i heart mindanao. i really do. i love cagayan de oro city to bits. i adore camiguin. i am awed by bukidnon. i'm fascinated with siargao. i'm intrigued by dapitan. i could actually live here.
food is one of the reasons i love mindanao. the variety of fruits available - from durian to mangosteen to marang to grapefruit is nothing short of amazing. during this trip, i tried the local delicacies such as the paklay (mindanao version of papaitan), balbacua (beef skin and oxtail soup similar to the mexican menudo, only much, much tastier). oh my goodness, lami kaayo.
in a farm somewhere in manticao, misamis oriental, our host served what could very well be the best meal i had during this entire trip. and that is no exaggeration.
prawns and crabs cooked together in this lovely dish our hosts call 'alavar,' from the famous alavar seafood house in zamboanga years ago. apparently, they were business partners before and they "invented" this very, very delicious dish.
our host's server got two big banana leaves, laid it on the table and placed the food there. there's broiled tuna and some other fish, tinolang fish (very tasty, specially since they only cooked the fish heads, ulo-ulo), iligan lechon (which, i didn't realize was as yummy as cebu lechon. you can eat it without the liver sauce). grilled squid, vegetable salad. except for the lechon, everything was home-cooked. 
