Seattle seeing a ‘mini-boom’ in Filipino desserts

SEATTLE, Washington – This city is seeing a “mini-boom” in Filipino desserts, according to an article in Seattlemet.com, with ube or purple yam leading the way.

Seattle’s better-known Filipino restaurants, Inay’s and Isla Manila Bar and Grill, both closed down last year, but now Filipino dessert is filling their tracks.

Writer Rosin Saez reports that ube has created a cult following for Hood Famous Bakeshop, a small, bakery on Shilshole Avenue in Ballard, owned by Fil-Am Chera Amlag, who opened In 2013 with her husband, Geo Quibuyen, a hip hop artist.

The duo previously had a popup called Food and Sh*t that served home-cooked Filipino meals. Amlag baked cheesecake made with ube on a coconut-butter biscuit crust.

Her Hood Famous Bakeshop and another newbie, Central District Ice Cream Company, serve Filipino-inspired desserts. Central District Ice Cream Company serves a frozen version of ube cheesecake.

Hood uses Kalsada Coffee’s single origin beans. Kalsada is a locally grown business that’s reviving Seattle’s century-old connection to Philippine coffee farmers, reports Seattlemet.com’s Saez. The three establishments have an ongoing collaboration.

Amlag’s “hood famous” cheesecakes are now known citywide. She bakes a flavors beyond the signature ube: white chocolate with guava; mango with calamansi; coconut and pandan. She also offers halo-halo, her current version coming with green coconut jelly, palm nut, mung beans, brown sugar–sweetened plantain, jackfruit, macapuno, chunks of Hood Famous ube cheesecake and Rice Krispies.

Central District Ice Cream Company has rotating flavors of the month flavors that transforms Filipino desserts into frozen form: ice creams of caramelized banana turon and halo-halo, for example. Co-owner Kryse Martin-McGill, runs the shop with her husband, Darren McGill, both former Californians. Kryse is a proud first-generation Filipino American.