Exploring Flavor’s Outer Limits

Josh Boutwood

HELM

“I think every culture has the right to interpret a cuisine one way or another,” Josh Boutwood says. “And I think the truest form of appreciation of a cuisine is when one culture adapts it in a way where it becomes understandable for that culture.”

As an art form, cuisine isn’t something that stays still. It lives and evolves in the same the way people do. While any given region’s food will always carry a sense of identity with it — Italian, French, Filipino, and so on — it’s bound to change as chefs bring it around the world.

It’s an understanding that has likely been shaped by Josh’s experience of belonging to several places throughout his life: from his home in England to his mother’s restaurants in Spain and, eventually, to his first restaurant in Boracay, Philippines.

Now, as the head of Helm, his fine dining restaurant in Makati, Josh creates dishes that are as imaginative as they are tasteful, creating menus inspired by fantasy worlds like Star Wars and Harry Potter.

Helm is meant to be a theater for the palate, though this one parts the curtains to reveal the backstage. At the 24-seater restaurant, you can see the staff preparing the meals before theyhead to the table, encouraging interaction between the performers and the audience.

Helm has since earned two stars from the Michelin Guide — the first in the Philippines to earn that distinction, and currently the only one.

But skill and setting aren’t the only thing that matter. Not in the art of cooking, anyway. Where painters select their pigments and photographers choose their lenses, Josh handpicks the ingredients that go into his meals. 

In his roster are Laudemio Frescobaldi, an artisanal olive oil that’s been family-grown in Tuscany for over 700 years; Tirenna Pasta, made from heritage wheat and slow-dried for up to 144 hours;  Acetaia la Bonissima, a true balsamic vinegar made from cooked grapes and aged in heirloom wooden barrels in Modena; Mokaflor, specialty coffee that uses ethically sourced and individually roasted beans; and Captain Santor’s Southern Sea Gin, which is made in small batches at a micro-distillery in Calabria using wild botanicals.

“I've come to a point where I want guests to appreciate the ingredient and the beauty of it in its perfect state — like the perfect ripeness, the right balance of doneness, for example,” Josh reiterates. “Those are things that, as a chef, we cherish because we can't control those. They're controlled by outside forces — being the sun, the terroir, and everything else.”

“For us, the challenges — or the beauty of the challenges — lie in using ingredients like theseto bring out more than what nature can give us, and that is a secret right there.”

And so far, it is a secret that has paid off.