Cooking Demo at the 5th Negros Organic Farmers Festival

The 5th Negros Island Organic Farmers’ Festival held on December 2-4, 2010 was to celebrate the gains that the local organic food stakeholders and organizers have achieved since the festival started in 2006.

The three-day festival which is considered as the first and the longest running festival of its kind in the country featured cooking demonstrations of organic food by famous Negrense chefs, among others.

One of them was famous restaurateur Margarita Fores,
whose roots come from Bago City and Valladolid.
She prepared 5 recipes in 2 hours.
All from scratch!

Margarita "Gaita" Araneta Fores is the President of food-related ventures like Cibo Inc., Cafe Bola, Pepato, Sostanza Health Line, and Fiori Di M.

Cibo is a restaurant that offers affordable and delicious Italian cuisine. This venture is the fruit of her passion for Italian food. She even went to Florence in 1980 and had two Italian married women teach her about Italian ways and really entangled her with the culture. She studied their language and toured the markets and restaurants. She, together with her siblings, Veanna, Joe, Oye and Bledes, borrowed a million Pesos from their mother, Maria Lourdes Araneta Fores, to open the first Cibo restaurant. It was just a small restaurant between Landmark and Glorietta, with a staff of seven. It was a success that after a year, they were able to pay the money lent by their mom and transferred to a bigger place in Glorietta. They branched out and have 8 branches in Metro Manila: Glorietta 4, Shangri-la Plaza Mall, Alabang Town Center, Rockwell, Megastrip A of the SM Megamall, Greenhills, and at the Loop at ABS-CBN.

Marinated tomatoes setting in.

Pappa al Pomodoro
Rustic Tuscan Tomato and Bread Soup

.....and here's the recipe!

Grilled Organic Chicken Breasts & Eggplant with Basil & Peanut Pesto

Grilled Organic Milkfish with Tomatoes, herb Salad & Green Tomato-Pineapple Salsa

Herb Salad

Marinated Organic Tomatoes on Pasta

Chef BJ Uy of Planta Hotel and Business Inn was accompanied by his LCC students, who recently won in a national culinary contest

Asian Rice Pilaf

Fishcake Camote and ube salad

Gazpacho is a cold soup

Soon to be chef Sandy of ICA testing out the green salad with edible flowers.

Chef BJ Uy's Roasted Chicken

Aboy Evaristo peeling off the puso ng saging.