MEDIUM RARE
On the surface, another eating club sounds like something nobody needs, like two extra inches around the waistline. And yet, eating clubs like the one of David, Ading, VS, Julian, Charlie, Wicky, aka “Divisoria Mafia,” have lasted 40 years.
No dues, no fees, no rules except to show up when the call is sounded for a get-together, at which no wife will be allowed to show up.
Generally, eating clubs are bound by the glue of friendship and very likely, a common trade or interest. In the case of the Divisoria Mafia, it’s their long history as peers in the textile business. What keeps them together is also what keeps them looking for and proliferating into other trades, from which they learn new stuff, including mistakes, lessons, trade secrets, etc.
Their venue is a choice between two and not more restaurants, and lunch is always on a Saturday. Who takes care of the bill? By tacit consent, anyone may volunteer who’s just bagged a big contract or has reason to celebrate.
Simple enough. Yet other eating clubs operate along even more bare-bones simplicity: members just look forward to exchanging rumor and gossip, the more unfounded the better. (Before Covid-19, a working journalist could report to at least two eating clubs on different days of the week.)
Last Tuesday, Benjie texted members of “our eating group,” as he calls us, for lunch at Manila Hotel’s Café Ilang-Ilang; in other words, he was playing host; which meant, 100 percent attendance. We occupied a very long table. Manny came from Baliuag, Bulacan (“the trip is like Makati-to-Manila”). Joy and Putch arrived late, so did Olive and Niwa. Edna, dressed in crimson, sat beside Benjie, regaling us with stories about persons famous and anonymous.
Under Rachy’s stylistic direction, the hotel lobby was an orchid garden flourishing in pink to purple shades. In the coffee shop, Joy Yap, assistant directress of F and B, told me Ilang-Ilang can seat up to 600.
To Rachy I raved about the seafood pasta cooked in spicy tomato sauce. As it turned out, the Italian station is now headed by Filipino Chef Marlo Angeles after the Italian Chef Marco returned to Italy months ago. As I told Rachy, Marlo’s as good as Marco, grazie!