Kelaguen - Who brought it to Guam? - February 8, 2019

I love sharing our Chamorro culture through food and story. In the last several years, I have become fascinated with the origin of our foods, and how our foods tie us to other countries. Can you tell? When I first worked on A Taste of Guam, I was 32 years old and thought the Chamorro foods I ate as a child and teen growing up on the island was the food my grandparents consumed as well. I was partially correct. What I have learned since I started to post videos on YouTube in 2008ish -- courtesy the many comments of people sharing their knowledge -- was that food too was different before World War II. And so the inspiration to learn about our food's history began.

Kelaguen -- as a Chamorro army wife meeting other soldiers that have tried Guam food, they always asked about that chicken with lots of lemon and onions. 

A few days ago, I had just under a cup of chicken kelaguen left. I had already eaten it with titiyas harina or Guam-style flour tortillas, already had it with Guam bbq, and already ate it with white rice. In an effort to reduce food waste, I scraped together leftovers to make something soooooo delicious -- soft taco using "fresh" corn tortillas from a Mexican restaurant, and a taco salad. Holy toledo!

My goodness, both uses of Guam chicken kelaguen were excellent, but I most especially loved the little salad. The flavor of Fritos corn chips AND olives with chicken kelaguen is DIVINE! The dishes are really simple to do -- use chicken kelaguen instead of ground beef made with taco seasoning.

Which brings me to this post. How did kelaguen come to Guam? The oldest reference I can find -- in my personal collection of Guam books -- is in a 1954 cookbook by Alice Maxwell.

Other than that, for now, I'll have to rely on our history -- including our ties to the Ilocos region of the Philippines. Luzon Island is the northern-most island of the country. The Ilocos region is the northwestern coast of Luzon Island.  FYI -- Manila is located south of the Ilocos region, but in the central part of Luzon Island. 

The Philippines was settled thousands of years before Guam was. There are many more migration theories about the Philippines than there are for Guam. It's a common theme for both that the islands were settled in waves long before the Spaniards arrived. Spain claimed the Philippines in 1521 then claimed Guam in 1565.

According to Lawrence Reid's article on Guampedia.com, the ancient Chamorros spoke a very similar Malayo-Polynesian Austronesian language to the first wave of Taiwanese people that settled the Philippines. Dr. Reid also notes that "The earliest Chamorros sailed the 1,300 miles from the northern Philippines to the Marianas in the first major, open-sea migration in the history of mankind." He said it so well I didn't want to summarize. Furthermore, our Chamorro language is still not close enough to any language in the Philippines, or any language south thereof.

That said, here are some terms that are used throughout the Philippines -- similar to our word "kelaguen."

• Kilaw / Kilawin / Kilawen -- two terms more commonly used in the Ilocos region compared to the word kilaw. Kilaw is used more commonly outside of Ilocos. One source states that kilawIn usually refers to meat that has been cooked first vs kilawEn which gerally refers to a dish that starts with a raw source of protein.
• Quilao / Quilauin -- upon Spanish arrival, the Spaniards changed the spelling to quilao and quilauin.
• Naghilao / Hilao / Kinilaw / Lataven / Lawal -- other terms referring to the same dish depending on the region in the Philippines.

Did these first settlers of Guam and the Philippines bring kelaguen/kilawen to their new lands? Or, did kelaguen come to Guam by way of the Filipino men that traveled on trade/whaling boats, or with the Filipino soldiers brought to Guam by the Spaniards during their conquests?

Dr. Clarisa Quan, in an article for Guampedia.com, notes that in 1783 there were 648 Filipinos and their descendants on Guam; in 1819 that number increased to 1,774. Manila seemed to be the primary city from which Filipinos traveled to and from Guam at this time. Before WWII, the Filipino population on Guam was at 2.6% of 22,290, but by 1950 that number rose to 12.2% of 27,124 due to immigration and Filipino labor. 

Plenty history enough.

Growing up on Guam with Filipino friends, I don't ever remember them referring to our version of kelaguen as something that was similar to their food -- but that's my experience only. How about you? Granted we have several versions of kelaguen...

In the book, I Am Filipino: And This is How We Cook, kilawen is defined as a dish that starts with something cooked, like grilled meats, and then tossing the meat in vinegar. Kilawen sounds very similar to kelaguen and perhaps the Chamorros changed the spelling like the Spaniards did in spelling quilauin. We don't have a "w" in the Chamorro language, and to get that "w" sound we use "g" -- like guaka (pronounced gwa-ka). 

Fernandez describes kinilaw as the oldest recorded cooking method in the Philippines where a fish is cooked or cured in citrus or vinegars -- and sometimes made with veggies or shellfish -- to which fruit or coconut milk may be added.

So, what probably happened on Guam, as in many isolated places, is that we adapted the dish based on what was available. Why is it that we only use lemon for all our kelaguens? I've never had kelaguen with vinegar. Maybe we use lemon juice because there was a strong Latin American/Mexican influence on our cooking already and maybe we combined the preparation of kilawen with the preparation of ceviche. Ceviche is a South American dish using mainly lime or lemon to marinate raw seafood.

By the time there were a good number of Filipinos on Guam, there was a lot of produce growing thanks to introduction by the Spaniards.   Why is it our kelaguen has just onions and coconut mixed in? What happened to fruits and veggies that is common in Filipino kilawen? Again, perhaps we did a mash-up of ceviche and kilawen.

This stuff fascinates me and it's too bad there wasn't much recorded history about our Chamorro food -- regardless of who introduced it. I love that when I dig into a bowl of kelaguen made by someone else -- chicken, shrimp, deer, beef -- it's basically the same. Sure, there are nuances -- I've had a bit of shredded cabbage in one, avocado in another -- but these additions are relatively new, and are very rare.

I used to tell folks that kelaguen is similar to ceviche, but we used beef, cooked chicken, and deer instead of just seafood. Now, I know that our kelaguen, while still kind-of-like ceviche, has a close resemblance with kilawen from the Ilocos region of the Philippines.

I try very hard NOT to change the foods / recipes that I grew up with -- in the mid 1970s to early 1990s. It's part of my passing on and sharing my heritage. It's not to say that a big change of a recipe -- like making empanada with something other than chalakiles -- is not delicious, but it's just not Chamorro empanada. We are such a small population, with a tenuous hold on our culture -- that I feel it's essential we preserve our foods from yester-years. That said, kids on Guam today are surely experiencing a noticeable difference of Chamorro food on Guam -- but that will be their heritage to pass on.

P.S. -- the emanada crust made in Ilocos is colored/flavored with achote though rice is used for the dough. Not many empanadas in the Philippines, and around the world, use achote for the crust.

I had fun writing this! I hope you enjoyed the short history lesson on Guam's kelaguen.

:-)

paulaq

www.paulaq.com

Check out my book, A Taste of Guam, for my chicken kelaguen recipe.

In Remember Guam, you'll find shrimp and Spam kelaguen -- Spam kelaguen being a relatively new dish as well.