Bibingka & Puto Bumbong

Christmas is nearing and as early as now you can see Puto Bumbong and Bibingka being sold along the streets. These are the two favorites among Filipinos during Christmastime. If you gonna visit Philippines on September and onwards you will have a great chance to taste these two.

Ingredients for Bibingka includes rice flour, sugar, coconut cream, eggs, baking powder, grated cheese, butter, salted egg, fresh grated coconut and salt. Special Bibingka filled with more cheese and salted egg is being sold and really tasted great. I usually eat this during my visit in Manila.

Puto Bumbong is a purple-colored Filipino dessert made of sweet rice cooked in hollow bamboo tubes that are placed on a special steamer-cooker. When cooked, they are removed from the bamboo tubes, spread with butter and sprinkled with sugar and niyog (grated coconut). They are then wrapped in wilted banana leaves which keep them warm and moist until ready to be eaten. Like Bibingka, Puto Bumbong is inexorably linked with Simbang Gabi--the Catholic mass celebrated at dawn on the nine days preceding Christmas.