I thought I was just looking at another cassava snack.
Then I asked one question:
“What if they are doing by the sun... they will be arrested?”
Melvin laughed.
His mother used to make in the traditional way — drying it under the sun.
But Melvin wanted to sell the same kind of product to hotels and resorts.
The cassava itself didn't change.
The first steps didn't change either.
Peel it.
Grate it.
Flatten it.
Steam it.
But when it came to drying, he had to leave his mother's method behind.
So he bought a dehydrator.
Not because the old way suddenly became meaningless.
Because selling to a different market meant meeting different requirements.
And even then, it wasn't as simple as pressing a button.
He opened the machine.
“Still not dry enough.”
Back in.
A little longer.
Then check again.
Watching him, I realized I had been looking at this like a food story.
The same ingredient.
The same community.
A different way of making it.
After a long day in the mountains, I finally made it back to IT Park.
And somehow, the city felt very different after seeing where that little bag of cassava chips actually began.
Almost 3 years in the Philippines, and I'm still learning that food stories rarely end with the food itself.
Sometimes they lead to the people behind it.
Still Learning.
Still Exploring.
One local story at a time.
"The dehydration process under the sunlight is not allowed to register a enterprise from the food and Drug Administration." — Melvin
That's why I choose this hard process." — Melvin
Melvin runs a small cassava processing facility in Catmon, turning cassava from local farmers into packaged chips that end up on shelves in hotels and shops. I'd already written about the grant that helped him start it, and the machines he's added since.
But standing there while he opened it, checked the chips, and closed it again, I realized I'd started measuring this trip the same way I measure the machines themselves — is it working, is it worth it, has anything actually changed.
The real discovery wasn't the machine at all — it was realizing the same ingredient, the same community, had simply found one more way to keep doing the work together.
| Date | August 13, 2026 |
|---|---|
| Location | Corazon, Catmon, Cebu |
| Event Type | Follow-Up Field Visit · Cassava Processing Check-In |
| Access Method | Invited back by a local contact, Melvin |
| Food Featured | Cassava Chips (Drying Process) |
| Cost to Attend | Free (by arrangement) |
| Rarity | 🟨🟨⬜⬜⬜ — A routine production step rarely seen by an outsider |
| Bayanihan Index | 🟨🟨⬜⬜⬜ — A quiet, one-on-one continuation of an ongoing relationship |
Whether that's simply how Melvin's operation runs, or something closer to how most small businesses here quietly keep moving forward, is still something I don't know.