The trattoria in your neighborhood
In a time when the local restaurant scene is inarguably thriving, with new establishments mushrooming left and right, from the neighborhood park to Fort Bonifacio, there’s a lot of risk for an aspiring restaurateur. “Things are competitive and Italian food is just everywhere,” Natalia Moran tells me, sitting down in the balcony of her family’s ancestral home. “I just wanted to do something simple, in the house. I didn’t want to put up a restaurant because it’s too much.”
Natalia, 27, is the chef and owner of Il Piccino Trattoria, the new kid on the burgeoning private-dining-scene block. Most of these private dining establishments feature chefs educated abroad, who are thriving in catering but foresee the many difficulties an operation like a restaurant entails. These culinary upstarts have found a compromise: a small operation usually based in the house, with the financial freedom to come up with their own menus and make all their own decisions thanks to a low overhead.
The woman behind Il Piccino is no different. Educated in Florence, Italy, she came home two years ago to find the local food scene opening up. “When I got back from Italy, I was still catering. I’d cook anything – European, Asian,” she says. She found her market at, ironically enough, a weekend market. “I sold stuff at the weekend markets, ravioli, pasta at Mercato (Centrale).” It’s been a warm reception thus far.
It was this success at the weekend markets that inspired her to put up Il Piccino. “I like to entertain so we opened up the place,” she explains. “Last year was when I said, why don’t I try it out? First, I made a set menu and it was just friends at the start. They referred me to some friends and then to other friends. That’s how it kind of worked, word of mouth.”
Lamb with mint and mashed potato and mixes. The house itself adds a lot of charm to her operation. Although it’s undergone several restorations, Natalia says that its entirety is still as it was when “a Spaniard by the name of Primitivo Jason built the house.”
“It is still filled not only with antique fixtures and furniture, shiny wooden plank floors, wide capiz-shell windows, but also tales and stories of four generations of inhabitants encompassing the Spanish era, Japanese war, and the American occupation.”
Natalia recently invited us to dine at her home. And the experience was as she had planned: simple and unpretentious. The experience is more akin to eating at your kind (half-Italian?) neighbor’s house than a fine dining restaurant. Old photographs of her family on the wall, opera softly playing in the background — it feels cozier than the usual dining experience. At one point, I even bump into her toddler while giving myself a tour of the property. (“That’s why I don’t really accept walk-ins,” she says, laughing, “I need to tell them to leave.”)
The meal she prepared for us was four courses of some of Il Piccino’s specialties: polenta mushrooms, spinach and mushroom cannelloni, bacon-wrapped prawns with risotto, and lamb with mint and mashed potato. At times, the dishes felt a bit sophomoric, like maybe a bit of polish might do wonders for the meal. But with the price of the whole four-course meal (just P896), the homey atmosphere and the intimate feel, it’s a suitable tradeoff. You get what you pay for and while what you get is hardly perfect, it’s still an enjoyable feast, one that lends itself to intimate celebrations like birthdays and anniversaries. Sometimes, for an hour or two of peace, quiet, and intimacy in a bustling city and an increasingly tech-savvy world, it’s well worth it.
The ambience at Il Piccino feels more like the house of your kind Italian neighbor than a restaurant—in the best way possible.* * *
Dining at Il Piccino Trattoria is by reservation only. Reserve at least a day in advance through www.facebook.com/illpiccino or 0917-829-1900. Private functions of up to 30 persons are welcome.
