ohh lovely Tuyo, why you so smelly?

 

I've been craving for tuyo for a week now and all I have is a picture.

V and I absolutely love tuyo (a Filipino word that means dried) paired with garlic rice, tomato onion salad and vinegar (spicy for me). We can enjoy this salty dried fish  for breakfast, lunch or dinner.

Our whole family enjoy this Filipino delicacy with much gusto - foot up on the chair armed with our hands we dip and drench this stinky, crunchy, yummy  salted dried fish on a spicy vinegar mix and ate endless tuyo with tomato and rice.

As you can see it really is not that lovely to look at with the fish staring back at you. The smell oh men it just lingers for days specially when you are living in a condo. It's not a healthy dish as well, I mean it really is just salt and more salt absorb by the fish and then it's fried.



Yet it endures migration. Endless household in the country have some kind of tuyo stash in their cupboard and enjoy the thing for breakfast.  You can probably see that almost every Pinoy who moved out of their home country carrying a bag of this delicacy inside their luggage - a little smelly something that would always remind you of fun times on the dining table with your whole family.

A Pinoy might be coming home with a different accent and/or wearing some posh dress but when tuyo is serve in the dining table we eat together as one forgetting the accent and designer dress, eating with our hands and foot up on the chair, we laugh and lick our fingers and come home.

 

*Tuyo and Pinakurat is available in most stores that sell Filipino food. We also managed to buy some decent salty dried fish at Deira fish market.