Soft, chewy morsels of white rice is laced with pure crab fat, and taking the talangka experience a notch higher is a generous topping of crispy crablets. Leave it to Pampanga's esteemed Chef Claude Tayag to make your mouth water, and heart skip a beat.
Stepping inside Downtown Café in Angeles, Pampanga will bring you back to the comforts of a classic diner, complete with memorabilia displayed on the shelves, old posters hung on the walls, and a jukebox to complete the whole rock and roll throwback. Here at Chef Claude Tayag's casual restaurant, you can kick back with no-frills yet flavorful Capampangan food, along with his takes on traditional comfort food.
The pure crab fat (taba ng talangka) used in Downtown Cafe's heart-stopping Crispy Crablets With Pure Talangka on Rice comes straight from Chef Claude Tayag's line of gourmet bottled marinades and sauces. His Claude'9 Pure Crab Fat is available in the restaurant to bring home as pasalubong, and the chef even shares a couple of his crab fat recipes that you can try yourself in the kitchen. But why wait until the drive home to open up a bottle and taste it for yourself, when they already cook it so deliciously in the restaurant?
For their signature flavor-packed rice, almost a third of a bottle of pure crab fat (fat of shore crab) is used to combine with steamed white rice and the chef's own sofrito (a flavor bomb of tomatoes, onions, and garlic). Every morsel of rice is tinged with the signature orange color of the taba ng talangka, fatty flavor meeting garlicky notes. The softness of the rice get fun texture play thanks to the topping of crablets that are deep fried until crispy. You can go ahead and live even more dangerously by pairing this with the classic Capampangan sisig, or dare bigger and have their bagnetta – oven roasted and deep-fried pork belly.
Give that calamansi a big squeeze to lend some of its lipsmacking acidity to the rich flavors of the rice. Spoonful after spoonful, this aligue dish is absolutely comfort food stuff–manyaman, as Campampangans would exclaim. Now how about pairing some ice cold beer while we’re at it?
Posted by Downtown Cafe on Monday, March 16, 2015
The Dish: Crispy Crablets With Pure Talangka on Rice P250
Where to Find it: Downtown Cafe, located at NEPO Quad, Plaridel Street, Angeles City. Like Downtown Cafe on Facebook (/downtowncafe1956) more information.
