickles. At another dinner in New York, the repast commenced with a Consommé de brunoise (maybe made by an inmate called Bruno), a consommé of cubed beef bouillon and large vegetable cubes with roasted Cornish game hen surprise, the surprise being the gizzard, heart and liver, all still intact in their plastic bag inside the roasted fowl.

More recently, people paid dearly for a dinner cooked up by fifty (50) Beijing chefs. I had my doubts the moment I sat on the table and read the menu. And as the black chicken soup and boney fragments came in, I went to the next table and asked some chef instructors if they wanted to walk out and eat across the street at a Korean Chokbal (pork leg) restaurant. We ate horrendously leaving our frustrations out the door. What made us walk out was 10 small putrid prawns served at our table for twelve (what we are expected to do, do a Kung fu duel over the ten prawns?). Coming back to the hotel lobby, we had coffee and saw a multitude of angry (hungry) people going down the escalators. Next time these Beijing chefs come we should, we really should, have them put on thirty days of bread and water.

With regard to attire, we had been invited to a dinner where we felt our sartorial capabilities had to be commensurate to the invitations. Visions of a small, intimate dinner of interesting people from all walks of life played in our minds. The resulting scene was dinner on Melamine ware. It was so embarrassing not to be dressed for such an occasion since polyester or fake havaianas could have been the right choice for the evening.

So one can see that there are always two sides to a story. One should never think that memorable meals are only those that are meals of excellence. As in a person’s development, growth is determined by several factors such as peers and environment. Thank God the grub master in our boy scout patrol is now a computer expert. He used to have all these bizarre ideas in our camping meals; most memorable and possibly most absurd was a dish composed of a mix of pork and beans, pineapple juice and corned beef – yuck!