Filipino Spaghetti.

It’s a thing. It’s a sweet, sticky, saucy, even-sold-at-McDonald’s thing.

Much like the pancit from last week, this meal was served at almost every birthday party at the orphanage where I worked this last year, usually mushed together on kids’ plastic plates with heaping piles of steaming rice and some mixed vegetables. On this particular party day, Auntie Elvira and Auntie Puriza invited me into the kitchen and showed me how it’s done. Here’s the story, in pictures.

PS. Red hot dogs remain one of my unsolved mysteries about the Philippines.

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Here’s my full post on the Children’s Shelter of Cebu website. While you’re there, you can check out the special projects page to see if there’s a need that you and your family could meet, like providing a meal (maybe even spaghetti!) for an entire home of 30 children for $33.

These kids are so precious to us – thank you for getting excited about this series with me and loving them from across the ocean!

{Just so you know: Many people have commented on this use of banana catsup – a very sweet tasting catsup made from bananas, sugar, vinegar, etc. – as being necessary for authentic Filipino spaghetti. For this recipe, I am sharing what I was shown. These women are Filipinas, cooking for Filipinos, and they did not use banana catsup in their spaghetti. Comments that are negative or disrespectful towards them in any way because of this will not be tolerated.}