'Goto' Experience

After 2 years and 2 months, I was back in a rural community in April. I was reminded again of the things I love about the barrio and the things that I didn't like so much. I missed the laid back life, the warm people and most especially, the food. So in pursuit of the best things in that rural community, best things to eat that is, Ave and I tried the highly recommended 'eateries' in the area.

One of our adventure was visiting Marimar. Ave was excited because it was highly recommende by the people in the staff house. This family-run 'bulalohan' is famous for its bulalo (of course), chicharong baboy and 'anything-beef' dish, including kaldereta and 'goto'.

Photo from here

So off we go. We ordered chicharon and goto. When the orders came, we realized that we made a bad order and were thinking of the other type of goto. You know, the usual goto you see in Manila. Goto of Batangas was not what's on our mind! We didn't know what to do or how to eat our orders, especially when we got to smell it. We tried to do what the others were doing, drown our goto in calamansi, but to no avail, we couldn't eat it!

The owner probably noticed our worried look so she approached us and said, "Naku dapat sinabi niyo taga-** kayo, di kasi kumakain ng goto mga taga-**." We laughed in relief and Marimar advised us to order caldereta instead. We brought our goto home and gave it to our Batangeno housemates.

What was funny is we were only several hours away from Manila and we felt so alienated at that time. All because of goto. Our Batangueno friends said it's an acquired taste and once you get use to it, it tastes great. Especially if you don't think about the smell and what it is made of. In fact, I totally understood when a colleague said, "Just think that it's the same thing as your burong isda/balaw balaw. I couldn't take the smell of that thing, much less eat it." Owww.