A DIY Ilocos food trip
Where to eat in your northern sojourn
As a child, my grandson Kyle was full of questions about geography, history, and food. Travels all over the country with the entire family answered many of his queries.
A van took us out of town on weekends. We went as far south as Sorsogon, watched Mayon Volcano erupt, and marveled at the wellpreserved homes of Vigan. Between those long trips, we took shorter ones, posing with colorful harvest displays at Sariaya’s Pahiyas festival and feeding duck in Victoria, Laguna, where we observed the balut-making process.
He was thrilled with the tour of national hero Jose Rizal’s home in Calamba. He was photographed at the historic balcony of President Emilio Aguinaldo’s home in Kawit. We had planned a family weekend in Ilocos Norte to satisfy his curiosity about the Marcoses, Martial Law, and the cuisine of northern Philippines but work got in the way every time we made plans to go. The kids grew up, we gave up the car, and Vic departed for the Great Beyond. Kyle and I were left by ourselves. We decided it was now or never as far as an Ilocos trip was concerned.
Since we were backpacking, we decided to be really adventurous and go by bus, choosing between Florida
and Farinas transport companies, which both accepted advance reservations for specific trips and seat assignments. We had to travel light, carefully picking what to pack in only one bag each, plus a small snack bag for emergency snacks and bottled water.
Our first bus ride began at the Sampaloc terminal after midnight. The bus was very clean, roomy, and smelled of alcohol-based cleaning fluid. Thickly padded reclining seats allowed for comfortable sleep. The bus had a clean Portalet so we did not have to stop to allow for passengers to relieve themselves.
We got off the bus in Vigan after dawn, refreshed and feeling good not spending for a hotel room on our first night. I was behaving like a GI (Genuine Ilocano), I explained to my travel companion.
A pedicab driver brought us to a real Ilocano carinderia for breakfast. Gaizel’s, a few meters from the Vigan public market, is a two-story home, its living room filled with steel tables covered with flower-printed plastic tablecloths. Stainless steel forks and spoons alongside thick water glasses awaited diners. One side of the room had long tables filled with cooked food in pots, casseroles, trays, and other food containers for customers to choose from.
The dining room was filled with the scent of food in various stages of preparation. At the back of the house was space for charcoal broiling pork belly, chicken, and all kinds of fish. For my favorite dinakdakan, the cook was broiling boiled pigs’ head and pig’s liver. A kitchen on the second floor was for making dinengdeng and several vegetable dishes I was not familiar with.
Customers started lining up at one end of the buffet table. Staff quickly delivered the chosen dishes to the diners’ tables while an amiable old lady summed up and presented the bill. Whenever she had the chance, she explained the various dishes.
Although the vegetables were cooked similarly in fish bagoong, ginger, onions, and tomatoes, the resulting dishes tasted differently. The vegetables themselves, all very freshly picked, were alien to us.
Colorful blooms from trees, vines, and wild plants provided a kaleidoscope of new sensations for our taste buds. I learned to suck and scrape malunggay fruit, and enjoyed the bitterness of the creeping herb appropriately called papaet, which my Caviteña grandma called "sali-salida" and used instead of ampalaya shoots in mongo dishes. Of course, there were buds and flowers of kalabasa and katuray.
Our soup was lomo of freshly slaughtered beef loin simply boiled with salt, pepper, ginger, and onions. Our long breakfast lasted way past mid-morning, so we hied off to a tour of Vigan on foot and by tricycle, inspecting the home of President Elpidio Quirino, the grand Vigan Cathedral, and the worldfamous burnayan where old men made large traditional burnay or large water jars using the town’s natural red clay.
By sunset, we were on a bus headed for Batac, Ilocos Norte, where a family friend had graciously offered us shelter for the night. After depositing our bags, we walked to Batac's Empanada center, home of the empanada that threatens the popularity of Vigan empanada.
The concrete building, sitting across a bridge from the Marcos mansion, houses dozens of stalls preparing empanada from scratch. Tables and chairs invite visitors to eat the empanadas on the spot while awaiting more empanadas as "pasalubong" along with Batac longganiza, another hometown product that threatens Vigan’s meat vendors.
We decided to have Special Empanada (stuffed with longgonisa and egg) for dinner, with ripe apple mango for dessert. The next day, we were back at the empanada place for breakfast of longgonisa, salted egg, and a bowl of KBL (fresh tomatoes, onions, and fish bagoong). For dessert, there was a bowl of duhat from the garden of Malacanang ti Amianan (Malacanang of the North).
The rest of the morning we used visiting the first dragonfruit farm in the Philippines, the first wind farm, and one of the pioneer salt makers. Our noses led us to Laoag’s most famous makers of bagnet, similar to Bulacan and Pampanga’s chicharon and lechon kawali but crunchier and more flavorful. We bought several kilos of bagnet, then picked up a basket of Batac longgonisa from the town’s palengke.
All packed up and ready to go, we spent the rest of our time before our midnight bus trip at the Marcos Museum gawking at memorabilia of the family. Kyle had a special treat before boarding the bus: the old sergeant guarding the mausoleum of the late president was touched by the young man’s interest and allowed him to be photographed with the late strongman’s remains
It was a rare souvenir from an unforgettable food trip.
The dining room was filled with the scent of food in various stages of preparation. At the back of the house was space for charcoal broiling pork belly, chicken, and all kinds of fish.