Our second night in Cebu, and after a days’ work, we head on to Laguna for more local Filipino food. The place was pretty crowded, most of the tables were occupied (what economic downturn, you might ask ?). Nice ambience, wooden paneling, leafy potted plants , chairs with weaved rattan backing, dark solid wooden table,
Rice was served in your personal pretty little ceramic urn
Chincharon Bulaklak (Deep fried pork intestine) – pork intestine fried to a crisp , you can dipped these fried yummies into the accompanying (I think it’s vinegar + bits of freshly cut chilies. Yummy, these would go well with beer, I think I can finish bowls of these…( the intestine, not the beer..)
We also had Pork knuckles ( Crispy pata)-again , hey, it’s 2 days in a row of pork knuckles, the table was divided 50:50 on which porky knuckle was better, the one at Laguna or at Golden Cowrie. Anyway, I missed the photo op, so have to settle with the picture of the roast pork instead, this was nice, lean meat plus oily meat, well marinated and tender. This was served with the vineger+chili dip, and marinated ginger shreds..yumm
Tangigue Inihaw (Grilled Blue Marlin )– meaty chunk of grilled blue marlin, as this was plainly grilled, you get to savour the sweetness of the fish without any sauce or marinate getting in the way.
Nokos Inihaw (Grilled cuttlefish )- this was fresh but slightly on being very chewy- must be because of the size that made it a bit tough. Our host named this ‘chewing gum’ .The meat was fresh and sweet, and I admit ( no guilt) , there were no hesitation in getting a share of the cuttlefish eggs.
Kapitan chicken- pretty much like what we find back home, chicken pieces wrapped in pandan leaves. Not bad.
Lengua estofado (braise cow tongue ) ,I hadn’t tasted cow tongue ever, there were about 3 seconds of hesitation- and ehh..the texture of cow tongue not bad la..i expected tongue to be something soft and spongy but this feels just like very tender pieces of meat , nice…
Kare kare with bagoong – this was a dish my colleague wanted to try, the magic word for him seemed to be ‘peanut sauce’ and ‘oxtail’ . the 2 Malaysians were given the honour of trying out the dish first , there were meats, vege like long beans in the claypot, after the first taste, we weren’t impressed, I was expecting something like a satay sauce, this tasted bland with a milk-powder-ish taste,. Then we passed this down the table and immediately the waiter was summoned. It seemed that one important ingredient was missing – the salted fish. Oh AhhHH….the waiter immediately appeared with a little container with something that look like cincalok ( fermented little shrimps). We were told to re-try the dish by scooping some kare-kare onto our plates and to this add the ‘cincalok’ …AHhhhh…very much improved liao. ( later someone sheepishly admit ( NO, WASN”T ME) that the ‘cincaluk’ was already at our table before they served the kare-kare , just that we didn’t know what it was for..)
the mis-placed bagoong ( shrimp paste) or what i refer to as cincalok
One thing I noticed, the Filipinos love Coke, must be the American influence, I guess ? Am not too sure we have Zero Coke, do we ?
Total bill ( plus drinks) came to 3534Peso which is about RM 258 ( for 8 pax, we had 2 servings for some of the dishes), which is pretty reasonable, horr ?
Please click here for Laguna’s webpage
Laguna Garden Café
Garden Row 1, Biliran Road
Cebu Business Park
Cebu City, Philippines
Tel#: 032-2338600
Fax#: 032-2338602
