Filipino food is not the most well-known cuisine internationally. Often dubbed bland and unexciting, that doesn’t bother the Filipinos. Food is an important part of Filipino culture and it’s eaten in abundance and with gusto. Filipino food is, especially compared to its spicy neighbours, relatively mild and often sweeter than what you may be used to.

Specialities

• Adobo - the unofficial national dish. Consists of meat in stewed soy sauce, vinegar, black pepper and crushed garlic.
• Adobong pusit: a fragrant dish of squid prepared with soy, vinegar, garlic, onions and tomatoes.
• Lechon: spit roasted suckling pig covered in a thick pork liver sauce.
• Siopao: a steamed ball of dough stuffed with different type of fillings made of meat, fish and egg.
• Batchoy: a traditional noodle soup with a mix of chicken, beef and pork (crackling, meat and offal).
• Kinilaw: a ceviche style dish consisting of raw fish marinated in coconut vinegar, garlic, ginger and chili peppers.
• Rice is eaten with almost every meal, from breakfast to late night meryenda (snack).

Remarkable dishes

• Balut: not for the faint hearted, Balut is a fertilised, developing bird egg (usually duck), boiled and eaten straight from its shell.
• Durian: the King of Fruits is one of those foodstuffs you either love or hate. It is a large (weighing up to three kilograms) fruit with a spiky rind and is known for its pungent smell and confusing flavour combining sweet and savoury with a fleshy, custardy texture. Can be eaten at various stages of ripeness and is also used to flavour sweet and savoury dishes.
• Ampalaya: also known as the bitter melon, the ampalaya is a cucumber shaped, wrinkly fruit with a fresh yet bitter flavour.
• Isaw: a street food made up of chicken or pork intestines, skewered and barbecued.
• Dinuguan: A thick, black stew made of pig’s blood and chicken or pork intestines.

Drinks

• It is not recommended to drink tapped water so rather buy filtered water. It is cheaper to buy a big can or bottle of water and fill it at a refilling station, found widely on the streets.
• Buko Juice is young coconut juice, often served in the shell or with pieces of young coconut floating in the drink.
• Apart from the southern Muslim parts of the country, alcohol is widely consumed. Beer, San Miguel more specifically, is the alcoholic drink of choice.
• As imported wine is usually very expensive, stick to the locally made Tuba, a palm wine extracted from coconut flowers (Tuba), Basi, a port like sweet wine made from sugar cane juice or Lambanog, distilled Tuba.
• Whiskey, rum, brandy and gin are brewed locally and perfectly palatable.

See 'Worldsupporter resources' for Filipino recipes (in Dutch)

INGREDIENTS

• 2 cloves of garlic
• 1 nestle cream
• pasta pkg
• ½ cup milk
• ½ tsp of butter
• salt to taste
• ½ tsp white pepper
• ½ tsp black pepper
• 4 green chilies
• 2 big tomatoes
• 1 ½ tin tuna fish

PROCEDURE

remove the skin of garlic and grind it well until it make puree paste you can add little milk or water while making the paste out of it. Meanwhile make sure you boil the pasta by adding black pepper and salt ( a pinch or two will be fine).

once the garlic puree paste is done add the paste with the nestle cream and cut the tomato into cubes and the chills and then mix all in the white sauce (mixture of garlic puree paste and nestle cream). And add the white pepper ( if you love pepper you can more also)

once your pasta is boiled, remove from the heat and throw the water. Now take up a pan, in medium heat add the butter and before it melts make oil out of it ad the tuna fish and add the white sauce.

finally mix the pasta and add milk.

i add milk to make it creamy.

and you can serve with refreshing juice.

INGREDIENTS

• 2 to 3 very ripe bananas, peeled (about 1 1/4 to 1 1/2 cups mashed)
• 1/3 cup melted butter
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• Pinch of salt
• 3/4 cup sugar (1/2 cup if you would like it less sweet, 1 cup if more sweet)
• 1 large egg, beaten
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1 1/2 cups of all-purpose flour

PROCEDURE

 -Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C), and butter a 4x8-inch loaf pan.

- In a mixing bowl, mash the ripe bananas with a fork until completely smooth. Stir the melted butter into the mashed bananas.

- Mix in the baking soda and salt. Stir in the sugar, beaten egg, and vanilla extract. Mix in the flour.

- Pour the batter into your prepared loaf pan. Bake for 50 minutes to 1 hour at 350°F (175°C), or until a tester inserted into the center comes out clean.

- Remove from oven and let cool in the pan for a few minutes. Then remove the banana bread from the pan and let cool completely before serving. Slice and serve. (A bread knife helps to make slices that aren't crumbly).

No need for a mixer for this recipe! Clean-up is easy too, if you want, you can mix everything in one mixing bowl.

The best bananas to use for banana bread are those that are over-ripe. The yellow peels should be at least half browned, and the bananas inside squishy and browning.

Ingrediënts:

• 1 mango
• 400 ml (Greek style) yogurt
• 1 vanilla pod
• 20 g raw almonds
• 20 g raw cashewnuts
• 20 g raw pecans
• ½ tsp cinnamon
•  2 sprigs of mint

Serves 2

How to whip up this dessert:

1. Cut the mango lenghtwise. Remove one halve, take the halve with the pit and cut the pulp on top of the pit into cubes. Scrap off the cubes with a spoon or sharp knife. Take out the pit, and cut the pulp on the other side also into cubes and scrape them off again. Then scrape off the pulp from the two remaining peels.
2. Cut the vanilla pod lenghtwise, open it and scrape the marrow from the vanilla pod.
3. Mix half of the yogurt with the marrow from the vanilla pod.
4. Puree the rest of the yogurt with the mango.
5. Roughly chop the nuts.
6. Layer the mango yogurt mixture and vanilla yogurt in glasses and spoon some chopped nuts between each layer.
7. Garnish with cinnamon and mint.