Baking in the Philippines

As baking was growing all over and was very common in Europe and America during the 16th-17th century, it was not common in the Philippines. There was never as much baking going on in the Philippines and there still isn’t too much compared to Europe and America, going on today. We believe that the idea of baking in the Philippines did not come until around the 17th century. One reason that there was never really any baking done in the Philippines in the early days was because they did not have flour or most of the necessary ingredients to bake with, so there was never a thought to bake. As we can not say for a fact, some people suggest that a few Spanish Missionaries came to the Philippines and started baking. And that they were the ones that brought the idea of baking to the Philippines, but we are not a hundred percent positive that they were.

Filipinos started to try and bake bread and bake things after the idea came to them from the Spanish missionaries. When they were baking with the ingredients that they did had, they were not successful at it. They knew they needed something that would be able to hold most of the ingredients together and to make it a thicker consistency in their dough. They figured out that they needed flour because that was what the Spanish Missionaries were using whenever they baked. These Spanish missionaries were bringing their flour from other countries. They were not able to get the flour that they needed because there was not a flour mill in their country at the time. As they were wanting to make bread and they didn’t have any flour they started to buy flour from the United States of America.

They were buying wheat flour from America because it was the cheapest type of flour, and that they could afford it in a larger quantity than only a little bit of white flour for the same price. They also liked using wheat flour because it was also the healthiest type of flour to bake bread with. Baking wheat bread started to become more and more popular, and the Filipinos were wanting to be able to buy flour from their own country but were not able too because there was no flour mill. It was until around 1958 that the first flour mill in the Philippines was made. In 1976 there were about 8 flour mills that were established in the Philippines.

   Baking bread started growing crazily, compared to what it was before, around the country after the flour mills were built. Even though they loved the wheat bread and were very happy with it, now that they were able to have a mill in their country they started using white flour and were baking white bread now. Bread was the most popular item that was being baked in the Philippines. One of the most popular bread that was baked in the Philippines was the pandesal. The pandesal bread is a type of bread that is kind of like a biscuit. In the early days of the baking of the pandesal, it was originally hard and crunchy. But throughout the years of baking, it has become more soft and crumbly with a little crunch to it. It is usually eaten in the mornings as a breakfast item. It is used with jam, eggs, meat, or butter on it or added in the middle of it like a sandwich.

   

      Even though baking bread was more common in the Philippines back in the day they also baked some good pastry type desserts.  Puto Seko is one of the Filipino's favorite baked treat. It is a light, airy, buttery pastry. Puto Seko’s have been around for a  long time. They are similar to a soft sweet rice cake, they have a little bit of a crunch to them at first but then they are soft in the middle/inside of it. The Filipino’s often prefer to eat the Puto Seko’s dipped in their coffee or hot chocolate, and they sometimes eat them plain as well. Another treat that the Filipinos love is the Leche Flan, it is like a custard patty that has caramel drizzled over the top of it. They got the idea of this desert from the European dessert called “Creme Custard,” which was and still is known all around the world and is very popular in Europe and is popular in the Philippines as well.