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Affordable meets all-natural at 13 Ubay St. Comfort Dining
A spark lights up in her eye as she takes her first bite of the ube cheesecake on her plate. Though the familiar taste of her mother’s homemade recipe had already grazed her tongue a thousand times, for Zaza Sarmiento, 13 Ubay St. Comfort Dining’s business co-owner and executive chef, this one is just as irresistible and mind-blowing as the first.
It is so good, she tells me, that it’s the only ube she eats. Almost instantly, I secretly question the impartiality of her judgment. A forkful from my slice, however, is more than enough to silence my inner critic. More ube than cheesecake, it is rich and indulgent, perfectly complemented by its polvoron crust.
Prior to doing this, though, I felt the need to ask her permission to sample mine before finishing my main course. Despite shifting her focus to entrepreneurship, Chef Zaza is a culinary professional first and foremost, and I shudder to think how someone like her would judge me for impatiently jumping straight to dessert. “Okay lang, walang problema,” she says with a smile.
This is, after all, a comfort dining zone.
A promise fulfilled, a business reborn
While the story of 13 Ubay St. Comfort Dining began in 2009, the tale of the ancestral residence that houses it goes back way beyond that. Formerly a printing press owned by chef Zaza’s family, the relentless rains and flash flooding brought about by Ondoy in 2009 prompted them to relocate to Valenzuela.
Though it had been left unattended for years, it was still chef Zaza’s grandmother’s final wish for them to not sell the house. Ultimately, a shared love for both geographic and gastronomic adventures helped the family decide what to do with it.
After fully acquiring the property, they converted the spacious living space into a restaurant specializing in international cuisine. Decorating it with various ornamental masks and artwork that they acquired over the course of their travels — as well as photos taken by her paternal grandfather Joe, one of the first active tourism photographers in the Philippines — they launched the business in 2015.
From the get-go, the path to 13 Ubay’s success was a rough one, literally and figuratively. Road construction efforts right in front of the restaurant created an accessibility problem — one that was exacerbated by somewhat ineffective efforts to raise awareness about the establishment and reach out to its target market.
For the better part of two years, chef Zaza and her small crew worked tirelessly to build up 13 Ubay, even going so far as to rebrand the restaurant last November. By simultaneously introducing Filipino dishes to their menu and gradually phasing out their international offerings (save for the most popular ones), 13 Ubay fully established its identity.
“Our first year was truly an eye-opener for us,” muses chef Zaza, as I continue to listen to her story over my meal: chicken inasal with salted egg potato chips and beef pares, served with their signature fried rice. I scrape some meat off the chicken with my spoon, and it is so soft and succulent that it almost falls off the bone. Even the strictest of dieters would be unable to resist this powerhouse combination of tastes.
According to chef Zaza, their new menu is a collection of Pinoy favorites and best-selling dishes, such as pinakbet, inasal, pares, and binagoongan. It also features more of their family’s own recipes (such as her mother’s kare-kare and the aforementioned ube), savory delights (such as bacon pizza and buttermilk chicken), and mouth-watering desserts (like their ever-popular tres leches ice cream and ube piaya).
With interior design that is nothing short of Instagrammable and an exterior that gives the establishment a prestigious look and feel, 13 Ubay has been mistakenly perceived by some as a posh, expensive restaurant. In reality, however, 13 Ubay targets families and groups of friends looking for heartwarming comfort food that would not bust their wallets. The restaurant offers serving sizes that are good for 3 to 4 people, as well as for couples and even solo diners.
(I am already halfway through my pares at this point, cringing at the thought of sharing the perfectly flavorful, not-too-salty viand rapidly disappearing from my plate.)
There is one other significant homemade inclusion on 13 Ubay’s menu — one that became so popular, it was launched as a commercially available product of its own last July.
Named after her shutterbug grandfather, “Lolo Joe’s” bacon is cured and smoked in-house, with no flavor enhancers or chemical preservatives. They prepare the bacon in a large kitchen with a smoker under the main restaurant floor. The resulting product is equal parts salty and sweet, with a distinctly smoky flavor.
Curiously, chef Zaza wasn’t even planning to make their homemade bacon available for merchandising. The idea to launch it as a separate product actually came from her MA classmates at AIM, who were so delighted with the taste of her family’s bacon recipe that they felt it was a commercially viable product.
In fact, two of chef Zaza’s classmates, business owners themselves, struck separate deals with her. The result? Two unique (and incredibly satisfying) dessert options in the form of Pufft Marshmallows’ maple bacon and Cupcake Lab PH’s Lolo Joe's Donut. The former delivers melt-in-your-mouth goodness; the latter is a salty-sweet treat you’ll certainly keep coming back for.
Due to 13 Ubay’s family-centric branding, you will not find any hard drinks or cocktails on the menu. However, that doesn’t mean beer is out of the question, as far as chef Zaza is concerned. In fact, chef Zaza and her brother-in-law are already working on another dining concept: a restobar in Makati that focuses on beer pairing, showcasing their family’s homemade brew.
As I finish my meal, Chef Zaza shares her ultimate vision for 13 Ubay: For it to become a beloved, well-known “institution” restaurant in the Banawe, Quezon City area. With the way things are going for them, I would genuinely be surprised if this doesn’t happen soon.
And no, this is not just wishful thinking on my part, so that I could come back and get more of that delicious ube. — LA, GMA News
13 Ubay St. Comfort Dining is located at 13 Ubay Street, Santa Mesa Heights, Banawe, Quezon City. 11 a.m. - 2 p.m., 5 p.m. - 11 p.m. Delivery available via foodpanda.
