SEVEN major cuisines define the Philippines, the late food columnist Doreen Fernandez once declared, and they’re best described as overtones, or aftertastes: the bitterness of Ilocano dishes, the sweetness of Kapampangan, the permeating sourness of Tagalog, the rich spiciness of Bikolano, the subtle freshness of the Bisaya, the ornate Maranao and the connectedness of the Tausug to a life defined by the sea.

If we acknowledge the diverse roots of what we are, this range of flavors should come as no surprise. After all, Filipino food isn’t just sinigang or adobo. It’s a whole lot more, as these field notes would show. There’s a full range of exciting food options out there in the Philippine countryside that’s ours for the tasting.

1. Northern Lights: In Vigan, just across the street from Café Leona, I bought two empanadas -- one special (with a fresh egg and Vigan longganiza), and one ordinary (just vegetables). Wolfed them down in piping hot bites and dipped in dark Ilocano cane vinegar.

In Laoag at La Preciosa can be found northern Ilocano cuisine at its unadulterated best. Inabrao. Pinakbet. Igado. Dinengdeng. And of course, Poki-poki. The dishes are mostly embellished by ampalaya, saluyot, bunga ti marunggay, carbasa flowers, alukon blossoms and tenga-tenga, and bathed in monamon, that unforgettable Ilocano bagoong (salty fish paste). There’s also Arosep or Gamet, manifestations of the Ilocanos’ yen for seaweed. If you have a vegetarian bent, Ilocos food is the mother lode.

2. Nouvelle cuisine at the Plains: At Bale Dutung, Angeles, Claude Tayag’s home, mealtime is strictly by reservation. Here, a foodie might hope to travel the length and breadth of contemporary Central Plains cuisine. Drawing from local fare, the recent past, and from lands distant, Claude and Mary Ann Tayag prepare lunches that blow the mind, not to mention the taste buds.

We started with a platter of Kapampangan sushi, one oozing taba ng talangka (crab fat), another stuffed with piniritong hito (catfish) and balaw-balaw (fermented rice and fish), and a third one, sweet tamago-like eggrolls enlivened with slivers of pindang damulag (carabao tapa).

Main courses vary. We had a seafood kare-kare once, then another time, it was smoked tilapia, with pig’s ear binagoongan on the side. A third time, Claude prepared quail inasal with mushrooms and potatoes on the side. And I will never forget his roast duck in a lemongrass curry sauce served with Indian bread.

3. A confluence of sources: In Calamba, it turned out to be a delightful Sunday at the Lily Pad, writer Tweetums Gonzales’ home at the foothills of Makiling.

“I cook for friends,” Tina Tan says of the lunch she served us that day. Using the freshest produce from her hometown in Katanawan, Quezon, she served a cacophony of culinary comforts: a jazz trio of appetizers: kinilaw na tuwakang (anchovy), sautéed bihud (fish roe) and crisp squid sheets dipped in garlicky nipa vinegar.

For main courses, we had grilled salamin, an amazing jack with silvery skin that left a kiss of sebong isda (fish fat) on your lips; squid stuffed with chorizo de bilbao and cooked in its own ink; bite-tender lengua estofada smothered in button mushrooms and olives; and pasta accompanied by a soundtrack of black mushrooms, olive oil, garlic and pimento. You know you really enjoyed a meal if at its end, you’re bathed in joyful sweat. I was thoroughly peppered.

4. Hot Cuisine: In Naga, Graceland is a chain of short order houses and bakeshops. The pinangat here is called tinuktok (stuffed with shrimp) -- delicious, fino, delicate, delightful, different. The gulay na sili, a.k.a. Bikol express, is classic. Lunch at Graceland is a flavorful introduction to the coconut cookery of the region -- Bikol Cuisine 101.

In Legaspi, Waway’s (near the airport) is an all-time favorite. Three vegetable dishes: Gulay na Natong ( a.k.a. laing), Gulay na Sili (a.k.a. Bikol Express) and a not-too-common dish of paropagolong (segadilyas or winged beans) given personality by flakes of tinapa (smoked fish), then cooked in gata. For vegetable, chili and coconut lovers, Waway’s is still worth the visit.

In Sorsogon, the highlight of lunch at Fernando’s Hotel was Nilanta na Pili. We were shown how to slice grooves on both sides of the pili fruit before scooping out the fibrous flesh off the skin. Eaten with patis (fish sauce) and hot rice, the rich and creamy pili flesh tasted like macadamia with a hint of avocado and just a bite of bark. Dessert was conserva -- a dish made from the sugar of the buri palm, smothered in pili nuts. Very, very subtle. Almost demure.

5. The inland sea: In Dumaguete, we meet Potenciana. She churns the chocolate thick until the hot, brown liquid pours from her batirol in slow motion, like lava. She holds court every morning at the city market where hundreds of lips purse in pleasure as they allow the dark sweet mixture to intrude, then coat, then slide, then settle into their mouth to wash away the remnants of muddled sleep.

At Potenciana Lantaca’s stall, Postky #11, we feasted on budbud kabug -- glistening yellow fingers of steamed millet, lovingly bathed in coconut milk and sugar, then wrapped in banana leaf.

Alternately, there was puto maya, pearly-white fistfuls of glutinous rice, gilt just barely with highlights of ginger, dipped in (or drenched with) the dark, steaming chocolate. The cocoa beans are personally selected daily by Potenciana from among the many baskets brought to her from the uplands of Negros Oriental, then roasted, then peeled, then ground, then lovingly formed into tableas beyond compare -- pure, prime, and unadulterated.

6. Big Sky: On our first evening in Marawi, the chancellor of Mindanao State University hosted a Pagana Maranao for us.

The menu included Pisawawan a kabaw -- a carabao meat soup, boiled for hours, then enriched with coconut milk and local spices; Beef randang -- beef cubes in roasted coconut meat with spring onions and local spices; Pindyalukan a manok -- chicken with shredded coconut; Piaren a aloan -- dalag simmered in coconut milk; Giant lake tilapia, grilled, then smothered with a blanket of local spices; Koneng -- rice yellowed in turmeric then cooked with Maranao “kalawag” and coconut milk; dudol/tiatig/bruhas/anice -- rice cakes; variety of fresh fruits, amas (golden bananas), watermelon, jackfruit, mangoes, marang, papaya, lanzones, rambutan.

A heartwarming, elusive flavor filled each mouthful -- alluringly sour, yet sweet, clearly spicy, while milky rich. Mysterious and truly delightful, almost like a love potion.

7. Living on the edge: Where else but in Zamboanga can you find breakfast satti. The Morning Sun Panciteria serves chicken, beef or chicken livers served in 8-stick batches, with white chunks of rice (tamu) floating in a bowl of orange-pink, chili hot, sambal soup. You are expected to slurp this in between bites of satti, and feel it blazing a trail down your gullet. A raging assault on sleep-dulled senses that can change your outlook on life. Out here, who needs coffee?

Tawi-Tawi is another world. Imagine Malacca 200 years ago. A bustling port filled with colorful shops and stalls stocked with products from all over the world. A land without borders.

Our hosts, Tobel and Flora Tan, plied us with kamun (mantis shrimp), fresh fish and turtle eggs (that we politely declined), and introduced us to tiula itum, the Tausug tinola made with beef, blackened and flavored with charred coconut flesh, turmeric and lemon grass; khulma -- the local curried stew; and wanni -- a yellow-green mango variety blessed with the sweetness of an exotic perfume.

In Jolo, we had lunch at a bright little cafeteria called Golden Ribbon owned by Lucia Que, Ruthie Arakan and Hja Christina Lao. The culinary find here was balu balu, a brilliant concoction made from the Sama dried spice mix bubok mixed with toasted coconut, bagoong, green mango and a finely powdered dried fish. Balu balu is to grilled talakitok as the Supremes were to Diana Ross. Do not leave Jolo unless you have tried this stuff.

One comes out of this trip to Mindanao’s wild west in sensory overload. The images, the sounds, the colors, the textures, the memories, the tales, the flavors. Who can ever have enough?