Food Trip in Cebu : CNT Lechon

I just came back from my 9-day and 8-night trip in Cebu City and the flavors of Cebu are still fresh on my lips.

Most of these taste memories were made at CNT Lechon restaurant across SM City Cebu with all the native Cebuano dishes lining up for a visual feast.

The signature dish of Cebu and CNT is the lechon and everybody was lining up for it. Good thing they have a number system which makes ordering a portion of this roast pig more systematic.

Famed for having no sauce to go with it, Lechon Cebu is packed with herbs and spices, that's why it is almost a mortal sin to ask for sauce for the lechon when in Cebu.

I find most Cebu Lechon more on the salty side (add to that my sensitivity to saltiness in general) so that makes me go "big time" on the rice.

Called "puso" it's cooked rice packed in coconut leaves which is almost like ibos for the Ilonggos, but just plain rice and not malagkit. It is most prevalent in Cebu comapred anywhere else in the Philippines.

I was ecstatic to find out that CNT now serves the popular Cebuano meat soup - Pochero. It's like nilaga or bulalo, it surely quench my cravings for this dish which I raved about two months back. Tender meat and savory broth, this sure made my most of most Cebu taste memories.

But the dish that made my day and the most of my taste memories those past 8 days was balbacua. A heavy soup dish made with beef - mostly the tail and skin; and is very similar to the pata dish of the Ilonggos.

Though this particular one had lots of garlic and even has pineapples compared the simple ones I've tried but nonetheless, it was my most unforgettable native Cebuano eats during the trip. It haunted me for days that I went back a few days after just to give in to this balbacua cravings.

And surely CNT will be a regular pitstop the next time I find myself in Cebu City!

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FLAVOURS OF ILOILO

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