snake wine

A snake wine with the Philippine king cobra in a bottle. The snake is called banakon in Cebuano or ulupong in Tagalog. The slender snake is called iliw in Cebuano. Both snakes are known to be extremely venomous.

snake wine - /es-nek wayn/ Cebuano and Tagalog wine [n.] a spirit soaked with a snake.

A freshly killed snake (complete with its scales, skin, flesh, bones, and internal organs) is steeped in spirit or clear (transparent) distilled wine until the juice from the body of the snake partly became the flavor of the wine.

Snake wine is taken as a potent drink and is believed to have some medicinal benefits, add vitality, energy, and as an aphrodisiac or something that boosts one’s sexual appetite.

The authentic "Cobra Energy Drink." Unlike the commercially bottled cobra energy drink, this snake wine will not cause you to worry about having diabetes. The snake wine has no sugar added in it. What you will get is a real cobra in a bottle -  not just a label with a drawing or printed illustration of snake.

The usual kind of snakes used in making snake wine are those that are highly poisonous like the dreaded Philippine king cobra (Naja philippinensis) known as banakon in Cebuano or ulupong in Tagalog. Another known highly venomous snake is the Cebuano iliw.

The usual spirits used as a base for this potent drink are the hinebra (gin), vodka, lambanog (Philippine coconut arrack), anisado (anise wine), and naturally fermented rice wine.

I found this man peddling a bottle of snake wine on the sidewalk of Ormoc City in western part of Leyte, Philippines.  He told me that he used a local gin with a brand name Mallorca as base spirit for this potent drink.

To convince me that it is safe to drink snake wine, this man swigs a shot of snake wine.

Few seconds later, the drink started to warm his body. This man told me it would keep him active for a day. Awesome. Honestly, I was actually stunned when he did that. I thought the potent spirit he drank would later take his spirit away. But no, he stayed alive.

In 2018, while on the strawberry farm of La Trinidad, Benguet (about 10 Kilometers or 6 miles north of Baguio City), I found more variations of local snake wines. They are quite expensive. The smallest bottle (350 ml) of snake wine is sold at PHP1,000.00 each and the biggest ones are between PHP3,000 to PHP4,000.

More bottled snake wines in La Trinidad, Benguet using different kinds of venomous Cordilleran snakes.

See me sampling a shot of snake wine that is made with rattle snake from Kiangan, Benguet. Click or tap the photo, below, to watch the Facebook video.

SNAKE WINE from Kiangan, Benguet is very expensive. This one is of rattle snake in lambanog with ginseng root. I don't know how they got rattle snake here in Benguet. A shot glass is P150.00. Every drip counts. (June 08, 2018)

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buti-buti

buti-buti -/bu-tî bu-tî, buti-butî/ (Cuyonon [Palaweño] snack) [n.] Cuyunon puffed rice.

The ampao (puffed rice) of Cuyo island, found in a group of islands in the northeastern seas of Palawan. This ampao is mixed with caramelized sugar and molded into small balls. 

I found these packs of buti-buti peddled by Pastor Abad in the public market of Roxas, Palawan. I thought the balls were crumbled popcorn. But a closer look told me they are puffed big kernels of rice. I am amazed there is such kind of rice in the country with big kernels and grown in that small Cuyo island.

Buti-buti is made with native rice grown only on Cuyo island. The rice is dehulled manually using alho and lusong (wooden pestle and mortar) which produces barely polished native rice grains, with reddish or brown-colored bran intact.

The dehulled grains are pan-roasted until each grain would burst open to become like popcorn. Then muscovado sugar is melted (caramelized) in a pot with a little amount of water and the puffed rice is added in and mixed to combine with the caramelized sugar that served as the sweetener and binder of buti-buti. The caramel-coated puffed rice is then molded by hands into small balls, about the size of a golf ball.

Unlike popcorn, this native puffed rice is quite dense and the outer layer of the kernel is leathery that needs a lot of chewing to fully masticate. Only by chewing it well that you can savor the true taste of buti-buti.

These balls of buti-buti are delicate to handle. It sticks to your finger and easily crumbles when pressed between fingers or even when poked as shown in the next photos.

Due to a very limited supply of the kind of rice used, buti-buti is mostly reserved only to be prepared during festival celebrations on the island or on other special occasions, depending on the availability of the rice.

I got this authentic product of Cuyo, Palawan just an hour after it arrived from Cuyo island. Back then, it would take about two days to transport buti-buti to Roxas, Palawan. Cuyo is a small island off the northeastern sea of mainland Palawan. It's only in Cuyo island that you can find this rice delicacy.

The variety of native rice used in making buti-buti is the heirloom rice of Cuyo island. Growing this rice is seasonal and the grains are scarcely available, mostly only during harvest season or while stock last. This explains why the small pack of buti-buti I bought cost much. 

Rice farming in Cuyo island relies only on rain and sunshine to sustain its production. The rice is grown organically and without using synthetic pesticides.

I still kept on wondering how the rice subsists on that small island.

The name buti-buti is derived from the Ilonggo word butî which means the popping sound of bursting grains or kernels when roasting rice to make puffed rice or roasting maize to make popped corn.

Related posts:

Ampaw



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