South Bay Food Crawl - National City: Tita's Kitchenette

Featuring the First South Bay Food Crawl! Even though only two people ended up going out of 7 or 8(me and Dennis of A Radiused Corner), I'm pretty sure that we will do this once again with more folks and more advanced planning since many of our mutual blogger friends had work or other plans that day.

First stop in the South Bay is National City, where the population has over 20% Filipinos (roughly 10,000 or more, based on the 2000 census) and is home to tons of Filipino food joints. Believe it or not, I'd never been here to this particular eatery which was a specific request from Dennis to visit Tita's Kitchenette on East Plaza Blvd.

There was already a long line and it was only a bit past 11 am on a Sunday! There were lots of workers taking your order. You better know what you want too because they'll skip over you if you are a wishy washy lollygagger. Fk that, I already knew what to order.

Since it was just us two, we shared one two item combo ($7.00). See the sign? Cash only. Don't even think of using your credit card. I hate the way they spell "lumpia" as "loompia".

It got fkg crowded after we sat down. Lots and lots of people here. Almost all of them Filipino. We sat in a corner booth by the window because of the better lighting (for our photos, ha ha). This place is bare bones. No fancy decorations. Not that you need any. As long as the food is good, I don't care what the place looks like. Don't expect it to be super clean here either. If you're squeamish about unwiped tables, tough $#%@. I wiped one part of the table down myself with a napkin.

Before I ordered, I asked the chick there if they had any sisig and she replied no. So, I chose "dinuguan" (aka the infamous "Chocolate Meat"). Dennis was game for that. The other item was the pork menudo. The combo comes with a lot of rice and a cup of soup (Chicken Tinola). And by the way, there WAS sisig. As we neared the end of the line, I saw a tray that had some sisig in it, but we already had our order boxed and ready to go. Boo.

About the menudo, while it shares the same name as the Mexican menudo, they are entirely different dishes. Filipino menudo is pork (and sometimes pork liver) stewed with garlic, tomatoes, onions, diced potatoes and green peppers, and carrots and sometimes raisins. It is seasoned with vinegar and soy sauce along with black pepper. See that triangular shaped piece of meat? Well, it was mostly fat and man did it taste good! I think my GI tract will be ruing this day tomorrow!

You see that fork? Oh yeah, man, CHOCOLATE MEAT GOODNESS!!! For those of you that don't know, "diniguan" is pork blood stew with bits of pork. If you want to go old school, then it would also include intestines, tripe, and ears. But this was just the pork meat with fat! Dennis really enjoyed both of the dishes as well as the soup. One whiff of the soup and I knew it was Tinola, which is ginger based. The broth was quite flavorful as well. The vegetables in the soup were bok choy stems and big chunks of chayote.

"Dinuguan" is pork blood stew, blood pudding stew, chocolate meat) is a Filipino savory stew of blood and meat (typically stomach, intestines, ears, heart and snout) simmered in a rich, spicy dark gravy of pig blood, garlic, chili (most often siling mahaba), and vinegar. The term dinuguan comes from the Filipino word dugo meaning "blood".

It is frequently considered an unusual or alarming dish to most people, though it is rather similar to European-style blood sausage, or British black pudding in a saucy stew form. It is perhaps closer in appearance and preparation to the ancient Spartan dish known as melas zomos (black soup) whose primary ingredients were pork, vinegar and blood. Dinuguan is often served with white rice or a Philippine rice cake called puto." (info taken from wikipedia's entry on "Diniguan"


So don't let my snarky comments deter you. If you want some authentic Filipino food, they have it here! There is a lot of selection such as pancit, lumpia, fried fish, menudo, sinigang, afritada, pinakbet, (sometimes) sisig, lechon kawali, adobo, and more. The portions are humongous. One 2 item entree is way too much for one person in my opinion. Consider it both lunch and dinner!

I like places like this where it's down home and down to business. No one checking up on you. If you want more napkins or whatever, you can get it yourself. Just get down to the main business of eating and enjoying your food folks. It's not a yuppified version of Filipino food. This ain't the Gaslamp, Uptown, or La Jolla. This is food like your mom makes (if you are Filipino) or the kind of food you'd get at a Filipino party.

(image from the Pinoymall.com website)

I gotta hand it to Dennis for trying the "Chocolate Meat". Most people steer clear from it once they know "Blood" is one of the main ingredients! Dude, I hope you are enjoying those leftovers!

Next up, Seafood City...