May 2015 dinner at Tatoy's Manokan and Seafood Restaurant: Although small in size, the lechon native chicken was so good we ordered another one to go with the sinugba nga managat, lato salad and steamed talaba.
June 2019 dinner at Breakthrough Restaurant: The fried soft-shelled crabs dipped in sinamak was perfect and crunchy, the kinilaw nga tanigue seasoned with coconut milk and vinegar was fresh and heavenly, the talaba steamed right in their shells was plump and tasted of the sea, the KBL [a stew of Kadyos, Baboy, Langka that is similar to the sinigang] soured with batwan is not as glorious as I expected, but the binakol [native chicken cooked in coconut water ala tinola] with young coconut meat strips, carrots and potatoes was spectacular!
The title of being Iloilo's best restaurant is a close contest between Tatoy's and Breakthrough, and the bragging rights is ours in having dined in both.
May 2015 breakfast at Ted's Old Timer La Paz Batchoy: Iloilo is batchoy country and we had our first taste [special, super special and extra special] just beside the feminist Molo Church.
June 2019 breakfast at Cafe Panay: Our search for Ilonggo cuisine brought us to Megaworld, the former airport that was transformed into a Business Park, where we broke our fast with the highly recommended Tsokolate de Batirol and a platter of turon, cassava cake and ibos [deep fried sticky rice] topped with a bowl of Pansit Molo that is actually a soup with meatballs in wonton wrappers.
After breakfast, we whiled time exploring the mall and could not resist a plate of boneless lechon pork belly which turned out to be mostly fat but we cleaned up nevertheless, before Bulan came back from his lunch date with his professors for a quick tour of Jaro's Millionaire Row.
We finished the Lizares Mansion, the Mansion de Lopez otherwise known as Nelly's Garden, the Sanson y Montinola Antillan House and were on our way to the old Jaro municipal building that resembled a Masonic Lodge and the Graciano Lopez Jaena Center when I fell into an open ditch that called off the rest of the afternoon due to my bruised knee and ankle.
June 2019 Pre-Parangal dinner at Punot: The swelling eventually subsided so we had dinner at Punot [who claims to represent the modern flavors of Iloilo] mainly for the Kansi which is the Ilonggo equivalent of our bulalo [although theirs is soured with batwan] which we paired with an unforgettable Pomelo Balingon [a salad of pomelo, lettuce, cashew nuts and anchovies/dilis/balingon] and a jar of batwan juice. We had Sizzling Indong [eel] and Seafood ala Punot [a platter of assorted grilled seafood] too which are beyond okey but the Seafood Karekare is not karekare without the tripes and oxtail. And that is how we came late to the Parangal for UPV's graduating class of 2019.
We toured Calle Real for the sec ond time after returning from Bulan's graduation in Miag-ao with Balong's giant chicken pose in Mang Inasal's first ever store as the only new episode, then walked to what may be our last dinner together in Iloilo City.
May 2015 dinner at Roberto's: Of course, we had the famous siopao, and meatballs and halo-halo too although Roberto's was the unintended consequence of our futile search for Rawit's Native Litsong Manok.
June 2019 dinner at Jo's Inato: It is actually linner, or dunch which is a meal served between 3-5 pm, so we tided ourselves with a shared take-away of Roberto's siopao [no match with the Binondo versions] and over-extended samplers of its lumpiang shanghai and meatballs. Food finally at 7 pm in the form of chicken inato [grilled] and grilled pork belly. I ordered for myself a really superb kinilaw nga malasugue for my beer and that plus the coconut halo-halo are the highlights of the night.
June 2019 dinner at Breakthrough Restaurant: The fried soft-shelled crabs dipped in sinamak was perfect and crunchy, the kinilaw nga tanigue seasoned with coconut milk and vinegar was fresh and heavenly, the talaba steamed right in their shells was plump and tasted of the sea, the KBL [a stew of Kadyos, Baboy, Langka that is similar to the sinigang] soured with batwan is not as glorious as I expected, but the binakol [native chicken cooked in coconut water ala tinola] with young coconut meat strips, carrots and potatoes was spectacular!
The title of being Iloilo's best restaurant is a close contest between Tatoy's and Breakthrough, and the bragging rights is ours in having dined in both.
May 2015 breakfast at Ted's Old Timer La Paz Batchoy: Iloilo is batchoy country and we had our first taste [special, super special and extra special] just beside the feminist Molo Church.
June 2019 breakfast at Cafe Panay: Our search for Ilonggo cuisine brought us to Megaworld, the former airport that was transformed into a Business Park, where we broke our fast with the highly recommended Tsokolate de Batirol and a platter of turon, cassava cake and ibos [deep fried sticky rice] topped with a bowl of Pansit Molo that is actually a soup with meatballs in wonton wrappers.
After breakfast, we whiled time exploring the mall and could not resist a plate of boneless lechon pork belly which turned out to be mostly fat but we cleaned up nevertheless, before Bulan came back from his lunch date with his professors for a quick tour of Jaro's Millionaire Row.
We finished the Lizares Mansion, the Mansion de Lopez otherwise known as Nelly's Garden, the Sanson y Montinola Antillan House and were on our way to the old Jaro municipal building that resembled a Masonic Lodge and the Graciano Lopez Jaena Center when I fell into an open ditch that called off the rest of the afternoon due to my bruised knee and ankle.
June 2019 Pre-Parangal dinner at Punot: The swelling eventually subsided so we had dinner at Punot [who claims to represent the modern flavors of Iloilo] mainly for the Kansi which is the Ilonggo equivalent of our bulalo [although theirs is soured with batwan] which we paired with an unforgettable Pomelo Balingon [a salad of pomelo, lettuce, cashew nuts and anchovies/dilis/balingon] and a jar of batwan juice. We had Sizzling Indong [eel] and Seafood ala Punot [a platter of assorted grilled seafood] too which are beyond okey but the Seafood Karekare is not karekare without the tripes and oxtail. And that is how we came late to the Parangal for UPV's graduating class of 2019.
We toured Calle Real for the sec ond time after returning from Bulan's graduation in Miag-ao with Balong's giant chicken pose in Mang Inasal's first ever store as the only new episode, then walked to what may be our last dinner together in Iloilo City.
May 2015 dinner at Roberto's: Of course, we had the famous siopao, and meatballs and halo-halo too although Roberto's was the unintended consequence of our futile search for Rawit's Native Litsong Manok.
June 2019 dinner at Jo's Inato: It is actually linner, or dunch which is a meal served between 3-5 pm, so we tided ourselves with a shared take-away of Roberto's siopao [no match with the Binondo versions] and over-extended samplers of its lumpiang shanghai and meatballs. Food finally at 7 pm in the form of chicken inato [grilled] and grilled pork belly. I ordered for myself a really superb kinilaw nga malasugue for my beer and that plus the coconut halo-halo are the highlights of the night.
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