The ancient smoked ham of the Philippines

etag – (é-tag; Ilocano and Cordilleran [Ifugao, Igorot, Kankanay, and Benguet] preserved) (also spelled as itag in IIocano; a.k.a. innasin in Ilocano) [n.] cured and aged slab of pork; An indigenous smoked or sun-dried salted slab of pork.

....With due respect to customs and traditions of all the ethnic groups of Cordillera and northern Luzon, the process of making etag and how long the aging process would take to complete reminds me of the Fire Mummies (a.k.a. Kabayan Mummies) of Benguet. The mummification process of fire mummies was unique compared to on how mummification was done in Egypt and the rest of the world. It was like the natives were preserving their dead in a process similar to when making an etag. The mummification would begin right after a person died, whom they would let ingest a very salty drink. The corpse was washed and set over a fire in a seated position to dry out bodily fluids. The dead was also subjected to smoking process. Tobacco smoke was blown into the mouth to dry further the inside of the body including the internal organs and then herbs were rubbed into the body before the mummified body was placed in a ... (Read and see more here)