Starting a small food business at your own home is proven to be a worthy endeavor in the Philippines given how much Filipinos love food in general. Selling desserts and meryenda foods can become a lucrative business if you played your cards right. And with the right Filipino recipes that will sure to hit right with the customers, you’re guaranteed to make a steady living that’ll help support yourself and your family.
There are many rags to riches stories in the Philippines that started out selling simple Filipino recipes for a small profit and expanded their brand to become a household name. The best example is the beloved fast-food corporation, Jollibee. From reselling ice cream and expanding their business to selling hot meals and sandwiches, they’ve seen expanded their line of products and became the beloved Filipino fast-food chain we know today.
You can start with something simple because success stories like that don’t happen overnight. It’s all about having great business sense and great recipes that are a hit to the Filipino taste.
So if you want to start your own small business, here’s a list of the best Filipino recipes for a thriving business.
1 Turon
Turon is a relatively easy recipe to follow that requires minimal preparation and only a handful of ingredients. You’ll only need ripe plantains sliced vertically into half. The most common ones used are saba or Cardaba bananas. Dust it with brown sugar then roll it into a spring roll wrapper. Create as many banana rolls as you want and have it deep-fried. That’s how you prepare the delicious afternoon snack called turon.
The ingredients are not at all that expensive and you could easily sell these deep-fried goodies outside your house. The entire neighborhood will come to seek out your delicious turon in no time.
See also: Espesyal Turon
2. Pastillas
Children love this next one. Pastillas is an authentic Filipino confectionery originated in the town of San Miguel, Bulacan. This milk candy was originally made using carabao milk by farmers but cow milk and store-bought milk and condensed milk can be used as a substitute.
You just need to combine the store-bought milk with the condensed milk, add some sugar to sweeten. Half freeze the mixture until it’s moldable and just take scoops of the milky mixture and mold it into bite-sized pieces. You’ll need a paper wrapper to put the finished product in then you can sell it to the neighborhood.
See also: Ube Pastillas Recipe and Cheese Pastillas Recipe
3. Polvoron
Similar to pastillas, polvoron is a beloved milky confectionery you can find being sold anywhere. It’s a great pasalubong to your loved ones when you’re out of town. You’ll often see this sweet milky confectionery available in pasalubong centers or bus vendors selling handfuls of polvoron to passengers.
That doesn’t mean you only have to sell it to travelers though because many Filipinos will take any chance they can get to have a grab of these delicious confectioneries. You’ll need a mixture of powdered milk, flour, butter (or margarine), and sugar to create polvoron. Your neighbors will appreciate it and come knocking on your doorsteps, especially the neighborhood children.
See also: Milo Polvoron Recipe
4. Halo-halo
Halo-halo is inspired by the flavored shaved ice the Japanese introduced to the Philippines but it’s entirely on a different level. It’s a great investment to sell halo-halo in the Philippines especially because of the refreshment it can bring due to the hot and humid weather.
Along with the copious amounts of ice, milk, and sugar, halo-halo has a multitude amount of affordable ingredients that may seem weird on its own, but when combined create the refreshing delicious flavor that only halo-halo can provide. A lot of households experiment and put whatever ingredient they can think of on their halo-halo but it always turns out refreshingly delicious and colorful.
See also: Fresh Fruit Halo-halo Recipe
5. Yema
Here’s another confectionery that children can never get enough of. Yema is this delicious ball of candy wrapped in a cellophane wrapper that never fails to make a child’s face light up when given to them as a treat. It’s also very easy to prepare with minimal and inexpensive ingredients. Of course, you can also go all out and experiment with your yema product to boost the flavor.
The cooking process is quite easy as well. You’ll need simple ingredients like egg yolk, sugar, condensed milk, and a flavoring of your choice. The most common ones are tea and coffee. Mix all the ingredients in a pot and bring to a boil. Then reduce it until you can form it into a ball. Once cool, you can then form individual yema balls and put them in a wrapper to sell.
See also: Easy Yema Cake Recipe
6. Leche Flan
The Filipino version of leche flan is much sweeter and thick than the Mexican leche flan and for good reason. Leche flan is a popular dessert all year round but especially for special occasions like Christmas or New Year’s feasts, and even just the occasional fiestas.
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Needless to say, Filipinos are always on the lookout to buy this delicious dessert whenever it’s available in the store. They even commission eateries to have leche flan made for their celebration. No fiestas will be complete without this sweet dessert.
See also: Banana Leche Flan Recipe
7. Peanut Butter
No Filipino kitchen is complete without a jar of peanut butter in their cupboard or on the kitchen table. Filipinos love to fill their pandesal with peanut butter in the morning and are always refilling their supply whenever a jar’s about to run out. Most Filipinos buy their peanut butter at the local market but you can easily make your batch at home and sell it to your neighbors.
All you’ll need is a kilo’s worth of peanuts and roast it in a deep pan or yok. Once the outer layers are roasted and the peanuts are cooled, mix in honey and vegetable oil and pour them all together in a food processor and blend it all together until the consistency is smooth. Now you have a batch of your own peanut butter to sell or use.
See also: Peanut Butter Candy Recipe
Read further: Top Health Benefits of Peanuts
8. Mango Float
This delicious creamy refreshing sweet dessert is always a welcome sight on the kitchen table whenever there’s a feast for celebrations, especially during the holiday season. Mango float is a dessert with layers full of deliciousness. The ingredients are minimal and simple to prepare but can be time-consuming, especially if you’re preparing several containers of it.
You’ll need fresh mangoes, a mixture of evaporated and condensed milk, and graham crackers. Layer the graham crackers and the slices of mangos in a container with the milk mixture always in between. Once the container’s full of the delicious concoction, freeze it overnight to create the mouthwatering mango float.
Sell it by the slices or by the container, it’s always going to be sold out by the end of the day.
Read further: Different Recipes for Graham Crackers
9. Siomai
This next recipe is actually a traditional Chinese dumpling adapted in the Philippines where different versions of siomai are created in different areas of the country. Filipinos love this bite-sized treat and eat it as a snack or as a meal of its own complete with a plate full of rice.
This is a great recipe to create a small business with. Siomai is basically ground meat (usually pork or beef) wrapped in wonton wrappers then steamed. It has a long shelf life so you can put batches of it in your freezer and recook when there’s a buyer.
10. Coffee Jelly
Coffee Jelly is a recently popularized dessert in the Philippines that’s a hit to students and day workers. The coffee is balanced by the sweetness of the creamy milk and gelatine perfect for the Filipino palate.
This sweet creamy refreshment is perfect to sell in the summer and for the hot climate in the Philippines, that’s literally every day. It’s relatively easy to make and quite light on the pockets with its ingredients making it an ideal recipe to start a business with.
11. Cassava Cake
The sweet and filling cassava cake is a popular afternoon snack amongst Filipinos. This sweet rice cake delicacy or kakanin is commonly sold all year but especially during the holiday seasons in the market place. But you can cook your own cassava at home and have a supply available for buyers because it will surely attract the sweet tooth customers out there.
Cassava is this delicious kakanin which means that it’s ingredients are quite easy to find and inexpensive as well. Some of it you can even find in your kitchen so preparing the rice cake is, well, a piece of cake. Sell it by slices or by containers, your customers will always ask for more.
See also: Steamed Cassava Cake Recipe
12. Biko
Another favorite sweet rice delicacy or kakanin, Biko is a popular one to make especially for special occasions where a feast is warranted. But it’s also a very popular afternoon snack as well because of its sweet delicious taste, you’ll easily feel full with just a few bites.
Just like the cassava cake, the ingredients for biko will not leave your wallet high and dry. You’ll just need simple glutinous rice, coconut milk, latik, pandan, and some ginger, most of which you can already find in your kitchen. The process of cooking biko can take quite long though but the finished product will be all worth it when the slices are sold out.
Read further: Top 12 Best Filipino Kakanin Recipes
13. Kwek-kwek, Kikiam, and Fishballs
These series of recipes are extremely popular street food anywhere you go in the Philippines. The ingredients are quite cheap to buy and the individual flavors of the recipe compliment each other so it’s quite rare to see a stall selling on one of the recipes listed above. Kwel-kwek, kikiam, and fishballs are a student’s favorite afternoon snack and even workers going home after a day at the office.
All of the foods are deep-fried so you’ll need a deep yok or pan to do just that. Rent a stall near a school or you can do it at your home too. Kwek-kwek, kikiam, and fishballs are always guaranteed to be sold out when the afternoon hits.
14. Pork Barbeque
If you’re already familiar with the other contents of this website by this point, then you already know how much Filipinos love their pork barbeque with its sweet barbeque sauce.
Grilling the skewered pork outside your home can be the start of a lucrative business. The smoke emitted by the flames will entice people passing by to grab a taste of what you’re cooking. This is a common technique by eateries to entice customers to come inside their establishment and it works every single time.
15. Puto Pao
The next recipe on this list is a variation of the popular kakanin puto. Puto pao is can be considered a combination of puto and another snack called siopao, a smooth fluffy bread filled with various meats and a slice of boiled egg. The same concept is done with puto pao except instead of the dough being filled with the various meats, the kakanin puto is substituted.
This proved to be a big hit for Filipinos and wherever there’s puto pao available in any store, it’s always guaranteed to sell out at the end of the day. It’s relatively easy to prepare and
See also: Banana Puto Recipe
16. Pancit Canton
And the final Filipino recipe on this list is pancit canton. There are loads of instant pancit canton being sold in the market so cooking homemade pancit canton to sell could make a great profit, especially since it’s a popular food to eat during the afternoon or meryenda.
Filipinos will seek out the delicious smell of freshly cooked pancit canton and order it by the plate every day. Some people even order pancit canton by the platter for celebrations and fiestas. This can also be a great recipe to sell in your carinderia.
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