TASTED: SALAPUSOP

If you're planning a trip to Vigan, you probably have a few items on your pasalubong list like the longganisa (garlic sausages), chichacorn (fried and flavored corn kernels) and bibingka (rice cake). 

Here's one more food item you should add to your list, Salapusop.

Pop Talk host and food blogger Tonipet Gaba, who brought me a box of these treats, shared that making  this delicacy is now a dying art in Vigan, and only one woman knows how to make this,  Corazon Regua of Barangay Mindoro. 

Click on the pic or here to watch the video

Like all traditional rice cakes, it is sticky, starchy and has a sweet sugary topping. Though it's best after being cooked, you can take home a box if you want. Just make sure to steam it before serving. You can also serve it with muscovado (brown, unrefined) sugar.

As my contribution to the preservation of Manang Cora's heritage recipe, here is how you can make your own Salapusop.

SALAPUSOP

INGREDIENTS

Malagkit (Ground sticky rice)

Kinayod na niyog  (grated coconut)

Muscovado (unrefined, brown sugar)

You will also need to use a big palayok (red mud pots) and smaller palayok covers which you can also buy in Vigan.

 

TO MAKE

Mix all the ingredients in a bowl. Make sure  the sugar and coconut are evenly distributed.

Boil water inside the big palayok.

Fill the small palayok with the mixture and steam the salapusop mixture, one by one,  for about 5 minutes.    You read that right, one at a time.  I guess that's one of the reasons why no one makes this delicacy any more.

If you're not interested in making this delicacy,  just buy a couple when you're in Vigan. For a few bucks, you'll help a heritage recipe live on a little longer.