‘Sisig’ sizzles in northern Luzon food festival

THE KAPAMPANGAN pork dish “sisig” is featured at the opening of Big Bite, Ayala’s Northern Food Festival at Marquee Mall in Angeles City. TONETTE T. OREJAS/INQUIRER Central Luzon

ANGELES CITY—Put together 225 kilograms of preboiled pig’s ears and snout, 60 kg of chicken liver, five sacks of onions, two sacks of garlic, 5 gallons of soy sauce, 2 gallons of oil, six slabs of margarine, 10 kg of siling labuyo (hot chili) and hefty amounts of freshly squeezed calamansi.

All these ingredients went into a giant steel pan to produce the iconic Kapampangan pork dish “sisig,” which was featured in the opening program of Big Bite, the second Northern Food Festival, on Friday at Marquee Mall of Ayala Land Inc. (ALI) here.

Last year, the festival featured the “birenghi,” the Kapampangan version of the Spanish paella.

Sisig has been hailed by a New York Times food column as “arguably the best pork dish in the world.”

“The authentic sisig of Pampanga isn’t crispy,” said Chef Sau del Rosario. “It will be served a bit wet.”

Just as some crackling was heard from the pan and to give the sisig its final touch, Angeles City Mayor Edgardo Pamintuan led ALI executives in putting in the siling labuyo and calamansi.

The tasting signaled the opening of the three-day Big Bite’s food market, food art installations, street food party, culinary cook-off and cooking demonstrations until Oct. 19.

Mark Sablan, mall general manager, said this year’s event surpassed the 100 stalls that participated in 2013. The 128 stalls sell raw, organic and cooked food, local delicacies, nature’s bounties and beverage from Ilocos, Cagayan Valley, Cordillera and Central Luzon for a gastronomic festival in one place.

Erly Torres, who makes “puto” from Calasiao town, Pangasinan province, said Big Bite gave lease-free space. “It’s a big help to us entrepreneurs,” said Torres, granddaughter of Catalina Decena, one of the first makers of Calasiao puto.

Benjie Reyes, owner of Dencio’s Delicacies, laid out sweets from San Miguel town, Bulacan province. A long queue for Zita Degay’s coffee, grown in Kalinga province, was seen on opening day.

Putting entrepreneurs together was a corporate social responsibility program for the mall, Sablan said.

A 16th-century Kapampangan dictionary compiled by an Augustinian friar has an entry on sisig, which was described as “anything that was sour and raw like fruits, and was usually eaten by pregnant women.”

A sisig festival here started in 2002 by former Mayor Carmelo Lazatin presented 177 ways of cooking sisig. Tonette Orejas, Inquirer Central Luzon