Eating balut in the Philippines is a unique food experience and I think a must-try when visiting the Philippines. Balut, a fertilized duck egg is a popular street food in the Philippines that is commonly sold at markets and stalls.  With a touch of salt or vinegar, balut is a must-try snack for those that are seeking local Filipino street food. I’ve tried balut several times now, while it seems intimidating at first, I want to share my experiences and information on eating Balut in the Philippines.  **This post contains affiliate links. If you click on one of the links or banners throughout the page, whether it be TripAdvisor, Booking.com. Agoda.com, or any other affiliate, I might receive commission at no extra cost to you. For more information, you can visit my affiliate link page here. Thanks for the support! What is Balut? We’ve all heard of balut, mainly from negative responses and reactions. But what actually is balut? Balut is a fertilized duck egg that has been incubated meaning it is developing an embryo under favorable conditions.  So, what is the difference between your regular egg you get from a produce market or grocery store and balut?  A regular egg you buy at the store is not fertilized, it’s only egg white and yolk while balut is fertilized and begins to develop.  Balut is considered a delicacy in the Philippines. It’s a popular street food snack and can also be found in restaurants prepared in many different dishes.  From what I learned, the eating experience can depend on the amount of days the embryo has developed. The common stages I’ve come across are 14, 16, and 18 days.  14-day Balut: the embryo is mostly underdeveloped. The yolk is thicker and the embryo is soft and not clearly formed. If you are trying balut for the first time, try the 14 day old one.  16-day Balut: The embryo develops more, you can start seeing features like tiny feathers, a beak, maybe even bones. It’s still easy to eat. This might be the most popular version.  18-day Balut: This is considered a more mature version. The embryo is almost fully developed. The bones are firmer and the feathers are visible, yet still easy to eat. At this stage, the taste is much stronger.  How to Eat Balut My experience eating balut has only been via street vendors at markets in Cebu and Manila. Every case was pretty much the same, you crack the top, sip the broth, peel the shell, season it to your liking, and eat it. I’ll break it down a bit more for you.  Crack the Top of the Egg: First things first, crack the egg if it hasn’t been cracked for you by the vendor. Open the top portion so you can see a little of the inside.  Sip Down the Broth: Once the egg is cracked, you’ll see the broth or juices inside. Slurp it up, it can get messy! Taste wise it’s pretty good, it’s like warm chicken broth.  Peel the Rest of the Shell: This part can get messy. Peel the shell halfway or entirely. Usually I do it halfway at first and eat as I peel. I’ve had instances of the embryo slipping out on to the ground when peeling to quickly.  Season to your liking: Almost all vendors selling balut will have salt, vinegar, and maybe chili. Use the seasonings to your liking. I usually eat mine as is or with a touch of salt.  Eat the Inside (Yolk and Embryo):  Just think of the balut like a normal hard boiled egg. Everything inside is edible, so eat the embryo, yolk, and whites. Sometimes the white part is a little tough.  Let me know what you think: If you have tried or eaten balut, please, let me know what you think of it. Was it good? Terrifying? Ok? Let me know!  My Experiences Eating Balut in the Philippines The first time I tried balut in the Philippines was at the Carbon Market in Cebu City. I had the 14-day old one. Since then, I’ve also had balut in Tagaytay and Manila’s Chinatown.  I’ve had the 14-day, 16-day, and 18-day balut. Honestly, I prefer the 14-day balut. I love hard boiled eggs and the 14-day old balut tasted just like a boiled egg, it was not as intimidating as the other stages.  My first experience eating balut, I was both excited and intimidated to try it. But as a traveler, I always tell myself, I’ll try everything at least once. Worst case scenario, I won’t like it, I can say I tried it, and won’t have to eat balut ever again. As I cracked the egg, I looked inside and it did not look appetizing. I was on a Cebu City food tour and the guide just told me to sip the juices so I did and was surprised it tasted just like warm chicken broth.  I then peeled the shell, picked the balut apart, mainly for photos and to see the anatomy of the duck embryo and ate small sections. Honestly, it was good, tasted just like a boiled egg, with a little more “texture.” My least favorite part was the thick white part, it was just tough and didn’t have to much flavor.  Fast forward a year later. I visited Manila and had the opportunity to try balut not once but twice. On this trip, I tried the 16-day and 18-day old balut.  The more developed duck fetus seemed like it was a little more to stomach. The first one I had while on a day trip from Manila the duck embryo slipped out of the shell and landed on the floor.  The 18-day old balut I tried from a vendor in Manila’s Chinatown. I felt very confident, peeled the egg and put the majority of the balut in my mouth to kind of taste all the textures all at once. Would not recommend this your first time.  Today, I wouldn’t say I absolutely love balut. But I can eat it no problems. If I find myself in the Philippines again, I’ll definitely eat it again if the opportunity arises.  Conclusion Eating balut in the Philippines is more of an experience then anything else. When I first tried balut I was hesitant mainly because of the looks of it after first cracking the shell. But I was curious on how it tasted and honestly I was surprised by the taste.  It tasted like a hard boiled egg with I like to say, “a little more texture.” After trying it a few different times now, I can confidently tell you that balut looks much worse then it tastes. So try it out next time you are paying a visit to the Philippines. And let me know what your experience is!  Enjoying my photos and want to see more? Check out my Picfair Store. 📸   Plan Your Trip: 🗺️✈️ 🇵🇭 Booking Accommodations ⛺️🛖  For booking recommendations on the best deals and locations, check out Agoda or Booking.com Activities and Tours  🏖️🚁  Find fun activities and things to do through Tripadvisor. If you are looking for tours and day trips, Viator and Get Your Guide have a lot of great options.  In need of a car rental? 🚗🚘  I recommend checking with Rental Cars.

A Manila street food tour is one of the best ways to experience the city’s food culture after dark. Sample must try foods like Kwek-Kwek, Balut, and Sisig. The night markets in Manila are filled with delicious eats that showcase Filipino street food. In this post, I’ll outline the food tour in Manila that I booked and what to expect on a Manila street food tour. ** This post contains affiliate links. If you click on one of the links or widgets throughout the page, whether it be Viator, Booking.com, Agoda, or any other affiliate, I might receive commission at no extra cost to you. For more information, you can visit my affiliate link page here. Thanks for the support! Booking a Manila Street Food Tour Dive into authentic flavors and local culture on a Manila street food tour. Food tours don’t just offer food, but they help you connect with local customs, cultures, and the guide or guides explain the dish and what makes the dish uniquely Filipino.  When booking my Manila food tour, I wanted to explore more then just the Filipino food scene. I wanted to see Manila at night, ride a Tuk-Tuk and Jeepney, learn about Filipino food, and check out a few markets.  Based on what I wanted, I decided to book this Manila Street Food and Night Market Tour.  I booked this tour well in advance through Get Your Guide.  There are plenty of other options out there for food tours in Manila in case you are looking for something different. Here are a few other tours offered: Manila: Street Food and Drinks Walking Tour Manila Slums, Smokey Mountain Local Market and Street Foods Manila Food Tour: Introduction to Philippine Street Food Manila Street Food Tour Itinerary I had so much fun on the Manila street food and night market tour. We wandered through some bustling night markets and tried some fantastic local favorites like kwek-kwek and even balut.  Each stop on the Manila food tour offered something unique and the journey of getting from place to place was just as adventurous. Below is the itinerary we followed while eating our way through parts of Manila.  Sample Kwek-Kwek, Sisig, Sinigang, Squid, and Barbecue at Tutuban Night Market The Manila street food tour kicked off at Tutuban Night Market. Tutuban Night Market is located in Tondo, Manila and is a popular destination especially for locals to do some daytime shopping and going to the market in the evening for street food.  I met our guide here, we found a table, talked about Manila for a while then he started brining out plate after plate of some familiar dishes and some very unfamiliar dishes.  While seated at Tutuban Night Market, I tried Kwek-Kwek, which is fried quail eggs, similar to ones I’ve eaten in Japan. Next I tried Sisig, which I’ve had a few other times in the Philippines. Sisig might be my favorite dish in the Philippines. Sisig is a dish made of pork and sometimes liver and it’s cooked with a mix of other ingredients like peppers, onions, and calamansi. It might come with an egg you can stir into the dish.  One of the other dishes I want to discuss is Sinigang. Sinigang is a soup that has a sour broth. The sinigang I had came with shrimp. Even with its sour taste, the soup was really good and I highly recommend you trying it when visiting the Philippines.  Balut Trying balut in the Philippines is easily one of the most unique and adventurous food experiences you’ll have guaranteed! If you don’t know, balut is a fertilized duck egg that is incubated for a time period of about 14 to 21 days.  So far, I’ve tried balut three times, 14, 16, and 18 days old. In my opinion, 14 days was the best. Once you start getting to 16 and 18 days the embryo starts to form more and you can see the tiny duck inside.  I actually enjoy balut, I describe it as tasting like a boiled egg with a lot more texture. You crack the top of the egg, sip the soup, peel the rest of the egg, and eat it.  When you find a vendor selling balut in Manila, they usually have salt and vinegar or sometimes a type of chili to go along with the balut. I like to eat it as is without anything, to taste the true flavors.  Wander Ilaya Street Night Produce Market We found ourselves in one of the biggest produce markets in the Philippines on Ilaya Street. The tour guide said this is one of the biggest markets in the Philippines it attracts buyers and sellers from all over Luzon (Island in Philippines where Manila is).  It was mainly a produce market and for locals to buy, sell, and trade. But I still love a good local market so it was a great opportunity and experience to walk through one of the biggest markets in the Philippines.  Dried Squid at Chinatown in Binondo After wandering the night market at Ilaya Street, we made a brief pit stop at a local vendor in Manila’s Chinatown selling dried squid from her small cart.  Nothing fancy here, just fresh dried squid on a stick! The vendor had squid on a skewer and grilled right in front of everyone looking to snack on a squid skewer.  You have the option to dunk the squid in a sauce made up of vinegar and onions. Again, I like to try my food as is first, so I tried the squid skewer plain and it tasted just like what it is, grilled squid. It’s a great and cheap snack while walking around.  Finish the Night at the Chinatown Arch The Manila street food and night market tour concluded at the famous Binondo Chinatown Arch. What makes it even better, is the Arch is lit up at night.  The Binondo Chinatown Arch is an iconic landmark and Manila’s Chinatown is the oldest Chinatown in the world.  Chance to ride in a Jeepney and Tuk-Tuk The Manila street food and night market tour was more then just a food tour. Instead of staying in one area in Manila, we bounced around from one place to another.  Instead of walking, we got a chance to ride in a Jeepney, something I highly recommend doing at least once while visiting the Philippines. We also got to ride in the back of a tuk-tuk. Which was convenient when making multiple stops.  Conclusion  I felt this Manila street food and night market tour was more then just tasting local dishes. We actually immersed ourselves in the city and got to experience some unique things like walking through one of the biggest markets in the Philippines.  I always love sisig but I also enjoyed trying the variations of squid that we ate. Not only did I try many different dishes, but I got to ride in a Tuk-Tuk and a Jeepney. Also walking the streets of Manila at night was a thrill. Enjoying my photos and want to see more? Check out my Picfair Store. 📸   Plan Your Trip: 🗺️✈️ 🇵🇭 Booking Accommodations ⛺️🛖  For booking recommendations on the best deals and locations, check out Agoda or Booking.com Activities and Tours  🏖️🚁  Find fun activities and things to do through Tripadvisor. If you are looking for tours and day trips, Viator and Get Your Guide have a lot of great options.  In need of a car rental? 🚗🚘  I recommend checking with Rental Cars.

Cebu City, Philippines is rich in culture and history but is also known to be a haven for food enthusiasts. To fully explore the food scene here, it is highly recommended to join a Cebu City food tour. Let the professionals and locals guide you around Cebu and show you the historical monuments and all the best places for authentic dishes. From delightful dishes like Sisig to the downright weird food like Balut, we tried it all and want to share our Cebu City food tour experience to include how to book a tour, expectations, and the food we got to try.  **This post contains affiliate links. If you click on one of the links or banners throughout the page, whether it be TripAdvisor, Booking.com. Agoda.com, or any other affiliate, I might receive commission at no extra cost to you. For more information, you can visit my affiliate link page here. Thanks for the support! Booking a Cebu City Food Tour Compared to other cities I’ve traveled to, there were not a whole lot of food tours offered for Cebu City, at least through Viator. Through Viator, we ended up booking the  Cebu City Historical Street and Food Tour. Using this link through Viator you can enter in your travel date, number of people, and read the overview, what is included in the tour, and even read up on some of the reviews from fellow travelers.  The Cebu City Historical Street and Food Tour was definitely one of the highlights from our trip to Cebu City and I highly recommend booking it. Cebu City Historical Street and Food Tour Our tour guides met us at Ayala Center, we hopped in a Jeepney (which is something I really wanted to do while in the Philippines), and started our food tour. After riding in the Jeepney, the rest of the tour was on foot and it ended at the Carbon Market. The tour consisted of  two guides. They were both very knowledgeable in regards to both the historical attractions and Filipino cuisine. They also provided us with water and several other drink options throughout the tour.  What I really liked about this food tour was that it combined a traditional food tour with a historical tour. So we got to see some of Cebu cities most important historical sites while sampling delicious Filipino Street Food.  Historical Monuments Visited on the Tour Yap-San Diego Ancestral House Built during the Spanish colonial era, Yap-San Diego Ancestral House is a 17th century home in the heart of Cebu City.  The house was built by a Chinese merchant, Don Juan Yap and it still belongs to the family. The family still lives in the house from time to time, even when open. Today, the house can be explored by visitors. There are many antiques scattered throughout two floors. There is a 100 peso fee per person to visit the Yap-San Diego Ancestral House. It is well worth a visit.  Heritage of Cebu Monument Across the street from the Yap-San Diego House is the Heritage of Cebu Monument. This large and detailed monument showcases the history of Cebu City. There are several depictions on the monuments, from the Battle of Mactan to important structures found throughout Cebu City.  Cebu Metropolitan Cathedral and Sto. Nino de Cebu You can’t visit Cebu City without stopping by one of the churches.  On our Cebu City Historical Street and Food Tour we briefly stopped at the Cebu Metropolitan Cathedral and Sto. Nino de Cebu.  These cathedrals and churches reminded me of the ones from Europe or Central and South America. They were elaborate and massive.  Magellan’s Cross Perhaps one of the most well known attractions in Cebu City is Magellan’s Cross.  Magellan’s Cross is encased in an Octagonal building with the cross in the dead center. The cross you see today is actually a covering to protect the real cross. The famed conquistador, Ferdinand Magellan planted a cross at this location and it is still preserved to this day.  Food and Dishes We Tried Fried Food at Pungko-pungko sa Fuente Our first stop on the Cebu City Historical Street and Food Tour was to Pungko-pungko sa Fuente.  Once we arrived, I noticed there were several tables at the restaurant, each table had large tubs of primarily fried food.  You pay for what you pick, but this style of eating is very cheap.  We tried several different things here at Pungko-pungko sa Fuente. We ate various fried pork bits, crab innards, small sausages, and spring rolls. Definitely not the healthiest of options, but I honestly did not care, it was for the most part, delicious.   Pusô Pusô seemed to be everywhere in Cebu City. Heck, even some of the convenience stores had it.  Pusô is basically a ball of rice that is boiled n a hand woven pouch that is generally made of palm leaves.  We had Pusô twice on our food tour, once with the Sisig and Tuslob Buwa and one with the Lechon.  Locals eat Pusô  with just about every meal and they love it! It even goes well with drinks.  Sisig One of my favorite Filipino dishes on our Cebu City Historical Street and Food Tour was Sisig.  Our tour had us sit down at a restaurant called Red Barracks, not far from the Heritage of Cebu Monument.  At Red Barracks, we actually tried Sisig, Tuslob Buwa and Pusô. Sisig is  a pork dish where many parts of the pig are used and cut into small pieces. The meat is usually mixed with calamansi and other spices and usually serves with an egg.  Each bite has a nice mix of crunchy, soft, fatty, and flavor. The calamansi, which is like a Shikuwasa or lime adds a nice refreshing taste.  Tuslob Buwa A dish that I’ve never heard of is Tuslob Buwa. Tuslob Buwa was a bit bizarre and could be added to my Interesting food around the world post.  Tuslob Buwa is kind of soup like and meant to be eaten with Pusô or just plain rice.  This dish is made out of primarily pig brain, liver, and broth.  The restaurant in Cebu City we went to, Red Barracks, had stove grills on the table. Our guide then added garlic, oil, and other ingredients to the grill before dumping in the brains and liver.  Honestly, dunking the Pusô in the Tuslob Buwa was really good. I would definitely eat this dish again.   Lechon Lechon is king in Cebu City. Lechon is a roasted suckling pig and it is found everywhere in Cebu City.  We tried Lechon at the Carbon Market.  Think of pulled pork but with a crispy and crunchy outside. The meat was moist and the skin was crunchy. Lechon is delicious and is a must when sampling Filipino foods.  Balut The star of the show, at least for me. I’ve been wanting to try Balut since moving to Asia. I knew the Philippines was going to be my best shot at trying Balut from a local street food vendor. After trying Lechon and ending our Cebu City Historical Street and Food Tour, our guide found me a vendor outside selling Balut.   Balut is one of those dishes that many have heard of but are to squeamish to try. I’ll be honest, I was a little nervous to try it. So what is Balut? Balut is a fertilized duck egg. The duck eggs I tried had an incubation period of 16 days. Anywhere from 14 -21 days is pretty typical.  So how do you eat Balut? You crack the egg and suck out the juices. The juices tasted like you would expect. It tasted like duck broth and egg. You then crack more of the egg off and eat the different parts of the egg. Yes, since Balut is a fertilized duck egg, there is a lot more to these eggs then your typical store bought egg. You can see the duck that started to form. Depending on the incubation period, the duck can be further along and even have feathers.  After trying Balut for my first time in Cebu City, I was actually surprised by how much I enjoyed it. I wouldn’t say it was delicious but to me it tasted like a normal egg with a little texture to it. I would definitely try Balut again.  Conclusion What better way to explore one of the Philippines top destinations then by booking a Cebu City Historical Street and Food Tour. This tour combines history and food. I guarantee you will learn a lot about Cebu City and its history but at the same time explore Cebu’s culinary scene. You’ll try popular food like Lechon and Sisig, if you are brave enough, try the Balut, I bet you will be surprised! I highly recommend booking a Cebu City Historical Street and Food Tour while on vacation in Cebu City, Philippines.  Enjoying my photos and want to see more? Check out my Picfair Store. 📸   Plan Your Trip: 🗺️✈️ 🇵🇭 Booking Accommodations ⛺️🛖  For booking recommendations on the best deals and locations, check out Agoda or Booking.com Activities and Tours  🏖️🚁  Find fun activities and things to do through Tripadvisor. If you are looking for tours and day trips, Viator and Get Your Guide have a lot of great options.  In need of a car rental? 🚗🚘  I recommend checking with Rental Cars.