October is Indigenous Peoples Month: Garlic Pepper Chicken | Amrey’s Kitchen™

Garlic Pepper Chicken with Sagada Rice and Inampalaya.

My first solo backpacking trip to Sagada happened when I already transferred to one of the universities in Mindanao in 2005. It’s just so ironic that whilst studying in Baguio, which is relatively nearer to Sagada, I never went upper north. Looking back though, my priorities were different and my preference for the sea over the mountains was much evident.

I developed a certain love for Sagada during that first trip. It was also then that I learned that as a solo backpacker, you need to be more proactive, flexible, and friendlier. Remember, backpacking is travelling on a budget. And most tours offer packages for groups, so if you do not strike up a conversation with a group of travellers, you’d have to be willing to shell out for the full package fee. You can also try your luck and hope that the guides will be kind enough to offer you a solo fee instead.

It was also on this trip that I was able to witness how pinikpikan is made for the first time. Pinikpikan is a dish in the Cordilleras wherein they use the whole chicken, including its innards and all. It’s a slightly bitter chicken soup dish, usually served during their traditional rituals. The act of killing the chicken and having its blood spilled serves as an offering to the gods for a good harvest. They then proceed with preparing the chicken by burning and plucking its feathers off before turning it into a native delicacy. I learned from the locals that it’s called pinikpikan because the chicken receives a good ‘beating’ aka pikpik (tap or pat) for it to become a food source aka die. So, imagine the mixed feelings I had when I first saw the whole process of how this dish is made.

As I’ve mentioned in Yeti’s Sweet and Spicy Chicken Adobo, chickens are a dime a dozen and one of the most readily accessible versatile animal protein sources most people enjoy. During that trip, I realized how one chicken meal serving can actually feed two people. Or prolly, I used to eat like a bird back then? Hah. It was then that I also observed that the rice they serve is a combination of white and black rice, giving the cooked rice a wonderful purplish-red hue. I then came to call it Sagada Rice. I cannot remember how many chicken meals I had during that trip, but it comprised the majority of my sustenance including veggies (mostly freshly picked from the backyard) and fruit!

Today’s Garlic Pepper Chicken recipe celebrates the Cordillera IPs and all the fond memories I have of my early uni days and the subsequent backpacking trips there. 

Photos shared are from trips after 2005 because I still have not had a chance to digitize the photos I took during my first trip. I was still using advantix (point-and-shoot camera) back then. Oh how I miss that advantix of mine. LOL.

Kodak Advantix C800

Image Source: reddit user laydubk1

Have you ever been to Sagada and were you able to taste pinikpikan? What was your fondest memory during your trip? I look forward to seeing your version of this easy Garlic Pepper Chicken on IG @amreyskitchen (#amreyskitchen #amapolism). I’m excited to see what rice and sides you served it with. Remember, sharing is loving. Let’s keep spreading LOVE with Amrey’s Kitchen™ mindfully crafted recipes and creations!

The music you’ll be hearing with the reels for the whole month of October will be the digitized recordings and collection of my movement mentor in ‘Sanghabi’, Orlan, who has already passed on. With his teachings, and knowing that his spirit is always with us, I am truly grateful to have learned from him. And now that I am ‘digitizing’ his cassette tapes, I can’t help but be nostalgic and very ‘sensitive’ these past few months.

Happy cooking, lovelies! #mettalove