As Philippine Airlines’ assistant vice president for catering operations, Chef Vallerie Castillo-Archer is on a mission to make each and every meal aboard the flag carrier memorable — all as she pays tribute to her Filipino roots.
By Ivy Lisa Mendoza-Yulo
Photography by Mark Chester Ang
It seemed like a full circle — only better.
In the ’70s, a six-year-old Vallerie Castillo and her sister took a Philippine Airlines (PAL) flight to Hawaii, where their parents were waiting for them. But she was so sick then that all she could remember was waving her goodbyes to her beloved grandparents and not being able to eat the in-flight food.
A few years later in fourth grade, this girl wrote in an assignment that she wanted to be a flight attendant someday. She said she wanted to travel everywhere and enjoy all the good food the world had to offer.
Earlier this year, she made a life-changing decision. She packed in her bags not only her stellar culinary career and her adventurous spirit, but also cherished memories of her Filipino roots and all the love in her heart. Chef Val then took that PAL flight “home.”
On the eve of her departure, she showed both excitement and anticipation for the whole new world waiting for her. “Here I am now, wide awake, eager to return to the country I wanted to leave so badly as a child. Making the biggest move of my life, coming home, returning to my roots, where all my dreams began because when I left as I child, I left the most important part… my heart,” she posted on Instagram.
Vallerie Castillo-Archer is living out her dream today, making sure that each PAL journey is eventful, the food memorable — not only for her but for millions of the flag carrier’s passengers.
This is the personal mission she commits herself to as PAL’s head chef and assistant vice president for catering operations.
As the first female and first Filipino-American executive chef of Yamashiro, an iconic restaurant in Los Angeles, California frequented by Hollywood A-listers, Chef Val has built an impressive reputation in the US culinary circle, considering that she has only been working in the professional kitchen for the past four years.
“I was a mom who just loved entertaining at home and cooked for fun during events at my son’s school in Los Angeles. Baking was also a sacred activity between me and my daughter when she was being bullied in school. I went to culinary school at 40 but when my kids left school, it got me thinking: Should I get a job, should I continue with more volunteer work, which I had been doing since I graduated from culinary school, should I make this a career, or just continue doing this for fun? It was really me testing what I should do and that opportunity with Yamashiro to work as its pastry chef came up in 2019,’’ Chef Val recounts.
Raves about her wonderful culinary creations got passed around so quickly that it was no surprise that it reached the land of her birth — and PAL president and CEO Capt. Stanley Ng’s radar. Initially, Chef Val was invited to be PAL’s guest collaborator, but her creative vision and wealth of experience impressed Capt. Stanley so much that she was tapped to be PAL’s culinary chief, and tasked to introduce positive changes to the art and science of preparing about 30,000 meals a week for PAL’s global network. She said yes.
Aside from overseeing food safety, menu development, quality control, working with partners in the supply chain, and team management, Chef Val takes it upon herself to give weekly lectures to PAL personnel, flight attendants included, on topics like passenger relations and interaction, and equip them with understanding of what service is all about.
“I believe that the more you will know, the better you are, the more confident you become. I give them lectures but I also make myself part of the learning because I want them to understand who I am. I want them to understand the menu so that when the passenger asks what the food is, they don’t just say it’s fish. I want them to say ‘this is sea bass, which our chef prepared at six every morning for six hours so that when you bite into it, it melts in your mouth,’” Chef Val explains.
“Watch Me”
Chef Val has started reinventing the PAL menu with one single-minded pursuit — to make it stand out.
Before she came on board, incorporating in the in-flight menu that piping hot bulalo soup with all that bone marrow goodness was unthinkable. But she just had to confidently quip “watch me” to the skeptics, buckle down to work and prove that it could be done.
“Our caterers were arguing with me, you can’t serve that because of the bone marrow, or the soup may be too hot, but I showed them why we could and now, we are serving that and our passengers love it! We want them to have an experience and that is the experience,” she says, while giddily showing to us pictures on her phone of daintily plated bowls of bulalo.
But Chef Val also makes sure she respects time-honored recipes by not reinventing them to the point of ambiguity, or worse, tampering. “We make the food authentic in order for our passengers to know Filipino food, but we respect it, we treat it as authentic as possible, not to diminish it once we add anything to it that is not Filipino. In short, do not try to reinvent the adobo,” she says with a laugh, reacting to a famous American TV chef who attempted to put strange ingredients in our very own adobo.
Thiis is the type of leader Chef Val has transformed herself into over the years — one who walks the talk to make people see her point, one who does not back down because she is a woman in a predominantly male kitchen, someone who puts a high premium on communication and friendship.
At PAL, she manages both corporate and creative people, and she knows only too well to adjust to each of them. “I look at teamwork as a dish, every team member a vital ingredient who all have to come together to produce the best result,” she says.
Chef Val also debunks the misconception that airline food is easy to create. Mass assembled it may be, but a lot of planning, food safety and security considerations, and rigid budgeting go into every plate before it reaches the cabins.
“Ahh, they do not know how things can be frustrating. People must realize that not all that works in a restaurant will work in an airline. For instance, you can’t really use the ingredients that you want, you have to stick to the required grammage, or that you can’t serve pork in some places. I cannot go back to my kitchen and cook the food to one’s specific liking. But I put the menu together and make sure it is followed to the letter,’’ Chef Val explains.
Respecting her roots
Chef Val is nevertheless distinctly bringing to PAL all of her heart, roots and soul. That little scar on her right cheek always serves as a reminder of where it all started for her.
“This was caused by a spark that flew right into my cheek from my grandfather’s native oven in his bakery in Baay, Batac, Ilocos Norte where I was born. I was always beside him, helping in the bakery, watching him make pan de sal and pan de coco. My grandparents taught me food, but they also showed us humility and unconditional love, they’re the ones who gave up their careers to take care of two girls without parents, they’re the ones who stayed up when we were sick,’’ Chef Val recalls.
This lasting bond with her grandparents still shows up in her food, sometimes unwittingly. For instance, when her Tata Ramiro started making his pan de coco smaller and she called him out for it, he explained to her they were “love bites.” Today, those love bites can be found on PAL food trays, delighting passengers in all seat classes.
Her grandma, a schoolteacher, taught her how to garden and how to cook vegetables, among others. Don’t be surprised then to spot those little colorful flowers used to garnish the dishes in-flight. It reminds Chef Val of the time she and her grandma would pick flowers along the streets.
But more importantly, her grandparents taught Chef Val to always remember where she came from. Decades of making a life, a family and a career in the United States did not make her forget her roots, thanks to the Filipino dishes that consistently popped up on their dining table.
These recipes are also now finding their way to the PAL menu, intended to showcase what Filipino food is really all about, beyond pancit and lumpia. Chef Val is committedly seeing to that.
Amid all her achievements, of her seeing all her childhood dreams come true one by one, of her traveling the world and tasting life’s goodness, there is one question at the back of her mind that she would still like to ask her grandparents — “Did I make you proud?”
From her heart of hearts, Chef Val knows the answer — she certainly did.
Art direction by Dexter Francis de Vera
Makeup by Johnson Estrella for Estee Lauder
Hair by Roman Rago for Estee Lauder
Styling by Mike de Guzman and George Palmiano of MGP, assisted by Ysabelle Bianca Viray
