Snacking at Painitan sa Baybay

Sticky rice and the hot chocolate duo have been our family's favorite ever since. I could remember back in the days when I was younger, every early morning, my parents would go to the market and buy sticky rice packed in clear plastic containers and hot chocolate! I would sometimes go with them, we either dine in if we feel like it or just bring the orders for taking away.

I remember my parents taught me how to sprinkle the white sugar on top and then add the hot chocolate for a bowl of softer sticky rice. We also witnessed how its price had increased exponentially today. But we don't mind it because it is always our favorite.

So when my younger brother told the family that there's a simple eatery in Jagna which offers such, we decided we needed to visit it soon. And so last Saturday, we finally had the availability to visit it and have an afternoon snack by the bay!

Let me share with you how this went through the pictures my husband took and I post-processed them.

Painitan sa Baybay Offers Puto Maya and Sikwate

Painitan sa Baybay is located at Bunga-Mar in Jagna, Bohol. The tiny hut they had built sits opposite to the sea and thus the name. Painitan is a Bol-anon word for meryienda which means a light meal usually in the afternoon but it can also be eaten any time of the day. Then sa Baybay means by the bay.

They had mentioned Puto Maya which is how Boholanos refer to the sticky rice. Sikwate is the hot chocolate made from pure tableya which is from pure roasted cocoa beans that are pressed into coin-shaped tablets.

This can't be missed when passing by because they are just on the highway and there's also a hut right at the opposite side of the road which is also owned by the family who runs the business. In fact, their workers are just relatives.

Menu and Pricing

And looking at their menu, it shows how affordable these food options are, mostly are Filipino snacks such as Dinumugan which is a type of rice cake dessert made of ripe banana with shredded coconut meat inside and is wrapped in banana leaves or coconut leaves in the case of this eatery. They also have kutsinta, palitaw and sapinsapin, all classic Filipino snacks. When we visited it, they also offered Gabi roll, more information about that later.

As posted, they have a change in their opening hours starting in September.

Ambiance

In this area, Camiguin island is also visible and the curved highway road is interesting as well. I'd love to see the sunrise from here.

Inside their gate welcomes a garden filled with flowering plants and fruit-bearing trees. The family who owns the business lives here too, it is a residential area where the garden has been turned into an alfresco dining one. There were about six or seven tables here, all were made of wood, some were even just rough palettes of scrap woods being assembled together, I personally love those types of furniture.

My parents choose a bigger one which can accommodate the six of us, including Matti. Then my mother's "plantita" side was activated, she started checking if she has this variety of plants and so on.

Waiting time didn't take long, in just a few minutes, our ordered were served. The staff served them in a native tray and all tableware was also native or made of wood! Having wood on wood made these items pleasing to be photographed.

Below shows our sikwate or the hot chocolate in their wooden cups as well as the white sugar.

Food

Here's our "palitaw". My father likes this so he ordered a few pieces. I love the shredded coconut part of the "palitaw" and they had given us a generous amount of those coconut but I just asked for one serving. These Filipino snacks can easily be consumed. We even asked for another batch because we didn't expect that it to be tasty.

The gabi roll is another snack that they just offered aside from those that were on their menu. This is made of gabi or taro and then they added the "bukayo" or brown sugar-sweetened shredded coconut in the middle. It was good! It somehow cooked the same way as the "dinumugan" but instead of banana, they used taro.

The "sapinsapin" which is made with glutinous rice, flour, and coconut milk, on the other hand, looked like more of a "kutsinta" for me, perhaps because they are shaped like one. Kutsinta is also offered here but they already ran out of it. "Kutsinta" on the other hand is a steamed rice cake that usually has freshly grated coconut meat on top, it is chewy like jelly.

And here comes my favorite hot chocolate and puto maya.

My mother said our paternal grandmother cooks sticky rice very well. She had been observing her cook it but she can't really replicate the old woman's way. Whenever nanay Ceding cooks, the smell goes out to the neighborhood and their friendly neighbors who pass by our old house would call out nanay and appreciate her cooking skills. Too bad, I wasn't able to inherit that.

But I do remember back in my younger years, we often have suman, puto maya, and other typical Filipino snacks or desserts in the afternoon. Most of these were also being prepared during celebrations like birthdays and weddings.

Their puto maya was good but it somehow lacks the aroma of ginger which I always look after when eating this. Still, it was great! The serving was just enough and it came with a golden spoon so who am I to complain? Lol.

Also, allow me to tell you that I always like my puto maya wet so after I sprinkle it with white sugar, I would also pour some sikwate. This makes the rice smoother and easier to eat, I always feel like the rice is dry if I won't add it.

I am not sure though if there's a proper way of eating puto maya, that's just how my parents eat them and I had been taught the same.

After our stomachs were filled with this Filipino meryienda, we paid and my father was surprised he only paid less than Php 150 for all five of us!

I have one more goal though and that's to eat their puto maya and sikwate during sunrise. There's a sunrise view here and they have a nipa hut facing the ocean so I believe it will be a pretty view. It's still the rainy season right now in the country so sunrise is not always guaranteed, perhaps in the summer, we can visit it again for an early sunrise meryienda.

How about you? Do you like having some Filipino light snacks? What's your favorite?

xoxo,

mommy jean of momentswithmatti

Love harder than any pain you've ever felt.