The other day, I and my partner went to look for dried fish and a monoblock chair.
When it comes to dried fish (danggit),dried squid, shredded squid, TABOAN PUBLIC MARKET is the best place to be. According to almost majority of the Cebuanos, if you will ask where to buy best pasalubong delicacy of Cebu City that some local tourist can bring home, even for our international friends, they would highly recommend this Public Market.
Aside from Carbon Public Market being rich in almost everything you need in affordable prices, from dry goods to wet goods, here in Taboan Public Market they offer different kinds of high quality dried fishes such as, dried squid,Danggit,Bolinaw, pinkish round chorizo and many more.
For you to get here:
There are a lots of transportation options you can choose. You may ride a Taxi if you're only at the City. You can find jeepneys with 17C coding or any coding that will pass by Taboan (you can ask the driver) if you're in Colon. There are lots of "habal-habal" or motorcycle (Angkas App or Maxim) roaming around which can bring you there on their own rate or via private car.
You will start seeing this which we call "Tartarilya" in Bisaya, "Karwahi/Kalesa" in Tagalog, once you're near to the market, similar to horse riding but with a seat at the back for passenger. I can't seem to capture the horse from this photo but it looks like that at the back and the horse in front.
These are high quality of dried fish where you can only buy these at Taboan.
This Fish bone cost 600 pesos per kilo while this one cost 900 pesos.
Luckily, I was able to buy apart of this fish bone for 50 pesos and the other one for 100 pesos.
What surprises me more is that they pack it very well and super clean which is a very plus to a first time customer like me.
They have so much to offer here. I just wish I asked the names of each dried fishes so we could get to know them together but we were in a hurry that time because the sky appears to about to rain anytime. After buying the fish bone, we went to buy an affordable mono block chair in the opposite store. Aside from dried fish, the opposite stores are also selling home decorations for your yard, and crafts for plants etc.
Just the downside in this market is that when you get there, just expect that you would smell stinky because of the variety of dried fishes displayed around. The smell will stick to your clothes, hair and every parts of your body. So it would be better to go home directly after and take a shower right away because anyone can smell you and would knew immediately that you went to Taboan.
Nevertheless, if you visit Cebu City anytime, don't forget to put this market in your list to bring home some of our delicious dried fish delicacy which Cebu is very proud of. It may smell stinky but it taste like heaven.
