Panutsa, a Batangas delicacy (Bokabularyong Batangueño)

Probably, most Filipinos are familiar with peanut brittle since it’s a famous take-home food (pasalubong) whenever they visit Baguio. However, the food that you see in the picture below is not the peanut brittle that you see in Baguio but a variant that is made in Batangas. In the picture below, you have two kinds of panutsa, the one with the dull brown color and the other with the glossy/shiny dark brown sugar coating.

Panutsa (the brown peanut with sugar coating) with pakumbo (the purple one with scraped coconut/buko meat and sugar)

Which one of the two types taste better? Needless to say, taste is something subjective but I recommend the panutsa with the dull brown color. The panutsa in the picture below since it is not that tough  to chew. You can enjoy both though if you have a sweet tooth.

                                                   the tastiest variant of panutsa

There is also a smaller size of  panutsa, the  bite-sized that you can find in retail (sari-sari ) stores in Batangas. This size tastes the best of all. A decade ago, a piece of the bite-sized panutsa only cost one peso but now I guess you can buy one for two pesos. So where do we usually buy panutsa?

Panutsa is available in SM Lipa bus stop. You will see quite a lot of vendors there selling this delicacy. It’s a great take-home food. However, if you want to taste the tastier bite-sized, you can check the market and retail stores as I have never seen one at the bus stop or maybe I am wrong.

We (Batangueños) have been enjoying panutsa since we were young and even after decades of panutsa’s existence in the market, it’s still the same food that we prefer to buy whenever we crave candies from the sari-sari store.