Our drive to Batangas city was like a scene from one of my favorite cartoons. That scene where a little raincloud would persistently follow Wile E. Coyote, dropping rain and lightning wherever he went.
The weather was so wet & gloomy that the only stopovers we made were at restrooms, washrooms, and toilets. We even had to buy a Kit-Kat to cheer us up.
No matter, after about 3 hours and a few wrong turns we finally reached our objective.
Boy, was this NSO office tough to find! After all that searching apparently it was just right between the garbage dump and the two homeless dudes. Who would've thought of that? They should've just given me those landmarks instead of the postal address. It would've been easier to find...
After finishing our business with the NSO, Garandee and I hit the road again. It was getting late, but we were determined to experience an authentic Batangas Bulalo!
We checked out "Grace - Sister of Rose" Restaurant after seeing 3 vehicles parked outside. If these people were eating Bulalo and rice at 4:00PM, then it must be good!
There were about three big families in the restaurant feasting on a humongous bowl of Bulalo: Generous portions of vegetables and beef shanks boiled for hours in a delicious beef broth.
But when we got served, we ended up with this...
Bulalito (Bulalo Jr.)
Garandee and I just sat there, staring at it. Is this a joke or is it because there were only two of us, so we got a bowl half the size of the one the families had? It didn't even have any vegetables in it! I felt like reporting Grace to her sister Rose because I don't remember seeing a "Mini-Bulalo" on the menu. In fact, I don't even remember seeing a menu. I just told them I wanted Bulalo.
Out of sheer greed, I asked the waitress to be fair and serve us THE Bulalo. She took our bulalito away and came back with this...
Yeah! Now that's what I'm talking about! It was Bulalo with the works! We finally felt like we belonged. We felt accepted in the Bulalo eating society of Batangas City.
So how did it score? Well the broth was great, it tasted fresh. The meat was a little tough, I was hoping it would fall off the bone but I ended up struggling to slice the meat off with a tiny bread knife. Garandee on the other hand, was watching me mutilate that bone, realizing that she married a savage Neanderthal.
There was no way I could finish it... Garandee ate mostly vegetables like a good vegetarian. We just had the bone put in a doggie bag and brought it home.
Well that's it folks! That just about sums up our kawawang trip.
Total time on the road: 5.5 hours
Total time in Batangas City: 50 minutes
Garando mode:My butt's still flat from all that driving...
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