New restaurant in Mandaluyong presents a busy menu of borderless dishes
FANS OF FAT MICHAEL?S, THE QUAINT mom-and-pop restaurant in Makati that built a good following, will surely fall in love with The Frazzled Cook. Bigger and decidedly better, the new restaurant in Addition Hills, Mandaluyong, has all the key elements that have made Fat Michael?s an icon.

Except for Jude Mancuyas, one of the originators of Fat Michael?s, and his older brother Reuel, the new restaurant?s maître d?, the team behind The Frazzled Cook is totally new.

Old-time favorites from Fat Michael?s, including spareribs, grilled chicken Rosemarie, squid salad, chicken tostadas, seafood paella, scampi pizza and pancake a la mode, are still on the menu alongside new dishes such as wagyu salpicao, lengua with mashed potatoes, potato and basil soup and grilled hamachi.

For those with a sweet tooth, the restaurant offers a mouth-watering list of their favorite desserts such as chocolate and strawberry short cake, mango crema, mango torte and a selection of ice cream sundaes.

Restaurant?s chef

Mancuyas, the restaurant?s chef and creative director in charge of everything?from its soul food-inspired menu to its shabby chic décor (dangling lamps are wrapped mostly in lace and no two chairs are alike), left Fat Michael?s early this year and partnered with Lance and Susan Lee to establish The Frazzled Cook (tel. 725-3354).

After searching for several months for the ideal location, the trio stumbled on a two-story antique store at 916 Luna Mencias St.

?Again, drawing from my previous experience, perhaps our biggest come-on is the simplicity of our offerings,? says Mancuyas, who, before donning the chef?s toque nine years ago, was one of Manila?s leading stylists. ?There?s nothing fancy or pretentious about our food since these are the dishes we ourselves would likely order to satisfy our cravings.?

The menu seems to echo this thinking. Mancuyas won?t be serving kare-kare and dinuguan anytime soon, but the list is definitely eclectic, ranging from Italian to American, with a bit of French and Japanese thrown in.

?We?re definitely neither a Chinese nor Filipino restaurant,? says Mancuyas. ?But you can?t classify us as a purely Western restaurant either. There?s so much out there to offer that we don?t want to confine ourselves to a specific theme. Diners seem to be responding well to this borderless concept.?

This same principle guided Davelyn Camaclang, Mancuyas? late sister, as she went about establishing Fat Michael?s almost a decade ago. Like Mancuyas, Camaclang, an interior designer, knew next to nothing about the food business.

Drawing on her and her family?s penchant for dining out, she made a list of their favorite dishes from other restaurants and through a series of trial and error, produced her own versions before opening Fat Michael?s. She prevailed upon Mancuyas, her constant collaborator in the research stage, to switch careers and help her run the family enterprise.

Creative person

The creative person that he is, Mancuyas was able to learn a totally different medium in weeks. He has yet to perfect his craft, and is the first person to say that he still has a long way to go before he finally does.

When Camaclang passed away two years ago, Mancuyas felt it was time to move on and do bigger things. He met the Lees, then regulars at Fat Michael?s, and they gave birth to The Frazzled Cook.

Apart from mismatched chairs and sofas, and draped lighting fixtures, the place has a homey, Old World ambiance, thanks to several chandeliers and dimly lit corners that are either plastered with paisley-printed wallpapers or painted with whimsical murals by Tomas Daquioag.

One corner is painted with stick-like figures of characters inspired by a children?s book. As if this child-like touch isn?t enough, the corner also has overhead shelves featuring 30 or so battery-operated ?lucky? cat figurines beckoning potential diners with their left paws to come in.

The interiors are anchored on a series of floor-to-ceiling blue shelves with wallpapered surfaces laden with books and bric-a-brac. It also divides the spacious dining area into two. Swinging double doors leading to the kitchen are also plastered with floral-printed wallpaper to mask the cold, impersonal feel of steel slabs underneath.

?I got some of the chairs from thrift stores, while the rest came from dealers,? says Mancuyas.

The fundamentals he learned from his big sister are still very evident in The Frazzled Cook, but because of its sheer size?it can seat from 50 to 60 people and is open to private parties?Mancuyas had to come up with a more professional and streamlined system to run the place.

For one, the kitchen is much bigger and equipped with the necessary tools to answer the needs of a much bigger clientele. The set-up is certainly a far cry from that of Fat Michael?s with its limited number of stoves, refrigerators and freezers.

Before, he had a very vague idea of how to manage inventory. Mancuyas and his sister used to buy supplies before they ran out. Now, thanks to advice from his young team, he deals with suppliers and makes sure everything is well stocked in anticipation of bigger and unexpected demand.

?Unlike before, we can?t simply say to the customer that we?ve run out of this or that dish,? says Mancuyas. ?After driving several miles and braving the traffic just to get here, that?s simply unacceptable.?

The Frazzled Cook may seem every inch as homey and as personal as most mom-and-pop restaurants, but it?s definitely a bigger and more professionally run establishment than the hole in the wall.