Semiserious Chefs

In the short, Lumpia is the Filipino version of pork egg rolls.

The beautiful orange interior comes from the addition of atsuete/annatto.

The cuisine of the Philippines is actually quite an intriguing one. Obviously they are an Asian nation, and they have an abundant supply of such fresh ingredients as rice, bananas, citrus, fish, and other uniquely Asian fruits and vegetables, but they have also had some major influences from outside.

The Philippines, who were ‘originally’ Asian, became a Spanish colony in 1521. In fact, they were actually the colony of a colony. The Spanish colonial reign over the Aztecs where their governing body. So here we add the the influences of Central American cuisine, as well as the obvious influences that the Spanish brought to Central America. Then, even farther back, we can see the influence of the Moorish people on the Spanish culture. Now, skip forward, and the US takes control in 1898. This explains the very American spelling of ‘Filipino,’ among other things.

In reality this is the exact story of all of our world, but some places show it more obviously in the face… for instance the literal faces of the Asian and Mayan descendant Filipinos.

Lumpia brings the common ground pork, soy sauce, ginger, and fried wrapper concept from neighboring cultures, but their common use of atsuete, shows their obvious tie to South America. Here I have used ground annatto, but Filipino cuisine more commonly uses atsuete oil; oil warmed and infused with whole annatto seeds.