The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) has just included another Philippine city in its Creative Cities Network. Now recognized as a Creative City for Gastronomy, Iloilo City joins a list of 55 others as the group celebrated its World Cities Day earlier this week.
The cities were "acknowledged for their strong commitment to harnessing culture and creativity as part of their development strategies and displaying innovative practices in human-centered urban planning." The list has now grown to 350 member-cities across more than 100 countries.
Iloilo City became the first city in the Philippines to be acknowledged for its gastronomy. Kinilaw, Puto, Espasol, and Chicken Inasal are among some of its more notable cuisines.
Batchoy is usually made with crushed pork cracklings, chicken stock, beef loin, pork offal, and noodles.
.png)
Of course, the city might still be best known for the noodle soup Batchoy. Batchoy arguably remains Iloilo's most popular food export. Its origins can be traced back to the Iloilo City district of La Paz. Its true inventors, nevertheless, are still up for debate. Some claims say it was first conceived at a local shop in 1922 even before Deco's La Paz Batchoy Shop allegedly did so in 1938. Some say it was first made by a certain Federico Guilergan Sr. while others speculate that it was Teodorico "Ted" Lepura. The dish could possibly also be influenced by noodles soups common in the Filipino-Chinese community.
Among the other creative fields honored for this year include cities for crafts and folk art, design, film, literature, media arts, and music. Among the newest additions to the network are Brazil's Rio de Janeiro and New York's Buffalo City, Australia's Hobart, Nepal's Kathmandu, Spain's Valencia, and France's Toulouse, among others.
"The cities in our Creative Cities Network are leading the way when it comes to enhancing access to culture and galvanizing the power of creativity for urban resilience and development," added UNESCO director-general Audrey Azoulay in a statement.
Joining Iloilo City on the list are fellow Philippine member-cities like Baguio City, a Creative City of Craft and Folk Art, and Cebu City, a Creative City of Design.
The international recognition continues for the city. Earlier this year, the World Resources Institute also presented a trophy of the 2021 to 2022 WRI Ross Center Prize for Cities to Iloilo City.
* This story originally appeared on Esquiremag.ph. Minor edits have been made by the Preview.ph editors.
Hey, Preview readers! Follow us on Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, Tiktok, and Twitter to stay up to speed on all things trendy and creative. We’ll curate the most stylish feed for you!
