Filipino restaurant Tambayan Grill in Goulburn serves some of the most exciting food in NSW

July 7, 2025
9:30 pm

If you’re heading south these school holidays, stop in at Tambayan Grill on Sydney Road for delicious Filipino dishes such as chicken inasal, tuna panga and sizzling sisig.

13.5/20

Filipino$

Many of my core childhood memories involve road trips and recharging at servos, where scorching hand, tongue or both with a meat pie was an Australian rite of passage. The Sydney-to-Canberra route, and even further to Thredbo, would usually mean a pit stop at Goulburn. The Big Merino was (and still is for many) the most popular place to pull over, with the usual fast-food suspects and Ravi’s Curry In A Hurry, my sister’s favourite.

But if you’re heading south these school holidays, there’s another Goulburn service station you should consider: the “Gateway” near McDonald’s on Sydney Road. It’s home to some of the most delicious Filipino food in NSW.

Chicken inasal (marinated grilled chook).Dominic Lorrimer

On a late Sunday afternoon, the LED sign for Tambayan Grill & Filipino Store is glowing bright. A television is blaring Filipino songs (the catchy Lola Amour’s Raining in Manila as we walk in) and karaoke microphones are at the ready. The plastic rattan-style chairs will be familiar to anyone who dined in at a Caltex in the 1990s; the grocery section is stocked with snacks, sauces, spices and sweets from the homeland; freezers are full of longganisa sausages, pork tail and milkfish.

Owner-chef Jonathan Manglinong hails from the Ilocos region of the Philippines, just north of Manila, and is largely self-taught in the professional kitchen (aside from a stint at The Star when he was studying nursing). He credits his knowledge of traditional techniques and cooking to his parents. Filipino flavours flow between the salty, sour and sweet. Fish sauce for the umami hit; vinegar or calamansi for the sour; sugar and coconut milk for sweetness. Balancing these flavours can be a precise operation and Manglinong nails the brief.

He found himself opening a restaurant in Goulburn when he and his partner, Gil Sagmayao, relocated to the town in search of lower property prices. The dream was to open a Filipino grocer, but when the available shop space came with a kitchen, he went all in, leaving behind a nursing career to have a crack at running a restaurant.

Tuna panga (jaw).Dominic Lorrimer

The menu features, most notably, tuna panga. Made with tuna collar sourced from Sydney Fish Market, Manglinong believes Tambayan Grill might be the only place in Australia serving the dish. A hunky collar is baked then grilled, and basted with a mixture of oyster sauce, black pepper, spices, sugar and vinegar. It’s available in small, medium and large – depending on the day’s catch – and the meat is rich in collagen with a mouthfeel similar to lamb shanks. It’s a visceral and almost primal affair as you tear meaty flesh from fish bone.

Chicken inasal – the Philippines’ signature marinated grilled chook – isn’t overpowered by sweetness like some versions I’ve encountered in Sydney. You can enhance the slightly smoky bird with a drizzle of chicken fat and soy sauce. Another must-order is the sizzling sisig – a whole pig’s head and belly that’s boiled and deep-fried, mixed with boiled pork ears and diced. Sauteed with garlic and onions, and topped with a raw egg, chilli and calamansi, it comes to the table on a sizzling cast iron plate.

If your servo snacking plans are more grab-and-go, there’s fried chicken. The “chicken joy” is a hat-tip to Filipino fast-food chain Jollibee, starring a marinated thigh coated in light batter and dusted with spices (most distinctly, white pepper). The meat is tender, but has cooled by the time it reaches us, and the gravy is too sweet for our liking. The bird itself, however, is tasty as. (Jollibee fans will also be happy to know that the chain’s peach mango pies are available to take home from the freezer.)

Pork barbecue skewer.Dominic Lorrimer

The rest of the menu travels all over the Philippines, from barbecued chicken skewers to empanadas and lechon (roast pork). Fish head sinigang, a salty-sour soup, cuts through what can be a very protein-heavy meal. Do factor in that you might be in for a wait for any of this, though, as Manglinong is mostly a one-man band.

Tambayan Grill is more than a delicious new road trip destination – it bolsters a proud and vibrant Filipino food scene growing across the state. Closer to Sydney, Mama Lor leads a cluster of Filipino joints in Rooty Hill, with another dozen or so restaurants along the next two train stops, at Doonside and Blacktown. There’s the excellent Sir Manong in Eastern Creek, and Takam’s contemporary take on the cuisine in Darlinghurst.

The Goulburn servo is also a destination in its own right – tambayan means “meeting place” in Tagalog. With a liquor licence on the way, Manglinong will soon be able to serve Filipino beers with sisig and put those karaoke mics to work more often, too.