After a long hard day's work at UP my appetite is similar to that of an elephant who has been deprived of food for 3 years. But when my budget isn't agreeable (20 pesos!), I just go to my favorite barbecue stand and choose my ambrosia.  Of course it's isaw, delicious chicken entrails dipped in sweet, sour, and spicy sauce... Yum!  Though some of my friends find it disgusting and unhygienic, I still say that it's tastier than a juicy cheeseburger.

Aside from isaw, you can find good old fashioned barbecued pork or chicken strips. Then there is atay (liver), chicken skin, adidas (chicken feet), chicken ass, and just any other part of pork or chicken. Once I even ate grilled pork tongue, but that was long ago. These days it’s rare to find that. We also have lechon (whole roast pig) or lechon manok (whole roast chicken). This exotic menu of animal parts sound vulgar to virgin ears but to us locals, it is as mouth-watering as beefsteak.

Other than grilled animal parts, balut is also available as street food. It is a boiled embryonic duck egg that is served with a pinch of salt. When I look at shows of Fear Factor featuring balut, I laugh at the Americans' faces when they are challenged to eat one. Anyway I don't blame them. If I weren't Pinoy, I would be sick too. Balut, though appetite averting, is delicious and we consider it to be an aphrodisiac. *grin*

After this fine delicatessen let me describe the more common and favorite among the Pinoy youth. Fishball and Kikiam! Fishball isn't actually fish rolled into a ball but a fish-flavored paste that is dough-like and shaped like a ball. It is deep-fried in oil then skewered with wooden sticks. Kikiam is a more, let's say, spicy- flavored version of fishball. It's not spicy in the pepper-hot sense. It is also shaped into a fillet, not round like a fishball. You are then  given by the vendor, a choice between sweet sour sauce and hot-spicy sweet sour sauce dips.

Then there is bananacue, kamotecue, and traditional pancakes. Bananacue and kamotecue, though named, are not at all grilled. They are similar to fishball and kikiam. They are bananas or sweet potatoes (kamote) that are deep-fried in oil with brown sugar. Pancakes are, well, pancakes.  Only, Pinoys have their own recipes. They are coated with margarine or butter, sprinkled with sugar and wrapped in banana leaf. Of course you don't eat the banana leaf.  *smirk*

These foodstands are found in almost all campuses in the Philippines, whether they are elementary, high school, college, or university campuses, so students can have a quick bite or two. So if you’re hungry and have a tight budget, I suggest that you go to the nearest Pinoy food stand and sample their wares.

All this writing is makng me hungry. I’ll end this here... Oh, the joys of street food!
 

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