A unique eco-tour and food trip south of Cebu

In a village in Cebu province, residents are developing an eco-tour that showcase the rich natural resources located within a century-old reforestation project.

Elizabeth Nadera, the vice president of the cooperative, told GMA News Online that the eco-tour within the 123-hectare Experimental Forest Station in Camp 7 Minglanilla town is part of the Osmeña Reforestation Project, which is considered the first and oldest reforestation project in the country.

Within the forest reserve, members of the Camp 7 Non-timber Multi-purpose Cooperative are working with the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) in the conservation and management of the area that also hosts a clonal nursery, forest plantation, seed production area, cave and ecotourism, and field laboratory for Environment and Natural Resources technologies.

Local and foreign tourists can visit seven caves, including a white cave that is believed to have a land area the size of a cathedral, several bird species and plants endemic to Cebu province.

Visitors are given a refreshing “welcome drink,” a chilled concoction made from boiled camote tops, turmeric, ginger, and lemon grass.

Another unique feature of the tour are the local dishes served by the cooperative, which the women prepare using ingredients found in the forest.

These dishes include Native Chicken tinola (Chicken Ginger soup), Adobong Bisaya (fried pork marinated in vinegar and soy sauce), Puso ng Saging (Banana blossom) with coconut milk, and a salad of kamote leaves with French dressing.

Cebuano food heritage author Louella Alix developed the group's specialty dish, Manok sa Kawayan or chicken cooked in a bamboo tube.

Alix penned the book “Hikay: The Culinary Heritage of Cebu,” which is published by the University of San Carlos.

The sauce of the chicken dish, Alix told GMA News Online, is a mix of turmeric, (tanglad) lemon grass, and coconut milk.

“The final cooking is done, after the ingredients are sauteed together in a wok, in a bamboo tube,” Alix said.

“The flavor of the bamboo will permeate the chicken,” she added.

As a side dish, she suggests a serving of garlic-infused fried thin slices of gabi and camote.

The entire package comes cheap with only P500 per person and several private groups were already given the tour of the forest reserve and served the dishes that the women prepared.

Also available are necklaces and kitchen utensils created by cooperative also from materials found within the forest reserve.

The eco-tour is described by the coop members as “balik saysay sa kagahapon” or a retelling of the past, because for the longest time the community is dependent on the natural resources in their area and that this belief is attuned to the objective of the project, that is, conservation and preservation of the environment. — AT, GMA News Online