San Diego Magazine's Happy Half Hour

Welcome back! This week we chat with Tara Monsod, who recently took over as executive chef at Animae, the high-design Asian fusion restaurant owned by Brian Malarkey and Chris Puffer. Tara has also worked at Herringbone, Burlap, and at the acclaimed Mozza Pizzeria, and this is her first executive chef position. She recently changed Animae’s menu, and several of the new dishes reflect her Filipino American heritage and the flavors she grew up eating. David and I checked out the new menu (and didn’t invite Troy), and we recommend the scallop crudo with calamansi (a citrus fruit from the Philippines) and the beef short rib kare kare, made with a savory sauce of peanut oil and bagoong (shrimp paste). We chat about Tara’s passion for cooking and have a bigger discussion about whether Filipino food is finally getting the recognition it deserves, especially in a city that has one of the largest Filipino American communities in the U.S. She also shares the biggest lessons she learned from the late chef Anthony Sinsay