Filipino recipes
Easy Filipino Recipes: Adobo, Pancit, Lumpia and Leche Flan
Filipino cooking mixes Malay roots with Chinese and Spanish influences, and you can taste all three on the table. Garlic, soy sauce, vinegar and a sweet-salty balance run through the savoury dishes, from chicken adobo braised with bay leaves and black pepper to noodles and spring rolls, while canned milk and caramel define the desserts. Pancit, lumpia and leche flan turn up at nearly every birthday, holiday and family gathering.
These recipes use everyday supermarket ingredients such as soy sauce, vinegar, chicken, ground pork, rice vermicelli and canned evaporated and condensed milk. Where a dish calls for something specialist, like calamansi, cane vinegar, lumpia wrappers or a llanera tin, the recipe gives an easy substitute. Lumpia freeze before frying, leche flan can be made the day before, and adobo tastes even better the next day, so they suit a crowd as well as a weeknight.
4 recipes · Updated
Quick answer
Savour's Filipino recipes include pancit bihon, rice noodles with chicken and vegetables cooked in one wok in 40 minutes, and lumpia shanghai, crispy pork spring rolls that take 65 minutes including rolling. Chicken adobo, braised in soy sauce, vinegar and garlic, takes 90 minutes including 30 minutes of marinating. Leche flan, a dense caramel custard, takes 5 hours 45 minutes, mostly cooling and chilling, so make it ahead.
- Recipes
- 4
- Average total time
- 2 hrs 15 mins
- Quickest
- Pancit Bihon (Filipino Rice Noodles with Chicken) (40 mins)
- Rated Easy
- 2 of 4
- Average calories
- 406 per serving
- Newest
- Pancit Bihon (Filipino Rice Noodles with Chicken)
All Filipino Recipes (4)
Frequently Asked Questions
What pantry staples do I need for Filipino cooking?
Keep soy sauce, white or cane vinegar, fish sauce, oyster sauce, black pepper, bay leaves, plenty of garlic and onions, thin rice vermicelli, and cans of evaporated and sweetened condensed milk. Chicken adobo is seasoned mainly with soy sauce, vinegar, garlic, bay leaves and black peppercorns. Calamansi or lemons are used to finish noodles and dipping sauces.
What can I use instead of calamansi or cane vinegar?
Calamansi is a small, very sour citrus. Lemon is the closest easy substitute, and lime works too; for dipping sauces, lime juice with a splash of orange juice gets you nearer to its flavour. Filipino cane vinegar gives adobo a clean, mild tang, and white distilled vinegar is the most common substitute. Rice vinegar works too.
Which Filipino recipe should I make first?
Start with pancit bihon or chicken adobo. Pancit cooks in one wok in 40 minutes with everyday ingredients and reheats well for lunches. Adobo needs only a few pantry staples and simmers gently, covered, for most of its cooking time. Make lumpia shanghai when you are cooking for a crowd, and leche flan the day before a celebration.
Can I make Filipino food ahead?
Yes. Freeze uncooked lumpia for up to 3 months and fry them from frozen. Leche flan needs at least 4 hours in the fridge and keeps for up to 5 days. Chicken adobo keeps for up to 4 days in the fridge or 3 months in the freezer, and many people think it tastes best the day after it is made. Pancit keeps for up to 4 days and reheats with a splash of stock.