All About Filipino Food

I've been tagged for a meme by Just Jen! Here are the rules:

* Link to the person that tagged you, and post the rules on your blog.
* Share 7 random and/or weird facts about yourself.
* Tag 7 random people at the end of your post, and include links to their blogs.
* Let each person know that they’ve been tagged by leaving a comment on their blog.

I've done similar memes in the past, so today I'm doing one with a theme: Filipino foods. Here, then, are My 7 Things:

1) My absolute favorite fruit in the whole wide world is golden Philippine mangoes. The perfect mango can be hard to find, even in Manila but more so in the US, because there are so many under-ripe, sour mangoes out there, but a sweet, succulent mango is just perfect.

2) I once spent almost an entire summer eating nothing but mangoes, cantaloupe melon, water and breadsticks. I know, I know, I was insane...... but I was a teenager determined to slim down so I could look good onstage and so my dance partners wouldn't find it so hard to lift me.

3) I cannot stand coconut, buko juice, sapin-sapin, or anything with coconut in it (except macaroons). A bit unusual for someone who comes from a country who is the second largest exporter of coconut products in the world, but I am what I am.

4) I love lechon (whole suckling roast pig), but I can't stand the accompanying liver sauce.

5) I love halo-halo (a dessert made with sweetened fruits, shaved ice, milk and sometimes ice cream) but I never eat it with milk. I always get strange looks from waitresses when I order halo-halo without milk

6) When I made chicken adobo, I fry the chicken first, then simmer it the traditional adobo sauce (soy sauce, vinegar, bay leaves and peppercorns), whereas my mother does the opposite (simmers first, then fries it). Her adobo tastes better than mine but I'm too stubborn to change.

7) While at college, I developed a taste for pancakes with maple syrup and grated cheese on top. It was a snack served regularly at the dive-y eateries scattered around campus. I had forgotten all about this but was reminded of it last week when I watched Andrew Zimmern's Bizarre Foods . One of the "bizarre foods" he featured from the Philippines was cheese-flavored ice cream. Filipinos call this flavor queso (Spanish for ice-cream) and believe me, it's not weird at all. My palate is pretty conservative and I love queso ice-cream.

Now my tummy is rumbling, and I am tagging:

Lutchi
Liza
Teacher Julie
Maiylah
EastCoastLife
Lynn
Fridays Child

... you can do the regular "7 Things About Me" or play along with your favorite foods or favorite FIlipino foods. Also, if anyone who I haven't tagged would like to do it, consider yourself tagged and leave me a comment so that I can read you answers.