We decided to tag along for a road trip to Tarlac City. This place used to be just another place we used to pass to get to Baguio and now, it’s quite accessible with the opening of the SCTEX. So where do people eat in Tarlac? Victor’s.
My cousin discovered this place when he was stationed in Tarlac for his job several years ago. Since time goes so slowly in this place, he was able to sniff out a good food hang out in the city. Victor’s is just by the highway. It is beside 2 empty lots which serves as its parking space. People begin pouring in for lunch and dinner, we came a little early at 5pm, which was good at least all the service people were concentrated on us.
You can’t miss a place like this since you can see the chickens grilling over he hot coals at the side of the road. There is also 2 large signs that tells you, “Yes, you are here!”. My cousin immediately went to the barbeque area where you can hand pick which items you want grilled as well as you can pick out which sisig you want made. My favorites of course are the chicken hearts, ass as well as the balunbalunan or gizzard.
My cousin picked out a stick for the sisig that she gave to the server. She then took out this huge antique looking cleaver and began chopping the pieces on this tree trunk looking chopping board, when the pieces were chopped, she took out an onion and began chopping them all together. The pieces were probably further seasoned until the dish came out. This was sisig unlike anythng I’ve tasted before. It was soft and mushy, and had a nice roasted flavor beneath the hint of vinegar in the dish.
We ordered a lechon manok too. The skin was surprisingly quite crisp. Again, this was nicely grilled over coals and you can taste it. Sad to say it wasn’t as awesome as I thought it would be, but I guess they had this natural thing going on without putting emphasis on the marinade. It sort of felt like we were in the army and we just killed a chicken, now I have some salt…so I’ll just rub this on and we are good to go. But on a good note, it was pretty moist and juicy!
The barbeques were quite enjoyable. My favorite part, the balunbalunan was a little tough. But the lovely hearts were grilled and nicely smothered with sauce. At this point, I was also looking for something to cut off all this grilled stuff…some atsara or vegetables maybe? We never really got a chance to see the menu. The barbeque sauce was a sweet, filipino-style sauce. I think this place draws a nice crowd of people looking for a home grilled feel.
I would think that this please is pretty reasonable as people literally began filling the restaurant by 6pm! Hopefully if anyone has been here and seen the menu, you guys can share what you saw… 🙂
Victor’s is on McArthur Highway in Tarlac City
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