dinengdeng a marunggay with kaggo, marunggay leaves and clam soup

Dinengdeng a bulong marunggay a nasagpawan iti kaggo.

Kaggo is a big clam found in brackish and muddy waters in Cagayan, where rivers or swamps meet with the sea or sea water, usually under or along nipa trees. Also called kappo in other places, it is the same as the lukan of the Tagalogs. But they're more abundant and popular on the notherrn Cagayan towns along the coast, like Sanchez Mira, Pamplona, Abulug, Ballesteros, Aparri, Buguey and Sta. Teresita. Meanwhile, there's another shellfish popular in Cagayan, called karibuyo, a sea clam gathered along the seashore of same coastal towns including Claveria, Gonzaga and Sta. Ana. [source]

Kaggo can be made into a savory soup or stew, boiled/blanched, grilled, or simply into a kilawen or eaten raw right from the shell dipped in calamansi juice just like that of oysters. And besides its usual preparation, it's also a perfect sagpaw or add on to vegetable dishes like pinakbet and dinengdeng.

For this dinengdeng, I picked the most tender leaves from my marunggay tree--marunggay is perfect for that savory solo dinengdengs. And prepared the kaggo ingredient--I shucked the clam meat out of the live kaggo, including the salty and tasty "broth" inside the shell:

The most tender marunggay paired with kaggo meat/soup:

The marunggay and kaggo ready:

Put in the kaggo "broth" and some water in a pan and boil. Put in some bugguong and onion slices. For a more delicious and sweet dinengdeng soup, I added kabatiti. Boil for some minutes to cook the kabatiti, then put in the kaggo meat, quickly boil and simmer....

....then put in the marunggay leaves...

....boil a little, then put off fire immediately to prevent overcooking of the marunggay, its done.

Serve the dinengdeng hot and steaming:

That soup... so tasty, so delicious, so insanely good!

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"assorted" carabeef soup (lauya and pinapaitan)

"Assorted" (mixed pinapaitan and lauya)
at Papaitan & Laoya Sa Triangle, Libag, Tuguegarao City

Wonder what's new in Tuguegarao City's gastronomic concerns, or, rather, culinary offering, if any--besides the old and classic and way ubiquitous pancit batil patong?

Well, its the proliferation of so-called "papaitan and laoya" in the city's roadsides and outskirts and the kind of innovative "assorted" thing that came out of the two meat soup dishes. I've been only going to one eatery serving both, pinapaitan and lauya, and been trying the "assorted" concoction at random because I most prefer pinapaitan just for the heck that I love beef or carabeef (carabao) soup only when it's bitter.

But what the heck ngarud is this "assorted" (sic)? Simply put, it's an "assortment" of the various meaty and offal pieces of pinapaitan and lauya mixed into one unique dish--the "assorted." The tastiness and essence of the mostly bony parts of the beef (well, carabao meat is the usual red meat and the most preferred here in these parts) boiled for hours, and the bitterness of the pinapaitan courtesy of the beast's bile or the pespes (extract of the masticated grass inside the small intestines).

One of the popular "papaitan (sic) and laoya (sic)" and therefore, "assorted", destination in the city is found in Barangay Libag south of the city's centro. Wedged in a fork of the national highway and the diversion road to the city:

For Php50, you'll have a complete meal of either pinapaitan or lauya, or of the "assorted" mix. What's special in this eatery is that the rice is unlimited, you can order more rice if you're not really concerned of your abs. Note that they also offer batil patong, this is actually originally a panciteria:

And here's the lauya cuts simmering (actually preboiled for hours the render the tough meat tender and tasty), hot and ready for orders:

The pinapaitan pieces is being cut:

The soups are kept hot atop live coals:

This is the lauya soup:

And this here's the pinapaitan soup:

The "assortment":

We ordered "assorted", of course, and here's how it's being prepared--half/half. On the bowl, half pinapaitan pieces, half lauya pieces; half pinapaitan broth, half lauya broth. Kind of nice mixture:

Customers flock the small eatery, and most are having the "assorted":

Our orders are served:

The soup, turned darkly greenish, is overwhelmed by the pinapaitan essence, the bitterness is just mild though because of the lauya's more meat-and-bone-flavored dominance:

And the delightful consumption has began--we were eager to sip the hot soup first as a sort of an entrée, and of course, spiced it with that obligatory chili in vinegar: 

We are gourmands, or perhaps just so hungry, we ordered a zinagan (dinardaraan, dinuguan) as an added dish; this one's a crispy dinardaraan:

So, the meal is complete, and so, on to eating:

Here's my own messy labay:

We spiced our "assorted" too much with the fiery chili that we were hot and sweating and resorted to having an ice-cold soda--yet another no-no for me but just for this chance, I indulged completely:

Come to Tuguegarao, and let's go "assorting" again!

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More...

• Pinapaitan, the really bitter original innards stew
• Lauya a nuang
• Pnapaitan a silet ti kalding

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dinengdeng a sabunganay, banana blossom stew

Dinengdeng a sabunganay with sabong-karabasa and pallang.

Sabunganay or susop, banana blossom or inflorescence, can be prepared in a variety of ways as a vegetable. Be it inggisa (sauteed), kinilnat (boiled) as a salad, veggie for sinigang or other soups, and ingredient in the famous kare-kare, as an ukoy (fritter), as a bola bola (meatballs), as a kinilaw, and others.

I most prefer it as a plain dinengdeng anyway. Again, this is a childhood staple. We used to have a lot of banana "trees" (mostly plaintain variety called "dippig") in our place in Nueva Vizcaya which bear sabunganays all year round. My mother will dengdeng it with saluyot most of the time and sour it with young salamagi fruit. Or with young singkamas (jicama) pods when it's in season. Just a plain dinengdeng, without sagpaws. And what I liked most about this dinengdeng is the "puso," the innermost part of it, the bud, the core, which is the most tender and sweet. My younger brother and I crave for it and we usually "fight" over it and our mother will just halve it for us to have fair shares of the precious and delicious banana heart.

But preparing the sabunganay for a dinengdeng is a challenge of sort. It's kind of complicated task. Your hand, fingers, especially your nails is in danger of being stained with its sap, a sticky and brownish stain difficult to wash off. But the muri process is an art by itself: you open the blossom's bracts and pick out the clusters of the male flowers (the female flowers are the ones developed into fruit) and remove the stamen (or is it pistil?) or the "palito" out of each flowerettes. Discard the tougher and outer purple bracts, retain the white tender ones:

And here it is, cleaned and ready for the washing and rinsing off its sap (the sap should be discarded as it is kind of bitter or unpalatable):

Now this where you sacrifice that delicate and smooth hand and finger and manicured nail of yours--the squeezing to get rid of the sap. Put in some salt to help in the process, minimizing the bitterness later and sap stain:

Discard the sap out by rinsing it with water after every squeeze:

Squeezed dry, this is it, and there's the heart which I didn't slice, it should be intact to retain its sweet succulence:

We'll have pallang and karabasa flowers and tops to accompany our sabunganay:

I cooked it the way a dinengdeng should be: boiled water and diluted the bugguong, put in some onion slices and then the sabunganay, further boiled it, simmered (at this juncture, I halved the "heart" for it to evenly cook), and when it's tender enough, I put in the pallang and the karabasa and cooked it quickly to just kind of wilt it to retain crispness:

Here's the dinengdeng served, with that prized puso waiting for my eager plate and palate:

Of course, the heart is mine, alone, this time. No, I heartily shared the other half, I'm that generous still, I do have a heart.

And once again, I delighted in my childhood's dinengdeng a sabunganay. I swear I made it the way my mother intended it to be. My palate's memory of taste is as strong as today as it was. Come, share with me this grace.

[See higher resolution (larger and clearer) version, and more, of these photographs.]

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