Manado offers a cornucopia of tasty delights

Tantri Yuliandini and Jongker Rumteh, Manado, North Sulawesi

No one would ever associate Manado with the word "sleepy", and come Saturday night, the already lively provincial capital seemed to light up even more as people from faraway towns began to fill the city square and spill out onto the streets.

As night descended, public minivans overflowing with passengers jammed Jl. Piere Tendean, famously known as "the boulevard", their stereos blasting rock music.

The carousing and occasional fistfights may unnerve first-time visitors to the city, but it is this Saturday-night merrymaking that portrays fun-loving nature of the Manadonese.

Their love of food and the delicious traditional dishes they serve in their homes and restaurants also define the Manadonese "good life".

Adventurous travelers may sample Manado's more exotic delicacies, such as paniki, or fruit bat, dog and field rat dishes. And because it is a majority Christian area, there are pork dishes galore.

Other kinds of food are, of course, also available for those less adventurous, such as myself.

No morning is complete for a typical Manadonese without the smokol, a mid-morning meal that usually consists of bubur Manado, a Manado-style rice porridge -- locally called tinutuan -- basically rice porridge cooked with kangkung, or water spinach, pumpkin and corn.

Popular tinutuan joints abound on Jl. Wakeke, where civil servants spend their early morning break on weekdays and families enjoy their smokol on weekends.

The vendors sell the porridge straight from their front yards, as well as bananas fried in batter, boiled corn, fried skipjack tuna and fried tofu as accompaniments. Don't be surprised if you see someone mixing all four into their bubur Manado!

In addition, no decent Manadonese would go a meal without dabu-dabu, the local chili sauce -- and the spicier, the better. Unlike the sweet chili sambal of Java, the Manadonese dabu-dabu has a fresh tang to it, perfect for fish dishes.

Two types of dabu-dabu is usually prepared: the dabu-dabu iris of chopped up red and green chilies, shallots and small tomatoes mixed with lime juice, salt and coconut oil, and the dabu-dabu goreng, which contains the same ingredients crushed to a pulp and sauteed in coconut oil.

Located close to both the sea and the freshwater lake Tondano, Manado's fish dishes are mouthwatering feasts. Freshwater carp and gourami are either fried or grilled with rica-rica, a fiery Manadonese salsa with green cherry tomatoes, green peppers and shallots.

Most eateries in Manado offer assorted freshwater fish dishes, but the best places to go are the floating restaurants on the banks of Tondano Lake. The freshest seafood are on offer at restaurants along Malalayang, on the road to Tasik Ria Beach, which also offer a scenic view of Manado Bay.

Nasi Kuning Seroja, Seroja yellow rice, available in Kodo kampong on Jl. Diponegoro, stands testimony to the Arabic influence in the area. Sold in small shops with no parking space, the eateries are never short of customers.

Food is served without fuss: Every customer is immediately served a plate of yellow savory rice with boiled egg, fried string potatoes, spicy diced potato, abon -- shredded meat -- and diced meat. Water jugs are placed on each table, with plastic glasses to go around.

"The food stays fresh for a long time, so people from Jakarta usually take doggie-bags for their trip home," the owner said.

Also practical as souvenirs for friends and colleagues are local snacks such as bagea, a type of cookie made from sago, palm sugar, coconut milk and canari nuts, candied nutmeg and kacang goyang, or sugar-coated peanuts.

While you are there, don't forget to sample Manado's famous klappertaart, the sweet, creamy coconut tart that is a legacy of the Dutch and perfect for warding off Manado's afternoon heat.