Oak Park's Only Filipino Restaurant: Lola Tining's Cuisine
Kawali, adobo, longaniza and lots of other good stuff

Oak Park has only one Filipino restaurant, more than most Chicago suburbs.
Lola Tining's Cuisine (1141 Garfield) is right across from the Volvo tower, in a small, unprepossessing shopping mall. You've probably driven by it many times.
First time I walked into Lola's, the nice lady at the hot table looked up at me as though to say, "Are you sure you're in the right place?"
My appearance, I suppose, screams gringo, but I've long been a fan of Filipino food. Based on that first visit, I wrote a piece for the Chicago Tribune/Redeye in praise of the lechon kawali, incredibly delicious cubes of boiled and fried pork belly:
When I went back to Lola's last week, I got a lunch combo; pork adobo, kinapusan, ginataan calabasa, garlic rice and a skewer of longaniza.
Adobo is perhaps the most beloved Filipino food; it's a stew, usually pork but any meat can be used, sugar, soy sauce, vinegar and various spices (usually garlic, but it varies; , as with many traditional dishes, adobo is open to random improvisation).
Sarahlynn Pablo, my friend and co-founder of Filipino Kitchen, once told me that "Adobo is a comforting childhood memory, but the aroma is strong. When we've made adobo, we'd close all the doors to our rooms. Some people may not like it, but for me, it's a beautiful cloud of smells."
Lola's makes new dishes all the time. The last time I visited, I was introduced to kinapusan, a kind of fried bacon and, as manager Ashley Strong mentioned, "it's pretty much the same as lecon kawali, but meatier."
The ginataan calabasa is also an item I hadn't seen before: it's squash stew, with green beans, coconut milk, and shrimp, very mild, and a good foil to the lush pork that I also had on my plate.
With the lunch combo, I always get garlic rice. The alternative is white rice, which is okay, but why would you not want something tastier?
The longaniza is a sweet sausage, which I adore. I encountered a smaller version of these sausages in Bangkok, where I bought them every chance I got; I like the ones at Lola's even better because…they're bigger.
Everyone is a food explorer these days, open to trying new foods because they want to learn about other cultures but also because there's a lot of deliciousness out there. If you want to sample the Filipino version of deliciousness, you now know where to go.
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