Eating binisaya in style

Friday, December 2, 2011

IN SEARCH of Cebuano food like linarang, bakasi, balbakuwa, mandunggada or plain utan Bisaya (also known as nilaw-uy) but hesitant to go to carinderias or market food stalls where these are the specialties? Search no more, for you can find all these and more in Kan-anan, Cebu Parklane International Hotel’s tribute to Cebuano cuisine.

Parklane is, in my experience, the only hotel whose telephone operators greet me in Cebuano, and somehow it makes me feel proud that there is a hotel that takes pride in being known as Cebuano.

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This is because management is making the hotel stand for Cebu, so it has a diorama of Cebu’s top tourist destinations in its lobby and is slowly transforming its guest floors to showcase the different aspects of Cebu culture. Kan-anan, its fourth floor dining outlet, is a natural offshoot of this feeling of “pride of place.”

So what Cebuano food is offered here? For appetizers, there is ginabut (light buttered
internal organs), which has a tendency to make you munch and munch; kinusit–kusit nga nukus (squid from Bantayan), with green and red bell pepper, onions and tomato in vinegar and calamansi juice; hinalang nga bulinaw (sweet and spicy air-dried anchovy), a serving of which is served free to the diner; and labtingaw, which is lightly sundried and sea water marinated fresh fish, “served with sinamak sauce.”

For soup, aside from nilaw-uy, there’s monggo soup, tinuwang manok Bisaya (native chicken simmered with green papaya, ginger, kamunggay and lemon grass in coconut milk), as well as some people’s favorite aphrodisiac, lansyaw (stewed bull’s gonads).

For the main course, aside from linarang, bakasi (that’s eel from Cordova), balbakuwa, and manduggada, Kan-anan also has high cholesterol paklay made of an assortment of pork kidney, heart, liver and liempo, sautéed with garlic, onions, bell peppers, carrots and turnips (remember, says food guru Dr. Alonso, it’s the cholesterol that makes any food delicious!); caldereta nga kanding (goat stew), adubadung atay ug batikulun (chicken liver and gizzard), adobong kangkong (water spinach), inasal nga manok Bisaya (grilled chicken), and my favorite noodle-less pancit, pansit buku, which uses shredded young coconut meat instead of noodles.

The salads in the menu are my all-time favorites: latu, lukut ug gusu (seaweed), tossed with ginger, onions in vinegar and lemon juice, kinilaw nga nangka (young jackfruit salad), pusu sa saging (banana heart with ginger, onions, vinegar and light coconut milk), kinilaw nga tawung (eggplant salad), and ubud sa lubi (palm heart).

Any one of these will surely whet anyone’s appetite and gives me childhood memories of picnics in Sayaw beach (Barili town) that usually ended with another swim in Bolocboloc’s swimming pools with their healing waters.

Kan-anan, says food and beverage manager Joward Tongco, also has a choice of grilled food, as well as a showcase of raw meats, fish and shellfish which one can order to be cooked in any way one wants. Rice is “unlimited” and can be ordered plain or as Cebu’s iconic “puso.” If one is true blue Cebuano, there’s corn available, rather than rice, to go with all that food, and complimentary salabat (ginger tea) to end your meal.

All that food… do they not make you proud (and satisfied) to be Cebuano?