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Breakfast on the Island: Rice and more Rice

Filipinos are people with a big appetite. Average, people on the island eat five times a day. It all starts with breakfast over a snack around 10 am to keep them going till lunch. A merienda, or afternoon snack, will bridge lunch to dinner.

Filipinos are fervent rice eaters and have with a consumption of 118 kilos per capita/year(babies and children included) on of the highest consumption in Asia. Rice is ‘the’ staple food for breakfast, lunch and dinner but also for a lot of snacks they eat between the meals.

A basic breakfast is simple: rice, egg sunny side up or scrambled and soy sauce. Next to rice Filipinos are huge egg eaters and consume minimum one egg a day. A lot of mamas buy eggs with a complete tray at the time.

Talking to the locals I found out that the most popular breakfast is rice with bulad (fried dried fish) eaten with vinegar and fried egg. The fried fish is salty, the vinegar sour and they accompany this breakfast with hot chocolate made of local Tablea, pure cocoa.

Why is this breakfast so popular? 

I think there are several reasons. First this breakfast dish combines the favorite tastes of the Filipino: the salty crispy fried fish, the vinegar (here on the island most people use the local ‘tuba’, fermented juice they tap from the coconut trees), the egg and... it is cheap.

Popular also is fried rice (the leftover rice of the day before fried with salt and garlic) with fried egg and corned beef sautéed with onions. Sometimes small potato cubes are added. Children like also to eat rice with fried egg and hotdog before going to school.

For those who have some extra money, they will buy longanisa (a sweet version of chorizo) or tocino (pork meat cured with sugar). The meats are fried in oil and together with a fried egg, rice and some soy sauce. A luxury breakfast!


Note that the bulad, the corn beef, the hotdog, tocino or longaniza are not the star of the breakfast, a status reserved for the rice. It is common that adults eat 150 to 200 grams of cooked rice for breakfast. All the other breakfast elements are ‘side dishes’.

On rainy days champorado is also a favorite on the breakfast table. A rice porridge with tablea chocolate, a breakfast dish all kids, but also their mamas and papas, like much.

In the more urban centers there are Filipinos who are eating bread for breakfast too. The ‘national’ bread is pandasal (bread from salt) and is sold really early morning and eaten nearly straight out of the oven with coffee. But for people whom live in the countryside where there are no bakeshops, pandasal is not a regular breakfast option!

In the cities there are the fast-food giants such as McDonalds or Jollibee, the Filipino answer on American fast food. Both are offering their special breakfast menus. But also on these breakfast options you find the classics: longanisa, corned beef, hotdog all served with rice and egg. Most popular breakfast drink with these breakfast are coffee and hot cocoa. Next to the traditional dishes they offer also the Americanized breakfast like sandwiches with a patty and egg offered with hash brown and a hot drink. And don’t forget the pancakes with butter and a load of syrup!

And my breakfast on the island? 

Even after all those years rice is not really my thing for every day, surely not for breakfast. 

I stay with my toasted baguette with butter and coffee. 

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