“I just really love pancit,"

says Marc Angeles.

This is no idle statement of casual devotion. Angeles isn’t just some guy who loves pancit. He is the guy who loves pancit. He is the owner and general manager of Pancit Center, a humble little restaurant on Pioneer Street. He also runs a blog: pancitking.com. On his site, he documents his many travels around the Philippines in search of various regional styles of the dish that he loves so much.

“For me, this was a way to merge the two things I really like: travel and food.” Pancit provided the context for Angeles’ exploration of this country. He blogs under the alias Pancit King on his site pancitking.com. He documents his trips to various regions, going from one to panciteria to another, discovering what new unique forms they might have on offer.

“There are a lot of regional varieties of pancit, because it reflects our culture in general. Even though all of us are Filipinos, we have different languages and cultures. There are Bicolanos and Tagalogs and Bisaya. Each culture has its own preferences when it comes to food.”

“For example if you go to Bicol, their taste is what they call matapang. They put chilis to make things really spicy. And then they put sugar and a lot of salt. If you bring those dishes here to Metro Manila, it isn’t that sellable.”

“And there are regional varieties because each region has different ingredients available. It reflects the resources that they have. If you go to Quezon for the pancit habhab, they have a lot of vegetables, specifically the sayote. Pahiyas, their main regional festival, is a harvest festival. You can see that reflected in the food.”

And it doesn’t end with tradition. People are adapting pancit to suit their needs. You go to Mindanao, and you find less pork in pancit. You find people trying to make do with what they have, the dish still used in celabratory contexts even if there isn’t much to celebrate with.“In Zamboanga,” Angeles says, “I tried a pancit that had canned tuna on it.”

“I didn’t like it, but it was interesting.”