Dulang Food Fest Goes Global

Dulang Food Festival is a prelude to the celebration of the Pamulinawen Festival of Laoag City, Ilocos Norte. Traditionally, Ilocano folks don’t prepare and serve foods at homes during fiesta unlike people of southern Philippines. However, they came up with the idea of putting up this food festival. It is a way to exhibit best tasting foods and to let the public try these foods.

Dulang means table. A wide array of foods were served ranging from American, Korean, Spanish, Italian, Japanese, Singaporean, Chinese and the not to be missed traditional Ilocano foods. They have featured the global busi, a native delicacy made of popped rice mixed in mollasses then formed into balls. They made use of wire to form a shape of globe then placed many busi balls into it. Still under it were numerous busi balls arranged nicely. Most of the hotels, restaurants and organizations were tapped to participate in this event. They even received a certain amount from the local government to cook these foods.

I arrived at the venue on time immdediately after the cutting of the ribbon, but a large number of people went in and cannot stop them from taking their foods. There was a large number of people who attended this affair. Making it difficult for me to cover and document this event. Nevertheless, I have tried some spicy foods from the Korean section, sandwiches from American, sugarcane juice and busi from the Ilocano foods.