Steamed Garoupa Fillet in Brown Sauce, Dragon Style (Photo by PINGGOT ZULUETA)

MANILA, Philippines — As soon as we sit down and see the heading that says, “Happiness” on Mabuhay Palace’s Chinese New Year menu, we smile. It’s quite auspicious to see that word when someone is about to feast on a 10-course meal. We think, “Ah, we hope to reach that mental state in an hour. Wait, it’s a 10-course meal. Make that two hours!” Executive Chef Sun Bing, the traditional one, and Mabuhay Palace Executive Sous Chef Josephine Yu Tanganco-Candelaria, the chef in charge of giving the food a more contemporary take, seem to be determined not to make us wait that long, though.

When the first course arrives, it becomes apparent that we can expect a lot from the two chefs’ complementary styles. The appearance alone of the Mixed Assorted Vegetable and Sliced Salmon in Wasabi Sauce screams out with vibrant colors, with the pale green wasabi mayonnaise contrasting with the bright red dried cranberries. The flavors and the textures are the ones that turn it from “salad” to “fireworks in one’s mouth” though.

The savory smokiness of the salmon works very well with the sweetness of the dried cranberries and the hint of spiciness from the wasabi. The cashews add their sweet-and-salty flavor and crunch along with the fried noodles, which look like dragons rising from the deep. As a bonus, the noodles are supposed to give long life, too. Chef Josephine’s take on this salad seems to say, “New Year, new flavors”.

The Mabuhay Palace Shark’s Fin Crab Roe Soup follows. Fiery orange and swimming in top ingredients, it is luxury in a bowl. Chef Josephine explains that she does know how controversial it is to eat shark’s fin these days, but she also says that it’s a very old tradition and that Chinese people expect to see it on the menu and will not eat if it’s missing. We would have reached “happiness” with the rich crab roe soup alone, but who are we to question ancient traditions?

From the traditional, we again move to more familiar territory. In the case of the Deep-Fried Prawns in Mayonnaise and Sliced Almonds and Potato Chips, extremely familiar. Chef Josephine’s take on the local favorite, hot prawn salad. However, her version is more whimsical, with the prawns served on Pringles potato chips, with slivers of almonds mimicking the appearance of the potato chips. The sweet mayonnaise dressing is predictably rich, but strangely enough, the potato chips take away some of the creaminess. Of course, it’s not a complete dish without maraschino cherries and who could say no to that? It is an unusual combination, to be sure, and easy to ruin with too much sweetness, but Chef Josephine takes care not to have a heavy hand with the sweetness and prefers to let the ingredients sing.

The next dish brought happiness, prosperity, luck and most of all, gluttony. The Chinese believe that fish and seafood are lucky. Well, it certainly worked for us. The Assorted Seafood in Brown Sauce in Clay Pot was a symphony of seafood, with the cuttlefish, Australian scallops, shrimps, garoupa, sea cucumber and assorted mushrooms providing sweet music. Every piece of seafood is cooked to perfection. The scallops are especially sweet and tender. It’s amazing how the two chefs and their crew are able to create various textures and flavors from these treasures of the sea. The mushrooms help not just with the texture, but they give a kick of earthiness, too.

Our luck holds until the next course. The Steamed Garoupa Fillet in Brown Sauce, Dragon Style is not your typical steamed fish. The kitchen staff shows off their technique here, with the perfect layers of fish and mushrooms creating the appearance of dragon scales and bringing together contrasting textures to harmony. Nothing is overdone, but every ingredient is elevated to another level.

The next dish quickly becomes our favorite: the Braised Pork Knuckle in Rock Sugar with Vegetable and Sea Moss. Mabuhay Palace’s take on the well-loved pata tim is a triumph. The pork knuckle is so tender, that a whispered word would probably cause it to fall apart. The sauce has a hint of smoky molasses, but is more savory than sweet. The chewy, hair-like sea moss provides an ethereal texture as it wraps itself around the almost silky pork. If not for the other courses to come and other people in our presence, we would have been happy to eat the whole thing and lick the bowl afterward.

Good thing we didn’t because the Steamed Crab with Garlic Sauce awakens our taste buds anew. The garlic is surprisingly subtle, but it it still pungent enough to give the crab a pleasantly strong kick. The crab meat is moist all throughout and we end up giving up all pretense and pick up the claw to suck the succulent meat off of it.

The Lotus Seafood Fried Rice is one of the last dishes to arrive. We ask Chef Josephine why the rice is served after the other courses. She explains, “The rice is served to make you feel very full. A meal like this is supposed to signify abundance, so what better way to do it that by eating rice to make you feel fuller after all those other dishes?”

Our tightening waistlines are inclined to agree. The rice is surprisingly not too heavy, though. Each grain is puffed perfectly and interspersed with just the right amount of meal and vegetables. The lotus leaf is not only there for presentation. It adds an indefinable flavor to the rice and we discover that it also helps keep the rice warm for a longer time.

This is followed by two New Year-themed dishes: the Chinese New Year Dumpling and the Pan-Fried New Year Tikoy. The dumplings are juicy and enclosed in silky-smooth wonton wrappers, but the real star is the tikoy. The tikoy used has a reddish hue, as red is a lucky color and white is an unlucky one. Today, we have a trio of tikoy. There is the usual plain, fried tikoy, almond and coconut tikoy and our favorite, the salted egg and cheese tikoy.

We start by eating the plain one and then the salted egg and cheese variation. The latter is coated with bread crumbs that crunch loudly between our teeth, but the best part is the melting cheese and burst of saltiness from the egg. It is an unexpected surprise, one that we experience repeatedly. We leave the almond for “dessert”. It tastes and looks like almond mochi, with the coconut adding a new texture and some creaminess. It is a perfect and relatively light ending to our meal.

Every New Year’s Day, whether Chinese or not, people are filled with hopes of prosperity and happiness. Of course, sometimes, we are capable of bringing those things to ourselves. Prosperity usually comes with a mixture of luck and hard work, but happiness comes in various shapes and forms. Perhaps it can come from a huge change or a wish that came true. Sometimes, it can even come from something as simple and easy to get as a lovely ten-course meal.

The Mabuhay Palace is located at Manila Hotel. For inquiries and reservations for Manila Hotel’s Chinese New Year events, call 527 0011 local 1108 or 1243.