
How a sweet treat puts the Philippines on the map in Sacramento.
A dorned with sweet red and white beans, palm fruit, coconut jelly, coconut strings, ube jam, leche flan, and ice cream, halo-halo is as full of flavor as it is color. The classic Filipino dessert is easily found on street corners in the Ilocos or Manila regions of the Philippines, but in Sacramento, the Hella-Halo food truck is one of the only places to get it.
“Halo-halo means ‘mix mix’ (in Tagalog),” says Philip “Pipo” Carrasca, who co-owns Hella-Halo with his wife Kelly. ]
“I started my business as a way to bring awareness to Filipino food, and since it’s on wheels, I can bring it to underrepresented areas. I want to put the Philippines on the map.”
Many historians believe halo-halo, a treat that’s highly popular among Filipinos today, evolved from the Japanese kakigori. Similar to a snow cone, that confection is sweetened with condensed milk, syrup and sweetener, but is eaten with a spoon just like the Filipino halo-halo. Supposedly the Japanese brought ka kigori to the Philippines in the time before World War II. Accounts suggest that it was the immigrant Japanese farmers who modified kakigori by adding in mongo, red and kidney beans, and papaya. Considering add-ins like mung beans from Japan and flan of Spanish origins, halo-halo is just as much a mix of cultures as it is a mixture of ingredients. In the famed television series Parts Unknown, the late Anthony Bourdain said of his experience trying halo-halo in Manila: “It makes no god***n sense at all…I love it.”

Since 2019, the smiling purple scoop of ice cream atop a cone has served as the mascot for the Hella-Halo truck, which travels all over the Sacramento area. From food truck festivals to farmers’ markets, breweries and hospital parking lots, the truck is always on the move. On a busy day, the Carrascas’ crew serves between 250 and 300 halo-halos in varieties like the So Matcha with green tea ice cream and cinnamon toast crunch, the Hapa with strawberry evaporated milk and Graham crackers, and the What it DEW with honeydew evaporated milk and Rice Krispies.

Carrasca decided during the slower winter season to begin offering savory fare, like the adobo fries and adobo grilled cheese. Another Filipino staple, adobo involves marinating meat in vinegar, soy sauce, garlic, bay leaves, and black peppercorns, which is then browned in oil, and simmered in the marinade. Savory shredded adobo pork atop a bed of seasoned fries topped with Swiss cheese, green onions, and fried garlic made the adobo fries an instant hit. The diversification of his menu helped heighten the appeal of his truck to breweries, which Carrasca says didn’t necessarily find dessert to be a great pairing with beer.
With a team of five employees and his wife, Kelly, in charge of the business’s finances, Hella-Halo has grown impressively since it opened in 2019. Back then, Carrasca worked full time in construction until the government shutdown ended a number of his contracts and forced him to change course.

Reflecting on tender memories of enjoying halo-halo as a child in Hawaii, he decided to take a risk. “Every day my friend and I would walk home from school, we’d pass this place call Elong Elong, and this grandma would give us halo-halo for free,” he recalls. “At first we paid for it, but then we came in so many times, she started giving it to us for free. In return, we’d help break down boxes. I remember sitting on the roof, drinking halo-halo, and sharing stories.”
On top of that, his grandmother once owned a restaurant by the very same name, Hella-Halo, so Carrasca decided to start his business. Well before he even had the materials to begin, he created an Instagram page that garnered more than 500 followers in just a few days. “I couldn’t believe it! That showed me I had something, people wanted this,” he says of Greater Sacramento, which UC Davis reports has about 75,000 Filipino residents.
He secured a tent from a friend and followed another friend to a three-hour-long pop-up event,where he sold out of halo-halo in under 90 minutes. Now, just a few years later, Carrasca dreams of expanding his operation to Hawaii, where this passion all began. “If there were a prophecy, this would be written for me,” he says.