My Homemade Pancit Molo and Callos ala Micko....

Callos (Original)

Chicken Molo

Callos (Spicy!)

Sunday morning... I woke up early with my aunt and we then decided to go to the market to buy some local food like bitso bitso, siomai, fresh lumpia, panara, and to buy some ox tripe in the meat section to be used in my Callos. After so many years of not going to the market on a Sunday morning really gave me a sense of freshness in everything. I saw people bustling around buying things in preparation for their Sunday's lunch. I almost forgot this feeling especially that I got stuck to living in a dormitory where everything is just prepared by the cook and all you need to do is sit down and gobble your food. Well, I started to fall in love with Sunday morning again after experiencing it last week, with so many busy people going to the market after church services, people haggling, vendors calling the attention of the passers-by and the buzz of tricycles, cars and the noise of the city. After buying all we need from the market, we started home at around 8 a.m. and it seems like more people started to crowd the entrance of the market. It was a very interesting sight and it was made more interesting with the morning drizzle starting to pour down on the people running for cover. After we arrive home, I started to prepare for our breakfast and I cooked my own style of Pancit Molo! My cousins couldn't just stop getting extra bowls of my hot Molo Soup which made me so happy. After we finished having a hearty breakfast, I started to clean the ox tripe and prepare the ingredients that I would be using for my own style of Callos. My mom, who owns a small resto/snackbar in Davao, is a great cook and her Callos is always a crowd pleaser during gatherings and I decided to make my own version of it as well. Well, I realized that cooking Callos is no easy task and it took me almost an hour and a half just cleaning it and then I started to boil it to make it tender. Ox tripe is quite chewy and if not boiled well, it would seem like chewing a car's tire! ^^ Well, after hours of boiling it, the tripe got tender and well, this time, my cousins were so curious about its taste that they started to settle in their own places around the table. Looking at their faces while they were eating the meal I prepared just made my heart swell with pride. I know that if my mom gets the chance to taste my Callos, she will surely be proud of me as well....