Lucban Longganisa - Me and my favorite sausage!!

Lucban,  Quezon is a town at the foot of Mt. Banahaw. It is 3 hours from Manila. It is known for the Pahiyas Festival in May. It is also known for it's relatively cool climate.  Cuisine speaking, they are also known for their biscuits, pancit habhab, kiping (dried thin rice cakes that line the houses during the fiestas and then are fried to a crisp) and of course their longganisa.

We frequented Lucban in the 80's because my dad has close friends with the Pavino family. They own the famous Pavino's bakery shop at the corner near the plaza. We used to buy Lucban Longganisas by the dozens before. I can say that I have had my fair share of Lucban longganisas my whole life. I also purchase Lucban longganisa's from the Magallanes shell station and also from supermarkets.

The lucban longganisa's  primary ingredients are pork, garlic, pimenton, oregano and sausage casing. I watched how it's done and mainly its just mixing the ingredients, passing it on a food processor and stuffing them into the casing. They are then left to  hang and dry.

There are several lucban longganisas makers that were scattered all around the town. I must've eaten 8 different kinds of lucban longganisa in 2 days.  I must say that you can really see the difference between the longganisas. Some are indeed better than the others. I have judged the longganisas with these criteria.

1. Pork Meat - if it has sinews or "litid", amount of fat, if the pork is minced into cubes or ground
2. Garlic - flavor of the garlic, if the garlic is still noticeable
3. Pimenton - the color and flavor of the pimenton, this is what gives the reddish hue
4. Casing - if its artificial or natural



Here are my thoughts. Lucban longganisas has really regressed. What I ate in Lucban during my trip were really inferior than what I've tasted before.  The longganisas before was better because they used minced cubed meat before. When you fried the longganisas and sliced into them, the meat was chunky. What I liked about them before was when you cooked the longganisa into a crisp, the tiny cubes of fat were "tostado" or crispy.  The crispy fat bits was good and it added another aspect to the longganisa.

The casing also had changed. Now they use synthetic sausage casing. They used pigs intestines before and that also added another element into the lucban longganisa. It was far more flavorful that the synthetic casing. When fried into a crisp, it was like eating a stuffed chicharon bituka. It was heavenly.

The longganisa lucban today is still good.  The flavor of the oregano and the pimenton still makes it unique. It's just not as good as the ones before.

The shop that I can say makes the best lucban longganisa is the one near the church. If your facing the church,  its in the street in the left. There are two shops near each other. The better one is the one that looks like s small souvenir shop. There is no mistaking the shop because it's the one that has the longganisas hanging from bamboo rods across the room. If you're lucky you might even catch them while their making the longganisa.

They cost around P80 for a dozen of the small ones. Best served with sinangag, atsara and double yolk egg!!!