STREET FOODS Of CEBU / (Cebu City, Philippines)

Pea takes viewers on a nighttime street food crawl through Colon Street in Cebu City, one of the city's most famous (and highest-crime) eating strips. She samples nearly a dozen dishes, describes each texture and taste in detail, chats with a young food stall attendant named Era, and ends the night by buying dinner for strangers coming off their work shifts.

What's Covered ​

• Setting and safety disclaimer

  • Pea is filming on Colon Street in Cebu City, which she openly says has a high crime rate and isn't really safe for waving a camera around
  • She brought a large cameraman/bodyguard for protection
  • Despite the danger, this is a beloved street food destination for locals

• Tour of what's available on the street

  • Fried intestines (large and small), which they call "chicharron bulaklak" in Tagalog
  • Shrimp, seafood, vegetables, octopus/squid, soup
  • Babakwa — a soup made from cow skin with scallions, boiled for three hours to soften
  • Pancit (noodles)
  • Crab meat balls, spring rolls (lumpiya), hot dogs, sausages
  • "Dynamite" — stuffed jalapeño with cheese inside, wrapped in lumpia wrapper (one of Pea's favorites from her call center days)
  • Squid tentacles, fried large and small intestines
  • Seaweed in two varieties
  • Raw fish soaked in vinegar with ginger, tomatoes, and calamansi (kilawin)
  • Chicken intestine, blood, and vegetable stew

• Puso (hanging rice)

  • Rice cooked inside woven coconut leaves, shaped like a heart
  • 10 pesos each (about 20 cents USD) — she buys two for 6 pesos each across the road
  • Called "hanging rice" because of how it's displayed and carried
  • The essential pairing for all the street food dishes

• Prices — everything is shockingly cheap

  • Pork/intestines: 45 pesos each (~90 cents USD)
  • Chicken intestine/blood/vegetable stew: 40 pesos (~80 cents)
  • Calamari/squid tentacles: 80 pesos (~$1.60)
  • Seaweed: 25 pesos (~50 cents)
  • Seashells (mussels): 40 pesos (~80 cents)
  • Cow skin soup (babakwa): 40 pesos (~80 cents)
  • Puso rice: 6-10 pesos each (~12-20 cents)

• Pea's taste descriptions (she eats everything by hand)

  • Fried small intestine: crunchy but chewy, salty — "makes your jaw exercise"
  • Squid tentacles: rubbery, breaded and fried, similar texture to fried intestine
  • Seashells: grainy, sandy, salty — "tastes like ocean creature"
  • Cow skin soup: very fatty, thick broth from the skin, squishy texture "like brain" — she compares it to pig's brain
    • The cow skin still has fine hair on it: "there's hair on your food but we don't care"
    • The skin is described as fibrous, towel-like — in Tagalog they reference the texture being like a towel
  • Seaweed: sour from the vinegar, texture like glass noodles but green, with tomatoes and calamansi
  • Raw fish (kilawin): soaked in vinegar, reminds her of catching fish with her dad and eating it fresh
  • Chicken blood: solidified blood cut into pieces — she explains you pour pig/chicken blood into a container, leave it for an hour to harden, then cut into cubes; served with intestines, carrots, and chayote; her favorite dish of the night

• Interview with Era, the food stall attendant

  • Era has worked at this stall since she was 15 years old; she's now 24
  • Before the pandemic, they regularly got foreign tourists who'd come eat
  • Drew Arellano (famous Filipino vlogger/TV host) visited and ate there before COVID
  • Era explains the typical foreigner eating pattern: they start with barbecue (which in the Philippines means everything on the grill — chicken feet, hot dogs, intestines, liver, blood), then work their way to the more adventurous items
  • The "last stop" for adventurous eaters is tuslob buwa — pig's brain soup where you dunk hanging rice into the broth
  • They call the pig's brain "Plants vs. Zombies" because zombies eat brains

• Angel — the child hanging around the stall

  • A young girl named Angel appears; Pea asks about school and TikTok
  • Pea tells her she needs to go to school so she can own the stall one day

• Pea's personal connection to street food

  • She used to eat at places like this regularly when she worked at a call center — the food is very cheap, perfect for workers
  • When she worked at a health center, she'd come with coworkers because the stalls opened at 5 AM, which was technically their dinner time since they got off work around 6 AM
  • She genuinely loves eating with her hands: "it feels homey"
  • She always travels with her own paper towels since napkins aren't part of the service

• Buying dinner for strangers

  • Kuya Francisco stops by after work — Pea tells him to choose whatever he wants and she'll pay
  • Francisco is visibly emotional and grateful: "I was very happy because I have no money... thank you very much"
  • She also buys dinner for his coworker Kuya Albert
  • Then she tells Era to just total up everything on the table so she can buy it all and Era can share it with whoever she wants

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