What Tradition Tastes Like Now
At Flame’s HÉRITAGE dinner, French technique was not simply preserved; it was revisited, reworked, and served in the present.
Words Coleen Wong
Photos courtesy of Discovery Primea
July 28, 2026
Tradition can sometimes feel like something that needs to be protected from change. In food, especially, heritage is often treated as a fixed idea: old recipes, proper techniques, and ways of cooking that must be followed exactly as they were taught.
However, at Flame Restaurant’s HÉRITAGE dinner, tradition felt less like something held in place and more like something still moving.
Presented as part of Discovery Primea’s Elements of Flavor series, HÉRITAGE reunited Executive Chef Luis Chikiamco with Chef Cyrille Soenen, Technical Director of Le Cordon Bleu Ateneo de Manila and Maître Cuisinier de France.
Chef Cyrille Soenen and Discovery Primea Executive Chef Luis Chikiamco
Earlier in his career, Chef Luis worked alongside Chef Cyrille, whose mentorship helped shape his approach in the kitchen. Years later, they returned not simply as mentor and student, but as chefs meeting again through a mutual respect for technique, ingredients, and craft.
That history could have easily made the dinner feel nostalgic, but instead, the evening leaned towards what comes next.
From the moment guests entered Flame, the atmosphere already set the tone for the evening. There was a quiet formality to the dinner, but not the kind that made it feel distant. Rather, it was warm and welcoming.
Pulutan a la Prince Albert
The full tasting menu, together with its wine, beer, and sake pairings, gave the evening a sense of rhythm, moving from one course to the next without making the experience feel overly explained.
What made HÉRITAGE interesting was not the need to decode every technique behind the dishes. It was the feeling that the dinner was built around a relationship that had come full circle.
The history between Chef Luis and Chef Cyrille gave the menu a more personal weight, while the presence of the Le Cordon Bleu Ateneo de Manila chefs placed the evening within a larger story of teaching, learning, and carrying knowledge forward.
Executive Chef Luis Chikiamco and Chef Julien Bispo
The dishes moved across familiar French references and more unexpected choices, from Lobster Salad Remoulade and Halibut Viennoise to Crispy Korean Chicken ‘Oyster,’ Kurobuta Pork Sando, Pigeon Tourte, Trio Sorbet, Chocolate Tiramisu Tart, and Petit Fours.
But the point was not simply to show range. Course by course, the dinner showed that heritage is not only found in what is preserved, but in what the chefs choose to continue, revisit, and share once again.
HÉRITAGE did not treat French cuisine as something distant or untouchable. Instead, it showed how heritage survives because chefs continue to return to it and carry it into new contexts.
The discipline remains, but the expression changes.
The presence of Chef Cyrille, together with fellow Le Cordon Bleu Ateneo de Manila faculty members Chef Julien Bispo and Chef Régis Doré, also gave the evening another layer.
This was not simply a guest chef dinner, but a reminder of how culinary knowledge moves from one generation to another. It is passed through classrooms, kitchens, shared experiences, and eventually, reunions like this one.
For Chef Luis and Chef Cyrille, HÉRITAGE was a return to a language they both understood. For guests, it became a way to taste how that language continues to evolve.
At Flame, tradition was not served as a memory of what cuisine used to be. It served as a proof that heritage is most alive when it is still being used.
