antonio’s grill: kind of like a poor relation

because of our really great experience in antonio’s a couple of months ago, we were excited to try antonio’s grill as soon as we had a chance for dinner in tagaytay.

antonio’s grill has a great location along the ridge and the interior is very pleasant. wide and cool with the red and white of the original antonio’s.

since antonio is from bacolod, we ordered two of the better known dishes from the area: batchoy

and chicken inasal

i wonder if it was fair for us to compare these to what we have in negros. on one hand, these are not prepared in the local context by cooks who have spent their lives perfecting the flavors; on the other, these are done by a renowned restaurant name whose flagship restaurant is always mentioned among asia’s best.

we were, in a word, underwhelmed. the flavors of these dishes, while correct, were muted. some time during the meal i wondered if it was because there was a western aesthetic of subtlety being applied when these are not actually subtle dishes. whatever it was, they were simply not as tasty as they could have been.

price-wise, reasonable. we spent P400 for a bowl of batchoy, an order of pa-a (thigh and leg) and isol (ass). but perhaps better to order something else. on our end, we decided to just save up a lot and grab a steak at the original antonio’s where, apparently, the gastronomic delights are concentrated.

a quick note on batchoy

we did a major batchoy tasting during this trip to negros. we were there for 5 days and had a batchoy everyday. the full article of that will come out in sidetrip magazine, but we can’t help but still say something about this utterly delicious soup.

it’s easy to imagine the origins of batchoy as coming from the pig parts nobody really wanted. the scraps made into broth and the meat in the soup usually composed of intestines, liver, and some pork. batchoy is garlicky, having its fair share of toasted garlic. it is sweetish, coming mostly (ideally) from caramelized onion. it has crunch from chicharon and heft from the meat and noodles.

some restaurants fancify batchoy – like 21 in bacolod now puts marrow instead of liver. we didn’t try that version because the parameters of our article were to go with traditional preparations.

usually priced at P60-90 a bowl, this is truly a must-try for anybody visiting iloilo and bacolod.

bacolod dining: 2 soups and a slice of pie

our favorite part of our quick bacolod trip was going around silay. love the old houses and the old-world atmosphere of the whole city. of course, merienda had to be in el ideal, the 90-year-old bakery. we had fresh lumpia (which people said we must try) and an ilonggo classic, la paz batchoy (P70).

the color of the broth alone showed the richness. lots of pork and liver goodness in there making every other batchoy i’ve tried seem watered down. they were also quite generous in the meat and chicharon bits making it a very filling and flavorful soup.

in el ideal, we also had the guapple pie (P30)

made from a fruit that’s a hybrid of an apple and a guava and, i think, native to this part of the country. it was flavored like a regular apple pie, but the fruit itself gave a good twist on the taste being quite tangy with a little tartness. another thing we loved about it was that it had this feel of a homemade pie – it wasn’t too refined, but was very comforting.

for our last lunch, before heading to the airport, we had a nice big bowl of kansi (P220)

the ilonggo’s own version of bulalo. beef shank – make sure you have the bone in – with a sour element making it a combination of the tagalog bulalo and sinigang. the broth tastes like the beef has been simmering for more than a day making it incredibly tasty. but the big difference is the souring agent, batu-an, a relative of the tamarind. so the sourness is more subtle than sinigang, but adding great personality and roundedness.

we ate in a carinderia type place called sharyn’s which is beside another popular place called connie’s. very very good.

so our dining lesson for this trip was that for ilonggo food, it’s always best to have the real thing. somehow the places in manila, good as the efforts are, just don’t have the same zing to them.