A decades-old rivalry over roast pig reaches a new, more organized phase

BATAAN – A longstanding, mostly good-natured rivalry between two neighboring barangays over whose lechon reigns supreme has escalated this fiesta season into what one committee member half-jokingly called “a full logistical campaign,” complete with a recruited outside lechonero, a taste-testing subcommittee, and, for the first time in the rivalry’s history, an actual spreadsheet.

The dispute traces back at least fifteen years, when the neighboring barangay’s fiesta lechon reportedly won a regional informal taste competition that the losing barangay insists, to this day, was judged unfairly. This year’s fiesta committee, led by longtime organizer Boy Salcedo, decided the time had finally come to settle the matter decisively rather than continue losing the argument every single year at family gatherings that inevitably touch on the subject.

A Rivalry Taken Seriously, For the First Time

“Every fiesta, someone brings it up,” Salcedo said. “Every single year, ‘remember when their lechon won.’ Fifteen years. I got tired of hearing it. So this year, we did our homework.” The committee’s homework included recruiting a lechonero from a neighboring province with a strong regional reputation, conducting three private trial roasts leading up to the fiesta, and assembling an informal panel of five trusted community elders to blind-taste each trial batch against the committee’s best recollection of the rival barangay’s recipe.

Committee treasurer Loleng Batumbakal, who volunteered to maintain what has become known informally as “the lechon spreadsheet,” said the document now tracks skin crispness ratings, seasoning notes, and roasting time across all three trials, organized by column. “I did not expect to be doing data entry for a pig,” Batumbakal said. “But here we are. We take this seriously now.”

The Outside Lechonero’s Perspective

The recruited lechonero, a soft-spoken specialist from a neighboring province who asked to be identified only by his nickname, Tatay Ador, said he was initially unaware he’d been drafted into a fifteen-year rivalry and only realized the stakes once he arrived for the first trial roast to find the entire committee, plus several curious neighbors, gathered to watch in near-total silence. “I’ve done hundreds of these,” Tatay Ador said. “I’ve never had an audience treat a trial roast like a courtroom before. But I understand now. This is not just food to them. This is closure.”

He added that he has since adjusted his approach slightly based on the committee’s detailed feedback after each trial, incorporating notes on skin crispness that Batumbakal’s spreadsheet had flagged as “still not quite there” during the second attempt, a level of specificity he says he’s never received from a client before. He added, with evident amusement, that Batumbakal has started calling him between trials with follow-up questions about salt distribution timing, a level of engagement he now finds “honestly kind of touching, once you get past how intense it is.”

The Rival Barangay Responds

Word of the campaign reached the neighboring barangay within days, prompting what residents describe as a mixture of amusement and mild competitive alarm. “They’re bringing in an outside lechonero, we heard,” said rival fiesta organizer Pinky Dizon. “Fine. Let them. Our recipe has been the same for three generations. You can’t spreadsheet your way past tradition.” Dizon’s committee has, however, reportedly begun its own quiet preparations, including an early request to their usual supplier for a slightly larger pig this year, a detail Salcedo’s committee considers “basically an admission of nerves.”

What’s Actually At Stake

Beyond bragging rights, the winning barangay traditionally hosts the region’s informal post-fiesta gathering the following weekend, drawing visitors from several surrounding communities and, organizers note, a modest boost in foot traffic for local sari-sari stores and small vendors. Coverage of provincial fiesta traditions and their local economic ripple effects has been documented by outlets including The Philippine Star, which has covered similar friendly rivalries in fiesta culture across the country.

Salcedo insists the rivalry, however seriously his committee is now treating it, remains fundamentally good-natured. “At the end of the day, everybody eats,” he said. “Win or lose, there’s lechon for everyone. We just want, one time, for it to be objectively confirmed that ours is better. Is that too much to ask after fifteen years?”

The Fiesta Approaches

Both barangays’ fiestas fall on the same weekend this year, a scheduling coincidence that has only heightened anticipation, with several residents reportedly planning to attend both events specifically to conduct their own independent taste comparison. Batumbakal says the committee’s spreadsheet will be updated in real time during the fiesta itself, “for posterity, and honestly, for bragging rights that will hold up in an argument.” Salcedo, asked what happens if the verdict comes back in the rival barangay’s favor despite all the preparation, paused for a long moment before answering. “Then we start again next year,” he said. “Bigger pig. Better seasoning. This isn’t the kind of thing you just let go of after one loss, win or lose this time around.” Dizon, hearing this secondhand, laughed and said her committee felt exactly the same way about the whole affair. “That’s the part outsiders don’t get,” she said. “We’re not actually enemies. We just both really, really want to be right about the pig, and neither of us is willing to admit that out loud until the plates are empty.”

Ongoing coverage of the rivalry, and its eventual outcome, continues at bohiney.com.

Further dispatches from the humor desk: The Onion.

SOURCE: https://bohiney.com