A few weeks ago, my Singaporean teammates decided to try Filipino food at the nearby restaurant called Turo Turo.
Now in the Philippines, turo turo is a term for cheap food courts where you can point to the food that you want to order. Turo, you see, means “point” in Tagalog.
This particular Turo Turo does have a section of prepared food that you can point at, but you can also order food from a menu that they will then cook on the spot for you.
A week before this, two of my teammates (Guohao and Yan Ming) had already come here and tried the sizzling sisig with me. Sisig is a dish that is made of chopped parts of pig head and liver, seasoned with peppers and onions and usually served with an egg on a sizzling plate.
When they liked it, we thought that Nic and Evelyn should try it also.
But once there I realized that there was another item on the menu that was probably unfamiliar to them – relyenong bangus. So we ordered that along with the sisig, crispy pata, and adobo.
They were extremely fascinated with the relyeno, which looks just like a normal big piece of fish when you first look at it but is actually a milkfish that has been deboned, flaked, stuffed, and fried.
They were amazed at how they managed to stuff the fish and keep the skin intact.
Now that they mentioned it, that is interesting, isn’t it?
They were also surprised to find the side dish of salted egg with raw tomatoes. They don’t eat salted eggs that way.
Guohao was on vacation that day, so he missed out on the relyeno. When he got back, they told him about the relyeno and how interesting it was. Since Guohao has FOMO, he wanted to try it too. So we went there, but the relyeno was out of stock.
We went again the next day. And the next. And the next.
Then he had to go off on a business trip for two weeks.
The moment he got back, guess where we went?
After so long, he finally managed to catch this fish! 😅
I then noticed that they also have lechon – roast pig, one of the most famous Philippine dishes – so I had them try that, too. Our colleague Alan was with us then and that was his fave among the bunch.
When you’re living away from your home country, it feels good to be able to enjoy dishes from back home every once in a while. I’m glad Turo Turo provides that.
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