Indulgent Entrees

• Filipino entrees can be light without seeming too delicate. Cocido is a meat broth with chicken, ham hock, chorizo and other meats that takes its cue from the Spanish dish of the same name. It's served with an eggplant sauce and a ginger or shrimp paste sauce. Lumpiang, on the other hand, are Chinese-inspired egg rolls with ground pork in a thin rice paper wrap, which typically crop up to kick off important celebrations. Lechon kawali, also called crispy pork belly, or sizzling sisig, is a former street food made good, which incorporates pig ears, snout and belly with a chili and lemon sauce.

Robust Main Courses

• The nearest Filipino cooking comes to a national dish is adobo, a soy sauce, vinegar and garlic seasoning applicable to chicken, pork or lamb. A spin on a Mexican import, the dish appears everywhere from outdoor stalls in Manila to hipster food trucks in California. Equally revered is kare kare, a braised oxtail stew that replaces the almonds of its Spanish cousin with peanut sauce and is usually eaten with a fermented shrimp sauce. As an island nation, fish dishes come in many varieties. Lapu-lapu, grouper, is an exquisite standard-bearer, typically served in a sweet and sour escabeche sauce. Even noodle dishes, introduced by the Chinese but called pancit locally, come in budget roadside and gourmet versions, the latter heaped with meats and fresh vegetables.

Sweet Desserts

• Despite the richness of Filipino main courses, expect no let-up when it comes to the dessert course. Visitors familiar with Spanish and Portuguese sweets will recognize many similarities with the cream flans and sugary pies served across the Philippines, including leche flan and pan de coco. Local twists include buko pie, made with shredded young coconut and sapin sapin, a rice and coconut flan with food coloring. Ensaymada, on the other hand, are sweet, sugary pastries topped with grated cheese, sold as a snack throughout the country. Numerous desserts also showcase bananas, flambeed, drenched in syrup or wrapped in a turon roll.

Acquired Tastes

• The true gourmet will be thoroughly challenged by Filipino cooking’s niche delights. Testing the mettle of numerous TV chefs is balut, an unfertilized duck egg, boiled and eaten with vinegar and salt. Likewise, the squeamish might balk at kamoro, a platter of mole crickets boiled in vinegar and garlic then deep fried, from the Pampanga region famous for its food. Clearly influenced by French gastronomy, kuhol sa gata are snails cooked in coconut milk, usually offered as a starter in Filipino restaurants.