FLAVOURS OF ILOILO

The All-Time Favorite Ilonggo Comfort Food, Now Guilt-Free! Originally and Distinctly Ilonggo. In 1945 after the war, a local butcher at the Iloilo La Paz Public Market was looking for ways to make use of the pork and beef innards and bones left at the end of the day. He made steaming broth out of the bones, added some shrimp and chicken stock, tossed in the chopped stir-fried innards, some chicken and beef strips, a dash of soy sauce, poured the steaming broth over a bowl of miki noodles, then sprinkled with leeks and chicharon, and finally finished by cracking a raw egg on top for good measure. This created a dish with a distinctly salty-sweet-spicy flavor called “batchoy”, which eventually became the all-time comfort food of the Ilonggos, usually paired with pandesal or puto, and enjoyed for breakfast, lunch, merienda, dinner and midnight snack until this day. Originally and Distinctly MARINA. In keeping with its proud Ilonggo heritage as well as promoting the health benefits of sea...

It was the Holy Week last 2008 when I first heard of a seafood batchoy to be served on a limited basis by Deco's. But luck ran out for since I went to Mindanao then and when I came back, the run was over. So it was just in my dreams and hopes that it will be back, no matter when, who how, why, where, etc. And I had the widest grin upon seeing this on Facebook that I immediately marked the date. Marina Seafoods is already an institution in Iloilo City and is among the more successful Ilonggo businesses that has ventured out of Iloilo City. It was synonymous as the party place and "gimikan" prior to the emergence of the likes of Barracks and eventually Smallville. It has a wide array of Ilonggo dishes and specialties that wherever you are, it almost tastes like home. I even had dinner and breakfast at Marina when I was in Manila last year. And they had this fantastic KBL and laswa that looks good btu tastes even better. But before I start my litany on the good eats I had,...