Bulalo is a dish of boiled beef leg, with the marrow included. Boiling usually takes many hours, but the job is faster with a pressure cooker, though I think it still takes more than an hour to get that fall-off-the-bone goodness. Compared to Nilagang Baka (literally translated also means boiled beef), Bulalo hardly has any vegetable accompaniments. Mostly just the leg and the soup, which when done right gives a “milky” taste mostly because some bone marrow mixes with the soup. Nilagang Baka uses mostly the upper beef shank and is usually very lean with small amounts of fat and collagen for flavor. Vegetables are added to nilagang baka for better sustenance. But the bulalo is just plain food hedonism. All the goodness of the beef and fat mixed with marrow in a delicious steaming bouillon. And I drove 45 kilometers to Tagaytay City in Cavite to sample this wonderful dish.

I will not recommend a particular restaurant for great bulalo in Tagaytay City because I know most of us have our own favorite bulalo houses in Tagaytay. I ate at the Bulalo House beside the old cinema near the former location of the Tagaytay meat market, before they moved to their present location, by the slaughterhouse. At P350.00 (US$8.00) per serving, three people went home happy that day, including yours truly. Of course, I just couldn’t resist ordering another favorite, inihaw na liempo, or grilled pork belly.

This one cost P180.00 (US$4.10) per serving. It was soft and tender to the bite.

This part is the same as used in making bacon, only the cut is different and rather thick. In the Philippines, the pork belly is one of the most well-loved and prized part. It is not healthy because there are fat deposits in between the lean meat, but this only makes it taste good.

As in bulalo, the marrow is always the prized part, though the most difficult to retrieve because you will really have to get your hands dirty and go the extra mile to make it pop out in one delicious glob. In some fine dining restaurants, there are tools and implements that allow a diner to get the marrow out without having to use their hands. However, I think it’s always good to use your hands when eating. The lesser the pretension, the greater the pleasure.

After the marrow, deal with the meat.

Yes indeed, bulalo is truly the ultimate Pinoy comfort food.