From the foreword: Cavite is usually studied through historical or written records that document the establishment of towns, the highs and lows of population and demography, the catalog of revolts and revolution that figure in the birth of nation. It is even possible to see its heroes and its villains. Ige Ramos has chosen to trace Cavite’s past through its food and the process found a history rooted in its food: how geography determined the products of the land, and how waterways explained physical mobility and transfer of Chinese, Spanish, Mexican, American, and Japanese influences over the centuries that gave shape, color and taste to their food. - Ambeth R. Ocampo