Legazpi City: Old and New

I always look forward to trips to Legazpi City. Imagine waking up to this view every morning. Beautiful, right?

We stayed at La Piazza Hotel, so far my favorite hotel in the city. It's a few minutes away from the airport, and I always order their Bicol Express, which I highly recommend. Bicol express is pork stewed in coconut milk and flavored with shrimp paste and finger chilis.

For the rest of Bicol food, we dropped by the local food chain Biggs where we had, among others, laing. Laing is a vegetable dish with taro leaves, bits of pork, shrimp paste and coconut milk as main ingredients.

I highly recommend First Colonial Grill's Pinangat (same main ingredients with Laing, but has more pork, and made of layers of taro leaves) and Tinapa (Smoked Fish)Rice.

Another must-try is DJC Halo-Halo. They top their version with cheese.

We love the fried dried espada (cutlass fish) served for breakfast by the hotel, so we went to the local market to buy some to take home. There was also a dried fish called abu, which I made a mental note to buy the next time.