Filipino food is one of the most disliked national cuisines in the world

Filipino food
A psychedelic serving of halo-halo, one of the unique features of Filipino food that somehow doesn’t appeal to people outside of the islands.

Filipino food has been voted one of the world’s least favourite national cuisines by participants in an international opinion poll.

According to YouGov, 25,000 people in 24 countries that participated in its study said they did not like Filipino food.

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Filipino cuisine has an average popularity around the world of 36 per cent, placing it fourth from the bottom of the 34 national cuisines included in the study.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, Filipino food was enjoyed by 96 per cent of Filipinos. The nation’s next favourite cuisine was American, which polled 93 per cent. At the other end of the scale, only 40 per cent of Filipinos approve of Lebanese food.

Australian fans of Filipino food

Internationally, Filipino food was most popular among Australians, with 56 per cent expressing approval. At the other end of the scale were the Japanese, with only 21 per cent saying they enjoyed the nation’s cuisine. 

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Despite this apparent snub from most other nations, YouGov’s lead data journalist Matthew Smith said that Filipinos were the most avid consumers of food from other countries.

“By contrast, it’s Filipinos who are the most likely to appreciate international cuisine,” he said.

“An average of 67 per cent of Filipinos who had tried any given cuisine said they liked it, with only five types of food being liked by fewer than half.”

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The study concluded that Italian food was the world’s favourite, with an average popularity score of 84 per cent across the 24 nations. This was followed by Chinese food, which is enjoyed by an average of 78 per cent of people surveyed.

Top 10 national cuisines: 

Italian

Chinese 

Japanese

Thai

French

Spanish

American

Mexican

Indian

Turkish

Bottom five national cuisines:

Norwegian

Filipino

Saudi Arabian

Finnish

Peruvian

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