It's surprising to see Filipinos wanting to eat chicken and rice more often than fish and rice, considering we're surrounded by the China Sea. Nevertheless, I see fast-food places and restaurants serving chicken more than any other food items here in Olongapo City, Philippines.
I like chicken too!
Of course I like chicken. I'm an American and a white guy at that. I've been eating chicken served in a hundred different ways since before I can remember. It was home-cooked fried chicken before I joined the military in 1978 because the small town I grew up in didn't have any chicken places. We had no special chicken recipe. The chicken was dipped in flour, mixed with a pinch of salt and a little more pepper, and fried in a greasy skillet.
At my first military duty station, I tried the brand-new (at the time) chicken sandwich at a "Jack In The Box" in San Diego, California. It was like chomping down on a sawdust sandwich — almost flavorless. Well, they've improved tremendously since the early 80s.
In the late 80s and early 90s, while stationed in North Carolina, I and my family would make special trips from our rural home to the city in order buy spicy fried chicken at a place called "Bojangles". It was cheap and it was good and a box came with biscuits and a half gallon of sweet iced tea.
Later, after we'd moved to Phoenix, Arizona, we tried KFC a few times, but it always seemed undercooked — it was still called "Kentucky Fried Chicken" at the time.
One day we discovered "Banquet Hot & Spicy Chicken" at a local grocery store. It came in a box, with the chicken precooked. A couple of minutes in the microwave oven and a piece would be ready to join the rice in my plate. As the years progressed, it became harder and harder to get a box before they sold out at the local grocery stores. Finding it at other stores became an adventure in itself.
Chicken in the Philippines
If chicken isn't a delicacy here in the Philippines, then I don't know the meaning of the word. The local KFC is always crowded and chicken seems to be on the menu at EVERY restaurant and fast-food joint in the city. I think we can blame Jollibee for making it popular. Oh, and it's almost always served as chicken and rice.
I know one thing for sure. When I go to KFC and return with any leftover chicken I want to save for later, I have to sneak it into my house. Otherwise, relatives pop out of the woodwork and start begging for a piece, even if they just ate!
I can't find chicken in a box, like the Banquet chicken in the US, so I either have to buy it at a fast-food place or cook it myself. I really hate to cook. I really love chicken and rice though, and if I have to cook in order to eat it, then so be it.
