Oton: The country's watermelon town

The first two months of the new year always bring in the cool weather. Cold night breeze yet even cooler mornings, one can always wish for this weather to last year round. But as time flies, one might not even realize, summer is just around the corner. So goodbye to Mother Nature’s cool cuddle and welcome her warm embrace – it’s summertime! It’s synonymous vacation and travel, beaches and more travel. It also means cool eats – halo-halo, ice cream, cool drinks and fruits. Among the fruits of summer, watermelon and mango tops the list.

Iloilo is fortunate enough to have abundant sources of the two fruits that when summertime comes, it comes in great quantity and best quality at the bargain of prices. Here’s a feature on a national daily, The Manila Bulletin, how one Iloilo town supplies a large chunk of the country’s watermelon demand during this season.

Oton: The country's Watermelon town
By ZAC B. SARIAN | Manila Bulletin
January 7, 2011, 10:21pm

MANILA, Philippines – Oton town in Iloilo is considered the watermelon capital of the country. No less than 700 hectares are planted to this high-value crop every year in the town alone, according to Celsa Sorongon Suarez, the municipal agriculturist. In addition the Oton watermelon farmers go out to other towns and rent farms on which they also grow watermelon.

Oton Mayor Vicente Flores Jr. says watermelon has been planted by farmers as early as he can remember but no one seems to know who really started planting the crop in the town. Anyway, watermelon has become a very important crop for Oton farmers as well as the traders who ship out the harvests to Manila, Cebu and many other places.

Watermelon planting in Iloilo is quite unique. Instead of individual farmers growing their own crop, it is not uncommon for teams of workers and their financiers to grow watermelon on a joint venture basis. Just like the team of Jimmy Gaudeong and his two assistants.

We visited Jimmy and his team last December 2 when they harvested their joint venture project in Brgy Bantod, Tigbauan town. Jimmy is an Oton native but like many other growers, he goes out of Oton to look for suitable farms on which to grow watermelon. One should not grow watermelon on the same field year after year to avoid build up of disease organisms, according to him. Read More

Ultimate Ilonggo Favorite: KBL Kadyos, Baboy, Langka

K.B.L. or Kadyos, Baboy, Langka is the ultimate favorite dish of most Ilonggos. It is also one of the most missed native dishes as kadyos and the souring ingredient, batwan , are hard to find when outside of the Ilonggo region. Basically, it is boiled/stewed pork dish owing its "deliciousness" to the combination of the soft and tender pork, the tamed sourness of batwan and the malinamnam na sabaw . One of the "secrets" of the malinamnamn na sabaw , is the fact that the pork, whether just the plain meat or pata (hocks) are first grilled or broiled. This gives the broth a rather smoky taste that makes it more appetizing.. Learn how to make the Ilonggo dish KBL (Kadyos, Baboy, at Langka) with the recipe below. Ingredients 1 kilo Pata (pork hocks) or pork cubes, GRILLED and sliced into bite size pieces 1 unripe Jack fruit, cubed 2 cups pigeon pea (kadyos) 6-8 pieces batwan fruit (or tamarind powder) 1 piece pork broth cube (

Takway

The gabi (taro) is just one of those plants which is edible from "roots to tops". The most popular of which is the tuber part which is used in a variety of dishes and mostly in combination with coconut milk. Its leaves, of course, is the main ingredient of a Bicol specialty, laing . It is dried then chopped and sauteed with other ingredients including, again, coconut milk. Then there is takway . The local term for its tendrils/runner, that part which is torn between being a stem or a root for it neither grows upwards nor downwards - it grows sideways . Scraped off of its outer skin, takway is often a key ingredient in vegetable dishes like laswa and the gabi tuber with coconut milk and local snails know as bago-ngon . It is also popular when cooked adobo style with guinamos , the local bago-ong . It is very popular in the region that even big supermarkets sell takway in style - cleaned and plastic wrapped in styro with some additions to make it easier to prepare.

Easy Century Tuna Recipes

If you're looking for simple, easy and delicious Century Tuna recipes online, congratulations, you've found it right here! How about spicy tuna sisig or tuna sinigang ? Maybe stir fried tuna with pickles or just yang chow fried rice . I love Century Tuna from its flakes in oil variety, the spicier the better, but when I discovered the versatility of its solid variant, it became an obsession. At first I was just into the usual tested recipes; pasta and sandwich filling, but then it got simpler – I just eat it straight from the can! Usually with a piece of bread or an apple. I just add a few drops of vinegar to spice it up a bit. Then came the experiments. Yup I got tired of that habit that one day, I decided to test my skills in the kitchen. Serendipity, you might call it yet most of them turned into good recipes that I have shared now and then. Satisfying my Palabok cravings had me experiment on this recipe on the spot. With Century Tuna in lieu of the usu

An Ilonggo favorite - Valenciana

Found in almost all occasions like fiesta, birthdays, reunions and others, Ilonggos really love valenciana because most if not all have grown accustomed of having it in special gatherings at home. A complete " go, grow and glow " dish because it has the carbohydrates, protein and vitamins and minerals in just one spoonful, Valenciana is really an " occasional dish ". Here's the recipe for Valenciana

An Ilonggo favorite - Suman Latik

Suman Latik is one of my favorite native delicacies - plain suman/ibos topped with sweetened coconut strips or bukayo . Most of the time those sold in the markets have this two (suman and bukayo) already in one wrap and all you have to to is devour it. But most of the time, the bukayo portion is bitin that I wish there's more. So why not make our own suman latik so you can have all the suman we want with all the bukayo toppings we desire! Here's a simple recipe for Suman Latik

FLAVOURS OF ILOILO

Search This Blog