Filipino food or Philippine food is mainly the best thing that a Filipino can truly love during meal time. Some maybe salty, some maybe sour, some maybe spicy or some maybe bitter. Filipino food has a tang of different flavours - Chinese, Mexican, Spanish, American, Malay and Indian. It has a variety of food ranging from simple meals to wholesome rich cuisines. Filipinos consume three meals a day - Almusal or Breakfast, Tanghalian or Lunch and Hapunan or Dinner. Merienda or snack is sometimes done during in between meals.

The type and flavour of food eaten varies in different areas of the Philippines. The important food in some areas is rice but some are cassava. Although at every meal, rice is available.

Filipinos are very resourceful when it comes to cooking. They use a method that can impart flavour’s aroma. In the province, knowing the society today, they use clay pots and coal stoves to cook a meal. With this, they are also fond of ihaw or roasting on coal.

Sour and salty flavours overshadow Filipino cooking. Example of this is Sinigang dish. Pork, shrimp or fish is slightly boiled in sour stock of vegetables and fish sauce or patis as Filipinos call it. Fish is the best admired when it is raw and enjoyed most when it is in the form of kilawin (vinaigrette), inihaw (grilled) or just stuffed with onions and covered in a banana leaf.

Adobo in Filipino cuisine refers to a common cooking process indigenous to the Philippines. When the Spanish assail the Philippines in the late 16th century through Mexico City, they found a natural cooking process that involved stewing with vinegar. They referred to this method as "adobo". Over time, dishes prepared in this manner came to be known by this name as well. This also had become famous globally.

Coconut milk is the main ingredient among Philippine cooking. Bicol Express is one example that Filipinos can offer. When it is cooked, meat and vegetables are cooked in coconut milk. Added by finger like green peppers chopped in small pieces. By this, it gives a unique flavour to it.

Some of the popular ingredients that can be found in the Filipino cuisine are coconut, chillies, Chinese sausages, garlic, onion, mushrooms, ginger, tomatoes, pandan leaf (screw pine) and tanglad (lemon grass).

Filipinos are known to be festive people and their celebration would not be complete without drinking lambanog. Lambanog is a native alcohol beverage that is made from tuba or distilled sugar cane. But of course, beer is always their option. Drinking lambanog will not be complete without pulutan or finger food to compliment it. Some popular choices are chicharon (popped pork skin), adidas (sautéd or grilled chicken feet) and mani (roasted or boiled peanuts). But most of the time, pulutan are left over food.

The best part of all, Filipinos use their hands to eat.

                                               

                                               

                                                                                                               

                               

                                                               

                                               

                               

                                                                                

Since I enjoy eating a lot, and as if I can eat everything even with a touch of exoticness and "bizzarness", Philippine Street Foods indeed drive me crazy. Not all Filipinos eat this kind of "snacks", but who are those who dare themselves to eat these nasty chicken feet, chicken and pig intestines and curdled blood of chicken? For me, people that can eat those kind of street foods are cool, of course I'm one of them. 

IUD or Isaw (Chicken Intestines)

Isaw is my favourite among the rest especially when the sauce is well prepared and tasty. Isaw is made of chicken intestines, and sometimes pig. It is prepared by: first, choosing the best part of the intestine,  second, clean it with tap water thrice, then after that boil it in  hot clean water with rock salt. After boiling string it together in a barbecue stick, and lastly, the Isaw is now ready to be grilled and prepare it with your special sauce!

Adidas (Chicken Feet)

I'm sure that you are now curious why this street food is called Adidas, as we all know that Adidas is a brand of shoes. The reason why it is called Adidas because as if its describing the Adidas Logo. If you remember, Adidas has 3 lines right?, then those 3 long fingers of the the chicken signifies that lines in the brand. This is prepared just as like as what preparation we should do to Isaw or the chicken intestines I mentioned earlier on this post. After being grilled, your Adidas is now ready to take off to your stomach! Prepare with soy sauce, bit of vinegar, garlic and hot red chillis for the sauce.  Enjoy the soft meat and the smokey flavour of Philippine's very own Adidas!

Betamax (Curdled Chicken/Pork Blood)

People find it as disgusting but it really tastes good. Betamax is a street food made of curdled chicken or pork blood. Others called it as Black Pudding. It is cut into cubes to make sure that the inner part is cooked too when it is grilled and also it can be cooked very easily. Betamax is curdled through boiling the blood in an hour or less. It is prepared like what preparations we should do like the two above.  

Pinoy street foods' are still evolving. Every time in the year, there's another food that is invented by the playful mind of the Filipinos for sure. 

Some other Pinoy Street Foods:

• Chicken Hearts ( stringed together)
• Wetpaks (Chicken Ass)
• Atay (Chicken Liver)
• Balat (Pork Skin)
• Helmet (Chicken Heads)
• Balot
• Itlog ng Pugo (Hard boiled Quail Eggs)
• Banana Que
• Fishball
• Squidball
•  Kikiam
• Eggball
• Calamares
• Day- old Chicks
• Chicken Skin
• Turon

Philippine street foods' are now a part of the history of the country, these can give every streets and places in the Philippines some life full of happiness to every Filipino faces. And I'm hoping that these may take longer up to the very next generation.  If you want to taste this kind of foods, go to the Philippines, and I'm sure that when you taste it, it will also drive you crazy and you'll crave for more!