Melba's Cookbook
Our volunteers' favourite dishes, from Melba's kitchen
Ask anyone who has volunteered with MCP about the food, and they'll tell you about Melba. Her cookbook brings together 25 of the dishes our volunteers love most, so you can cook them at home.
Every recipe is vegetarian, from Filipino classics like siomai and chop suey to dinner-table regulars like pumpkin curry, shakshuka and cinnamon rolls. Along the way you'll get to know Melba herself, and pick up some of her Visayan kitchen wisdom.
The book is a 34-page PDF. There's nothing to print or ship, it's easy to keep on your phone, and you can print it at home if you like your recipes on paper.
What's inside
25 vegetarian recipes, each with an ingredient list and a step-by-step method, plus Melba's story and five pieces of her Visayan wisdom.
All 25 recipes
- Fried rice with vegetables
- Vegetarian burger
- Turmeric potatoes
- Cucumber salad
- Asian salad
- Pumpkin curry
- Pumpkin soup
- Chop suey
- Stir-fried cabbage
- Spanish patties
- Chickpea balls in hot sauce
- Vegetarian siomai
- Red hot pasta sauce
- Steamed tofu with oyster sauce
- Aubergine pasta sauce
- Shakshuka
- Spanish omelette
- Patitim
- Deep-fried dumplings
- Peanut sauce
- Cauliflower salad with apples
- Pumpkin patties with coriander
- Dream cake
- Cinnamon rolls
- Focaccia
If a rat comes into your kitchen, you shouldn't hit it, because it will like it and come back for more.
Meet Melba
Melba runs our kitchen, and she has been cooking for MCP since our earliest days.
She grew up in Hinoba-an, at the southern tip of Negros. As a teenager she moved to Cebu, where she learnt to cook in a factory kitchen: she and two other cooks made meals for 200 workers every day, until the factory closed a year later.
At eighteen she moved to Manila and spent 13 years cooking for Filipino, Chinese and Korean families, followed by four years in Kuala Lumpur. On a visit home to her family, who had moved to Lutoban in the meantime, she met Bernard, a local fisherman. They married in 2005.
Back home, Melba sold vegetables door to door and fish at the market in Malatapay and in Dumaguete. Then Bernard, who was doing some construction work at MCP, overheard our founder, Søren, say we were looking for a cook. He talked Melba into a try-out, and she has run our kitchen ever since.
Where your donation goes
All proceeds from the cookbook go to MCP's work protecting the reefs, mangroves and coastal communities of southern Negros. You can see how we use our funds.
Over the years, cookbook money has also gone straight to causes in the community around our base, including:
- A projector for Zamboanguita Science High School
- Paint, plywood, nails and epoxy for the patrol boat of the Bantay Dagat, Zamboanguita's sea wardens
- Christmas presents for the children of Lutoban beach
- Paint, signs, food and decorations for the opening of the mangrove boardwalk in Siit
- 50 sacks of rice for families in need during the COVID-19 lockdown
Rather have Melba cook for you?
Our volunteers eat from her kitchen throughout their stay. Read about our kitchen and food, or send us your application.