Isaw (Grilled Chicken Intestines) , a pinoy street food
Once every so often, my daughters crave for street food like isaw. I find isaw, disgusting to eat. It’s funny but I don’t mind eating diniguan (Black “chocolate” dish or chocolate meat). Anyway, I gave in to the girl’s monthly binge. Their favorite road side stand is in front of Ilang-Ilang Residence Hall at the UP Diliman Campus in Quezon City. The vendors barbecue late in the afternoon and you can see the queue as they wait for their isaw to be grilled. I don’t know what’s so great about isaw. “It’s cheap and it tastes good!“. the girls chorus. Sure, it’s cheap and tasty but is it clean? Can chicken intestines get thorougly cleaned inside and out?
When I reach home, I google for “isaw” . I get horrifed at this article, Pinoy favorites lechon, isaw, spaghetti are ‘most dangerous’ treats. Prof. Ma. Patricia V. Avanza, Ph.D. of the Food Science and Nutrition Department of the UP College of Home Economics in Diliman, Quezon City reveal that ” they are the most “dangerous” Filipino dishes, largely because of the insufficient cooking methods involved.”
the “bitter” taste which greets your mouth when you bite into the fried chicken intestines can be identified.
“That bitter taste is fecal matter,” she announced, raising gasps and yelps of disgust from her listeners.
“Normally, yung internal temperature, pag nag-co-cook ka ng isaw, hindi adequate eh,” she explained, pointing out that
not only is isaw usually improperly cooked, it is improperly cleaned.
*Yelp* Ugh. Now I know. I informed my daughters promptly. “So if it’s bitter, you know what to do!”
The grilling is not adequate to kill the bacteria or parasites.
Yes it looks cooked but are the bacteria killed by the cooking?
You dunk the isaw sticks into vinegar
Posted: December 5th, 2007 under Street Food with 3,084 views.
Comments: 7
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- Isaw (Grilled Chicken Intestines) , a pinoy street food (Dec 05, 2007)
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Hi!
Your interesting post on “Isaw” made me look it up in Wikipedia. It states in a brief article that the intestines are turned inside out and cleaned’ hence no faeces to be ingested.
However I have never tried isaw and am unlikely to ever try it, just like “Adidas”, deep fried chicken fetuses, cock’s combs and other delights our inventive people manage to salvage from going onto the scrap heap. I am all for ecological eating and not wasting anything, so I am glad a use is found for these items.
hi i showed my american bf pics of some Filipino street foods…. and it helps, ur site helps keep up!
Did someone say that isaw is improperly cooked and cleaned? And that the bitter taste is fecal matter? Paano nya nalaman na fecal matter nga you? nakatikin na ba sya ng fecal matter? Well if indeed it is disgusting and dirty, it will eventually cause disease among those those who patronize this food. We shouldn’t have any population problem then.
Disgusting foods to some is a delicacy to some.
rey
well there are some vendors naman here in the philippines who boil it first and some make it as an adobong isaw bago itransfer sa mga skewers… if they are cooked thoroughly naman i guess it won’t cause you any trouble unless na lng if hindi napapasukan ng germs ung katwan mo… if maarte talaga but you crae for this street food, i would suggest that you do it at home so you’ll know its really clean…
its considered a “pinoy” delicacy, a truly tatak pinoy food…rather saying something bad about it…try to experiment on how we can improve this dish or somehow know the proper way of handling this items to avoid contamination and food borne illnesses…
well there are some vendors naman here in the philippines who boil it first and some make it as an adobong isaw bago itransfer sa mga skewers… if they are cooked thoroughly naman i guess it won’t cause you any trouble unless na lng if hindi napapasukan ng germs ung katwan mo… if maarte talaga but you crave for this street food, i would suggest that you do it at home so you’ll know its really clean…
its considered a “pinoy” delicacy, a truly tatak pinoy food…rather saying something bad about it…try to experiment on how we can improve this dish or somehow know the proper way of handling this items to avoid contamination and food borne illnesses…
the bitter taste is not a fecal matter…it is the lining of the intestine called lumen..beides fecal matters don’t stay in the intestine…food goes right through there then getting the nutrients…it is then digested and the rest is history…
clear? lol
Very well said mr. Yohan!