The season of Lent has already begun and Filipinos, being a predominantly Catholic people, have also started fasting — refraining from eating meat as their way of penance and cleansing of, not just the soul, but of the body, as well.
This is where restaurants and cloud kitchens specializing in seafood come in handy. They make fasting lighter and seem more like a treat than a self-imposed punishment. With their wide array of dishes on the menu, their customers get to taste seafood dishes from all over the world and explore the flavors of the different regions of the Philippines. Add to that the chefs’ personal creations and family heirloom recipes.
Shrimp kare-kare.
One such cloud kitchen, that goes by the name @ticxs offers a mixture of international dishes and local favorites. Some dishes have no nationality or citizenship at all. Look at this list of their best-sellers: Cajun crab and Cajun shrimps (which provide customers with a taste of New Orleans or Creole cooking), Korean seafood Pasta (bearing the distinct flavors of the land of the Oppas), sinigang na salmon, adobong pusit,
Speaking of shrimp kare-kare, it just recently earned the title “Best Seafood Kare-Kare in Manila” from the Ultimate Taste Test 2022. It’s an annual event featuring the most promising start-up food businesses, and hundreds of chefs, food experts and media are always in attendance to serve as judges. They give scores to the participants upon tasting their signature products, and the top scorers are elevated to the circle of 10 winners. Each of the winners are also honored according to what they are best at, and in the case of @ticxs, it’s the “Best Seafood Kare-Kare in Manila” title. Their version of the shrimp kare-kare is slow-cooked and using only fresh ingredients. The peanuts are roasted and processed into a paste the traditional way. Also, even if there are lots of orders coming in, the cloud kitchen takes pride in cooking every dish in small batches to ensure quality. No mass production allowed.
Fat Crabs.
The name @ticxs actually came from the family name Tica of the owners, the mother -and-daughter team of Miriam Tica and Mirma Tica-Ortiz, in partnership with Mirma’s husband Marco Angelo “Chino” Ortiz. The Ticas are originally from Malabon, with Mirma being born and raised there until age six, when the family moved to the United States. When they came back, Mirma was 20 and they still chose to reside in Malabon, where they have access to the freshest fish and seafood in the metro.
The mother-and-daughter team of Miriam and Mirma Tica.
It was Mirma and Chino who started @ticxs back in 2013, serving torched specialty sandwiches at different bazaars in the metro as their way of saving (and earning!) money for their wedding. When they got married in 2017, they thought of opening their home for private dining through Plate Culture. Then the pandemic hit and everything stopped, but their passion led them to start again in 2020, serving freshly cooked seafood dishes for delivery. It answered a need and was rewarded for it.
It is actually the freshness of the seafood, in combination with the preparation given them that gives @ticxs’ seafood dishes excellent taste and quality.