LECHON is the Spanish word for suckling pig. In the Philippines, it connotes a whole roasted pig, lechón baboy. Chicken and beef, are also popular. The process of lechón involves the whole pig/piglet, chicken, or cattle/calf being slowly roasted over charcoal.

The first written record to mention “lechón” was the Vocabulario de la Tagala printed in 1613.

The photo above, showing a man cooking lechon baboy, was taken in Iloilo between 1907 and 1916, and now forms part of the University of Wisconsin’s Philippine Image Collection, American Expatriate Album, Southeast Asian Images and Texts Project.

Iloilo, like any other places in the country, has a thriving lechón industry. Restaurants along the Villa Beach area, for example, attract patrons because of their delectable lechón baboy and lechón manok. Iloilo’s lechón tastes different from that in other areas, food connoisseurs say. This is because it is stuffed with tanglad (lemon grass), and sometimes with tamarind leaves, rather than sibuyas dahon (onion leaves) that is used in Cebu and most Manila lechón.

Lechón is often cooked during fiestas, the holiday season, and other special occasions such as weddings, graduations, birthdays and baptisms, or family get-togethers. The lechón is usually the highlight and the most popular dish of these events. It is usually served with a liver-based sauce.

However, in some cases, it may be served Chinese style with steamed buns and a sweet plum sauce.

This dish is also popular in Puerto Rico, the Dominican Republic, Cuba and many other parts of the Spanish-speaking world.

Another version of lechón, called lechón kawali, involves boiling then frying pieces of pork.

Leftover lechón in the Philippines is easily recycled into another delectable dish, called Lechón Paksiw. Lechón Paksiw involves cooking the left-over Lechon by boiling it in vinegar making the meat moist and the skin very soft.

The typical Filipino method of roasting involves placing the pig on a spit and baking it on charcoals while wiping the skin with a brush made out of leaves drenched in water and the pig’s own fat. This makes the skin “pop” and eventually crunchy.

The pig had always been the center of communal feasts in pre-Hispanic Philippines, and “Lechon” is the normal manner it is prepared, from the remote part of the country where no Westernerners ever seen to the lowland Christianized Filipinos. But only lowland Christians use the word lechon to describe it.

For more information about the photo above, please contact:
Dr. Alfred W. McCoy
at: 207 Ingraham
1155 Observatory Dr.
University of Wisconsin-Madison
Madison, WI 53706
Phone: (608) 263-1755, Fax: (608) 263-3735
or at awmcoy@facstaff.wisc.edu

Text reference: wikipedia.com

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