My mom used to tell me that those of us who are in the business of running restaurants aren’t lucky because people eat our food; it’s the other way around, we’re lucky to be feeding people and letting them experience our food for a living. Both sides of my family—the Montanos and the Foreses—love to eat so it’s safe to say that food has shaped our lives in more ways than one. But for as long as I can remember, it was with and through my mom that the earliest foundations of my love for food and cooking started.

Growing up with mom, one meal at a time

My earliest memories were always of me and her in the kitchen. Dad would be at work and me and my mom would spend a lot of time baking cookies, learning a new dish, or cooking something for her business. This was even before I began school or before she ventured into a food business. She definitely had a lot of influence on me in developing a more open palate. She loves food from all over the world, with Filipino food at the very top. Almost anything that she eats, I too grew to enjoy or appreciate, perhaps with the exception of paksiw.

Growing up, we would often watch the Food Network together and she’d always have a yellow pad and pen with her so she could write down the ingredients or the steps to cooking the dish being featured. After the show, we’d go to straight to the kitchen and recreate what we just watched. She always enjoyed cooking. At one point, she made bagels and sold them even at a loss just so she could bake.

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As I grew older, we started this tradition of mother-and-son food adventures with my Tita Margarita Fores and her son, my cousin, Amado. During family vacations abroad, the four of us would make it a point to make reservations in restaurants we wanted to experience. My mom and Tita Margarita are adventurous eaters, however I know for sure my mom will not eat horse and dog meat, and in the same way, my Tita will not eat cat meat. But those are probably the only things they won’t touch. If you tell them to eat ant eggs or grasshopper, they’ll probably try it.

I feel especially lucky because to sit at the same table with them is like being in an honors class. When they start a conversation about food, you just know they are more informed than the rest. They both have their opinions but they’re also both very experienced in their own fields that sometimes you find yourself lost, not quite understanding what they mean right away. Now that both Amado and I are also restaurateurs, having them around feels like having a cheat code. We may have an advantage that way, but I would think, any child who has grown up with a mother—or even a father—who loves to cook is no different.

Unapologetically Mamou’s

With her passion for food, it was only logical for my mom to get into the food business. Her very first venture was Blue Kitchen where she was very much involved for 10 to 12 years. Mamou, however, was her very first restaurant, something she could truly call her own. When she opened it in 2008, the idea was to bring USDA Prime Steak, something both my parents love to eat, to the restaurant scene in the Manila. There was that apprehension from the very beginning that not too many people might be receptive to ordering food worth P2,800. At that time, people didn’t spend that much when dining out. But she and my Dad managed to put together a home-inspired menu that would be competitive in the market.

I spent a lot of time at Mamou’s first branch in Serendra. After school, I passed by every day. In the summers, I would work there as a waiter or a bus boy. Those times changed me over the years and exposed me early on to the kind of work ethic my mom had to make it in the restaurant industry. As the owner, she had the privilege to show up anytime she wanted to, but no, she was there for most, if not all of it. She would leave at 11 at night, sometimes dropping off some of the staff home along the way and then wake up at 8 am the next morning to do it all over again. In the first two years, she was so busy and stressed that she went back to her pre-marital weight. I witnessed her being the thinnest she has ever been. Despite that, never once did I hear her say, “I give up.”

If anything, Mamou gave my mom a validation that her food was amazing and that people really appreciated it and would go out of their way to eat there. A restaurant business matures you and humbles you, throws you into the fire, so to speak. On the other hand, it opens things up for you in the sense of human experience, like you inadvertently become part of people’s memories when they choose to celebrate important occasions with you. It is in all these ways that I think Mamou means so much to my mom.

It has been 12 years now and counting since she opened Mamou and I think what makes it truly relevant until today is because the food it serves is unapologetically what my mom likes—what she enjoys and what she thinks people would enjoy. It’s very hard to duplicate someone else’s unapologetic expression of food, and this is the same philosophy I find myself applying as I take on the same path.

Can’t fight destiny

Even if my entire family is passionate about food or involved in the business of it, I don’t recall my mom ever actively pushing me to go the same direction. All she wanted was for me to be a good person and be able to figure out what I truly wanted to do with my life on my own. There was a resistance for me to work in the food business for the longest time because I wanted to step away from the shadows of my mom and the Fores family. When I chose to take up Creative Writing at the University of British Columbia, both my parents were apprehensive but gave their full support. But, on my second year there, I realized that I was writing mostly for myself and I thought that wouldn’t translate much to a career.

For the next six months, I thought hard about what I really wanted to do in life. Interestingly, all those times I spent trying to figure it out, I found myself watching all the episodes of Anthony Bourdain shows, reading cookbooks, and cooking at home, so I said, “Okay, maybe this is what I should do for a living.” I transferred to Johnson & Wales Culinary School in Rhode Island. I realized, you can’t fight destiny.

Lessons from the Big C

It was while I was studying abroad, 2015 to be exact, that we learned my mom had breast cancer. It was during this time, while taking care of her at her weakest, that I thought it wasn’t a good idea to cuddle or baby her. If she was in pain, of course I’d be there to carry her to the bathroom or hand her a glass of water if she needed one. But when I thought she could do it on her own, I wanted her to put in the effort. Otherwise she would be stuck in that phase of helplessness. To be able to conquer a disease like cancer, you have to have self-belief. But even if this was what I felt, I struggled to come to terms with it because it was so easy to think that maybe I was just lazy and that I didn’t want to take care of her, which was not the case.

It was also around the same time that she and my dad were going through a separation, and they were just beginning to go through the process of living separately. For me, my mom and dad’s relationship started like a fairy tale. All their lives, they only dated each other and were together for the longest time. They themselves didn’t see the separation coming, or maybe they did but didn’t believe it. Who would when you have been with this one person for so long? I think it’s very important for people to understand that just because it didn’t work doesn’t mean it takes anything away from this beautiful thing that they had. I find it interesting that even if they live separately, I catch them defending each other like they are still together. I am thankful that they kept it together, and I couldn’t ask for better parents. They were almost by all means perfect even when they are imperfect.

Taking care of my mom certainly brought our mother-son relationship to a new level, especially when it came to her knowing my girlfriend Audrey deeper. Audrey, who took care of her dad who had passed away because of a rare disease years earlier, was way more prepared for the situation than I was. She helped me and my dad take care of my mom and it was then that my mom knew I had somebody very special.

I think this time in our lives made all three of us grow in a way that made us realize the strength we never knew was there—me, Audrey, my dad, and especially my mom who chose not to make cancer define her life.

I’ll always know where to find her

In December 2019, my mom had her last chemo and started remission. Looking back, she had so many points in her life where she could have taken the opportunity to just relax and stop working. After the cancer, Mamou already was what it was and she could have said “no” but she never gave up and I will always, always be grateful to her for always fighting.

In the same way, I will always be thankful for all the experiences, flavors, and lessons she has allowed me to discover with her and on my own. When I was in the early days of starting on my own with Made Nice, I think she saw that I had it in me to run a restaurant—my taste in food, the ability to talk to people every day, making customers feel like they were guests in your home. I know, however, that I have a lot of catching up to do when it comes to the work ethic she displayed back then, but I’ll always know where to find her if I ever need advice in that department. In the kitchen.

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Raul Fores' mom is a hero as our own moms are heroes to us. She deserves to be honored and treated on this special day. If you’re looking for gift ideas for Mother’s Day, click here