You’ll find only a handful of restaurants across the country taking a fine-dining or elevated approach to the cuisine of the Philippines. Las Vegas sometimes seems to have everything when it comes to food, but we don’t have that.

You can get a glimpse of what that could be like by way of an ongoing pop-up installation at Palms. It’s a six-course masterpiece of fresh flavors and modernized traditions, one of the most exhilarating meals you’ll have this year in this city.

I can’t stop thinking about the perfect lechon kawali, crispy pork belly that pops and melts in your mouth, served with pickled papaya, chili-spiked vinegar and a creamy sauce made with chicken livers. And don’t get me started on the chicken adobo and garlic fried rice.

The concept is called Makatas and it comes from Bryan Tejada—an LA chef who cooked under Michael Cimarusti and Roy Choi before joining Michael Mina’s team in San Francisco—and Gary FX LaMorte, the culinary force who served as vice president of Mina’s company for years before founding his own Honest Hospitality, a consulting cooperative that counts the Las Vegas Raiders, SBE and many others among its clientele.

Makatas is the second concept to be showcased at Palms’ spacious, edgy and vacant Greene St. Kitchen restaurant, originally opened by Clique Hospitality during the Station Casinos renovation of the resort. Since Clique won’t be returning to reopen GSK, Palms officials reached out to Jolene Mannina, founder of Fremont East’s Vegas Test Kitchen. She lined up local culinary talent for these weekend pop-up experiences.

The delicious fun began this month with Binky’s, a rustic Italian-American menu from chef Josh Bianchi. Makatas wraps up its run July 1-2, then the third concept launches July 8-9—Crystina Nguyen’s Mamasan, which will continue throughout the month. Nguyen, formerly general manager at Vietnamese favorite District One in Chinatown, has been wowing foodies for more than a year with her Asian cuisine at the Downtown test kitchen, and at Palms she’ll be dishing up throwback Polynesian-Chinese plates.

Pop-up restaurants have been a blossoming force in the scene for years now, a truly fun way to explore authentic Vegas cuisine while peeking into the future of local dining. Vegas Test Kitchen gave this phenomenon a home, and now the Palms is shining a considerable spotlight on it in a generous way. That it would provide the space and resources to do so says a lot about the reopened casino’s new operators and their approach to building connections in the community.

But really, you’ve got to try that lechon and adobo chicken.

GREENE ST. TEST KITCHEN Makatas, July 1-2; Mamasan, July 8-9, 15-16, 22-23, 29-30; $59, vegastestkitchen.com/events.

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