I Would Rather Go Hungry Than Eat Filipino Food Again!

[Monseratto]

This girl will get an social network ass-whooping from onion skinned pinoy community in 3...2...1.

I Would Rather Go Hungry Than Eat Filipino Food Again! - eTramping.com

Many said:

“You will love Filipino food for sure!”, “There is nothing better than seafood in the Philippines”, “Filipinos are proud of their very own local dishes”…

Sorry guys for disappointing you, but it is not true in our opinion.

You all should know by now that we are both food lovers and new flavour hunters. Every single trip, whether we discover new places inside or outside China, is related in some way to food. Before setting off for a new adventure to a new country, we do a proper research into new cuisines trying to find out which dishes we should avoid and which one can’t be missed out. So far, we enjoyed Thai, Indian, Vietnamese, Khmer and Chinese cuisines the most, whereas Sri Lankan dishes (although they were incredibly cheap and accessible) were not our favourite. Unfortunately, with tears in my eyes and broken heart, we must add Filipino cuisine to our “I would rather go hungry than eat this food again” list.

Expectations vs. Reality

What we hoped to experience…

Before coming to the Philippines, we have found CNN Travel’s list of 50 Filipino foods that define the Philippines featuring such dishes as:

Adobo - chicken and pork cooked in vinegar, salt, garlic, pepper, soy sauce and other spices.
Lechon – roasted pig with the crisp, golden-brown skin served with liver sauce.
Kare-kare - stew of oxtail served with delicious sauce made from ground toasted rice and crushed peanuts and presented with some banana blossom, eggplants and string beans.

We also hoped to try some fresh exotic fruits and veggies, grilled seafood, smoked meat and fish, plenty of balut (developing duck embryo that is boiled alive and eaten in the shell), local soups, different kind of rice (red and yellow), kind of dim sum and dumplings, sticky rice and a great composition of herbs and spices.

What we have experienced…

Let me start from telling you that for the first few days we gave the local food a go. We were open to new things, we were willing to eat anything locals gave us and we were so curious about new dishes. That has changed after 4 days of stomachache, dizziness and feeling overtired and bloated.

The fruits we bought at local markets daily looked and tasted old and gross. Bananas (they changed color into black) were the worst (you could see some flies flying around and sitting on the bunch of them). Apples were tiny, oranges and nectarines were extremely sour and pineapples were soaked in some kind of liquid that smelled bad. The only good fruits available there were sour mangoes sold with pepper and sugar as well as watermelons.

What shocked us the most was the poor quality of food. Most of dishes were left on the table without being covered with a lid, or without a fan to get rid of the flies, as it’s a common practice in other Asian countries. Fish and meat were mixed up together in the same bowl, sausages were displayed on a plate surrounded by flies and bugs, everyone was touching food with their fingers to try before buying and what was the worst the food was left on display for all night long and didn’t disappear from there unless someone bought it (we saw the same fish dish on display for two days in a row in one of local restaurants in Manila). It was a big mess, trust me!

The Filipino food is packed with salt, sugar and oil. The meat we were served was soaking in oil, the fish that supposed to be grilled was full of oil and veggies we wanted to try contained more oil than the fattest meat we saw there. As we know, oil makes you feel so tired and slows your metabolism down. After having a few small Filipino lunches, we felt bloated and tired and we could tell it was the food.

We not only started feeling fat (literally), but also suffered from stomachache and diarrhea. I had a massive migraine, mood swings and heartbum caused by spicy and oily pork.

No wonder why, in the north, the vast majority of Filipino kids and young people are overweight. This is something we have noticed straight away. People in young age are huge and it’s due to poor quality of food.

Prices

The Filipino food was extremely cheap though. Coffee was $0.22, bread was for less than $0.5 and meal dishes were never more than $1 (including rice). That was the biggest advantage of dining out in local places. On the other hand, if you wanted to eat something healthy and more Western (brown bread, brown rice, cooked veggies, yogurt, grilled or steamed fish, oatmeal, dried fruits, etc.) you had to pay a lot of money (more than you would pay in your own country).

Conclusion

Based on our experience, Filipino food did not live up to our expectations at all. Let’s hope we can make it there again in the future and find a better luck!

[1D4LV]

maarte lang yan. hehehehehe.
probably she was expecting something na fine dining.

[Pippo21]

Aba e sa tabi tabi kumaen eh. Haha! She should have realized she was buying and eating food from the bottom wrung of the city haha! Mga pinoy lang talaga kayang sumikmura nun haha!

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[Monseratto]

Buti di niya sinubok yung Padpad. Baka akalain niya na exotic food iyan...

[lowslowbenz]

Then go hungry.

Who cares.

[Manilablock]

pag nakatikim ng Pinoy yan magbabago ang kanyang pananaw....

hindi lamang sa tinapay nabubuhay ang tao, meron pang ibang pwedeng kainin na hindi mauubos...

[jhnkvn]

I wonder kung saan siya napadaan. I'll do voice out that not all street food is hygienic... and after venturing into other countries I have even more apprehensions in eating at our friendly Tondo karinderia too.

Then again, worst tummy ache experienced came from my trip to China. Man.. never gonna taste exotic stuff again.

[badkuk]

That's a rather simplistic declaration, don't you think? Pinoy food = bad, American food = good?

Right food, wrong places imho. In any country there's bound to be food that's poorly prepared, and ones that are done superbly. i don't see how she can be a good critic given her poor choice of establishments.

Common sense lang naman: if it doesn't look right, don't eat it...if the place washes your dishes in plastic basins, then it's probably not that clean; if the place has flies, then those flies might have taken a light snack on the food displayed in open air, after it made a pitstop on a pile of sh_t.

i often cringe when i see food show hosts eat at street carinderias -- sorry po kung me ma-offend, but you have to admit it's dicey eating street food here.


Re sugary, oily foods: hello? Krispy Kreme, Coca Cola, Slurpees, Big Mac, Baconator?
About Pinoy kids being obese: right back at you, US of A.

Pot calling the kettle black? If anything, USA is exporting all that unhealthy food to the rest of the world. And we haven't even touched on the chemicals they pump into their food...

Sorry to say this, but little Ms. "travel freak" is sounding like a very naive know-it-all.

[chua_riwap]

yung mga officemates ko na expats (yung mga cowboy) kumakain din ng streetdfoods ang mga yan like banana q, fishball & squidballs & walastik.

pero syamepre dinadala namin sila dun sa lugar na malinis at hindi kung saang tabi-tabi lang. kung sa maruming lugar syempre negative ang comments nyan.

sabi nga nung officemate kong expat noon, sarap daw ng quake-quake.





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[Calistro]

I do agree though that our food, especially those sold in canteens/carinderias, are most of the times, cooked with too much oil and salt.

P.S. Scrolled down the blog and it's already filled with what you're expecting. At least these posters should make it look like they're not angry..

[basti08]

sa ka-cheapan sya kumain eh. what does that bitch expect?

eh di magutom ka, tanga! pobreng foreigner. walang pangkain sa masarap na kainan dito. Pwe!

[Noel Salisipan]

Baka lutong-Macau ang gusto?(hehehe)

[ClaNker]

Then starve to death.

Ang daming kainan ng masasarap na Filipino food tungak! Kung saan-saang tabi kasi kumakain.

Edit:

Ayun naman pala eh under 25 bucks a day lang pala ang budget. Kain at wag mag reklamo!

[_Qwerty_]

eh kahit pinoy hindi talaga kakain don sa pinuntahan nya.. yan yung tipong carenderia na araw araw pare pareho ulam.. tawag namin dyan.. pangat.. pangatlong araw na.. yun pa din

[Syuryuken]

baka sa divisoria napadpad ang lukaret

[chua_riwap]

Then starve to death.

Ang daming kainan ng masasarap na Filipino food tungak! Kung saan-saang tabi kasi kumakain.

Edit:

Ayun naman pala eh under 25 bucks a day lang pala ang budget. Kain at wag mag reklamo!

P25 budget? alangya kahit sa turo-turo sa ulam pa lang kulang na yan. rice ngayon nasa P10 na.
eh ulam pa.

libreng sabaw at kanin na lang siya. kup*l siya......

[Red Advent 04]

kung purong forener sha pwede pako maniwala sa kanya..talagang maarte nga lang yaan. torat nga nakain sha panigurado tapos pag kaing fenoy ayaw nya.:police:

[Monseratto]

Another Foreigner's Response To "I'd Rather Go Hungry" Girl - I Dreamed Of This - Seeking Peace of Mind Through One Way Travel

A Letter To "I'd Rather Go Hungry Than Eat Filipino Food Again" Girl

Thanks for being honest with your opinions about Filipino food. Thanks for not holding back. Mostly, thank you for making me (another foreign blogger writing about the Philippines) look good. I mean, you're making me look really good. Yes, I wrote a "letter to Filipinos" a few weeks ago, and I worried it might be misinterpreted - possibly angering some Filipinos.

However, now that I have the perspective of reading your blog about Filipino food, I realize that I had nothing to worry about. My blog was received VERY well in comparison. You are receiving a lof of very negative attention, and I am usually a compassionate person, but in this case I think you may know exactly what you are doing.

In fact, it seems like you might be intentionally trying to antagonize Filipino people in order to bring attention to your blog, and here is why:

A full month ago you wrote another blog about your "impressions of the Philippines", and you included a few negative sections about the food. Then, perhaps you sat back and watched all the comments slowly start coming in. When you realized how sensitive and proud Filipinos can be about their food specifically, you decided to take advantage of the situation and write another inflammatory post all about the food.

Knowing how many comments came the first time, you chose to make your opinions and wording even more abrasive (offensive?) the second time...and guess what? The comments did indeed come pouring in! Yes, they're almost all negative, but look at all that blog traffic! Of course I can't say this is exactly what happened, but it certainly seems to be a possibility. Yes, you have a lot of eyes on your blog, but is this really the kind of attention you want?

Aside from all that, I would give you more credit if your observations resembled the actual reality of being a foreign tourist in the Philippines. It pains me to read how you describe the people and cuisine. You mention that people asked you to pay for a photo of them, and I'm curious as to how I spent an entire year all over the country (as a photographer), but have never been asked to pay for a photo once? Am I being nicer to them? Better luck?

As for being "ripped off", you seem to be a seasoned traveler, so you must realize how dishonest taxi and tuk tuk drivers are in other countries - in fact, much more so than in the Philippines. It's not fair of me to comment on China (from experience) because I've only been to Hong Kong, but from what I've heard, it's actually very bad there (and I think that's where you have spent the most time!).

You also mentioned how the different forms of public transportation are unsafe because of no seatbelts - well (with the exception of airplanes) most people know that seatbelts aren't used in public transportation anywhere in the world. Basically, honesty is great, but not at the expense of fairness.

If You Don't Want to be Treated Like a Tourist, Stop Acting Like One

Speaking of fairness, to be fair, at first I did not enjoy the food in Manila or some of the touristy areas I visited. I agree that some of it was over-flavored and unhealthy. The irony is that in my opinion, that's because these specific foods were very WESTERNIZED. Though it's not nearly as bad as you make it seem, the "obesity problem" you mention (in my opinion, and only in Manila) comes from the American-style fast food culture.

Other than that, in touristy areas, they serve food to...guess who? Tourists! In a place like Thailand, for example, that means you see these "western" fruit breakfasts, pancakes, French toast, hot dogs...etc. The same thing is happening in the Philippines. A lot of backpackers are looking for western foods after traveling so long. Demand creates supply.

As you should know, if you want the "real deal", you must escape the tourists (and vendors who sell to them). It's simple. "Street food" in the Philippines is not the enemy, and I don't believe you have to go to fancy traditional Filipino restaurants to get great food.

know it's not fair to compare my experience to yours, because it seems you may have only been in the country for a week or so. However, your short stay is exactly why I (and many others) hope you will be more careful with the "impressions" that you put out into the world in the future. You may be doing a real disservice to a country and a culture that has a lot to offer international travelers - and a country that could surely use the money generated by tourism.

A Possible Diagnosis For You?
As for Filipino food making you sick, I must admit that I have a strong stomach. Filipino food (in any form) never made me sick. While I'm sure it happens occasionally, I don't recall any tourists being sick - and some of them ate balut with me

You mention that after eating the food, you felt bloated and tired. You also mentioned that you had massive migraine headaches, and mood swings.

I'm no expert, and forgive me for saying this, but based on the symptoms you have described it appears as if you might have been experiencing PMS during your stay in the Philippines. You certainly don't look very happy in the black and white photo at the top of your post. The tone and mood of your post seems a bit "moody" also, so it would make sense if you were uncomfortable during your stay in the country.

If this is the case, it is especially unfair to blame your sour mood on the food of the Philippines.

Balik Sa Pinas
I say come back (just don't tell people who you are Give it more time, explore the country more fully, and with an open mind. I'm glad you acknowledge that it's one of the most beautiful places you've ever been. On closer inspection you just might find that this beauty extends to the people and food as well...I know it did for me!

Filipinos are wonderful people...so wonderful, in fact, that there is a good chance they will let you come back just to prove you wrong about their culinary heritage


Just thought I should give another foreigner's opinions.


Sincerely,
Nathan Allen

[falken]

She went to all the wrong places.

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[BratPAQ]

Naka experience ng isa or dalawang palpak, na generalize na lahat.

I do hope they will realize that they just declared "war" to one of the biggest population of netizens in the world by generalizing their bad experience and equating it to the whole food culture.

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