Sinigang is probably a familiar dish to you. It is very popular in the country for its distinct sour and savory taste. This soup is usually made sour by using tamarind. When seasoning is not yet available and produced, it is the native souring agent. Who would forget the delicious sinigang na hipon or any seafood being shared with the family while hanging out by the beach? It is really naturally refreshing to the taste!

Sinigang, which comes from the Tagalog word sigang, means stewed. And that’s how it is cooked, by stewing meat or seafood, together with vegetables. Pork, chicken, or beef can be used as meat. With vegetables, okra or lady’s finger, taro or gabi, labanos or white radish, water spinach or kangkong, eggplant, and sitaw or yardlong beans are the common additions that we will see in this dish. Sometimes, long green peppers are also used to add spice to this dish. And have you seen miso? It is a traditional Japanese seasoning produced by fermenting soybeans. Miso is also added in a sinigang variation called sinigang sa miso. Other variations are sinigang sa bayabas, sinigang sa mangga, and sinigang sa kalamansi, which are named according to the souring agents used.

This sinigang recipe is almost similar to the common pork sinigang, except that it’s not just pork. It’s lechon as meat! Roasted baby piglet! If you have lechon leftovers from last night and you do not want to eat it as is again, then you can transform it as another dish-lechon sinigang. The ingredients are all the same, but the taste gets better with the lechon flavor in it. 

By the way, do you know that there is a Malaysian dish that is derived from our sinigang? They call it singgang.

Enjoy your lechon sinigang!