PHILIPPINES

Halo-Halo

No, it`s not the Beyoncé-song and we also don’t need Anthony Bourdain to tell us that our halo-halo (literally mix-mix) rocks – though it’s nice that he did, even calling it “oddly beautiful.”  

A bedlam of sweetened beans, monggo (mung beans), saba (plantains), macapuno (sweetened coconut sport), garbanzos (chickpeas), langka (jackfruit), gulaman (gelatin), kaong (sugar palm fruit), and nata de coco (coconut jelly) buried in avalanche of shaved ice, and then topped with wobbly slice of leche flan (creme caramel) and a smear of ube (purple yam) before drowned in evaporated milk – what’s not to like?

 Halo-halo is everything the Philippine culture is: diverse, colorful, sweet, inventive and flamboyant. It should not be missed when visiting the country. As the Los Angeles Times succinctly said: “It’s a beautiful dish, a jigsaw of simplicity and aesthetics.”