By Gabriela Baron
Four Filipino dishes have made it to food encyclopedia Food Atlas’ “Top 100 Worst Dishes in the World” list, including hotsilog (hotdog, sinangag, and itlog) and kinalas.
Taste Atlas released the list on Saturday, Feb. 4, where Bicol’s kinalas placed 17th with a rating of 2.4 and hostilog in 36th palce with a 2.6. rating.
Often garnished with spring onions, fried garlic, or chili peppers, kinalas is made with a combination of noodles, spices, pork or beef brains, and scraped meat from pork or beef head.
The term kinalas came from the Bicolano world “kalas,” which means to remove the meat from the bones.
Traditionally served for breakfast, hotsilog typically consists of garlic fried rice, fried eggs, and hot dogs.
Meanwhile, balut (duck egg), a popular Filipino delicacy, received a 2.8 rating.
According to Taste Atlas, balut is “served everywhere from street stalls to upscale restaurants.”
“It is considered an aphrodisiac that is commonly paired with a cold beer on the side,” it wrote.
“Although balut is closely associated with Filipino cuisine and has achieved popularity throughout the world, it is still considered a poor man’s meal in the Philippines,” it added.
Filipino spaghetti, on the other hand, received a 3.5 rating.
Unlike the Italian version, Filipino spaghetti is sweet, combining the noodles with ground meat, hot dogs, banana ketchup, and sugar.
“It is believed that the dish was invented by Filipino mothers who noticed that their children love sugar, so they put a spin on the classic spaghetti dishes,” the food and travel guide website wrote.
Recently, bibingka was included in Taste Atlas’ “Best Cakes in the World” list, ranking 16th with a rating of 4.4 stars.
