6 Refrigerator Telltale Signs that You Live in a Filipino Home

Culture easily dictates and shows how varied it is when people treat anything around them. In this case, we’re checking on refrigerators and how Filipinos have some wacky things going on inside and around it. It may bring some sense of homesickness, but it also may bring some sense of belonging knowing that your family isn’t that only one that’s into Filipino refrigerator antics. Eager to find out what we’re talking about? Let’s start on with the list!

From the outside, you can easily tell it’s a Filipino fridge when it’s got souvenir magnets from local destinations.

Possibly, this is rooted in the Overseas Filipino Worker (OFW) culture of the Philippines, but it may be just that Filipinos like flexing that they have gone somewhere or that a relative has been to some neighboring or distant land. Filipinos love to travel and to remind them of the sights and attractions they have been to. With the range of choices to take home from the trip, refrigerator magnets are their choice of souvenir.

There’s a random clump of charcoal inside the refrigerator.

When you see a clump of charcoal in a Filipino household, you expect it to place somewhere in the garage hidden beside the makeshift grill. Local uling as their abstract shape and nature easily sets them apart and makes you easily identify it with local grilled snacks that usually consist of pig and chicken innards. Surprisingly, the same unaesthetic lump shows up inside your refrigerator, sitting at one corner in the most unfashionable way as possible. Your mom might put it there to “rid of strong smells” much like the typical lump of baking soda inside your homes’ microwave.

Fast food condiment packets are stored at a very accessible corner of the refrigerator. It can go as far as having a local dipping sauce supply!

Your refrigerator has a corner saved for every ketchup from every fast food in the Philippines. Every day you can access that corner and swap through the different ketchup offerings, and this makes you knowledgeable on what makes this fast food’s ketchup different from this other fast food’s ketchup. For more unusual flavor profiles, some families even take home those little repacks of spiced vinegar and soy sauce. Only goes to show how much Filipino’s value dipping sauces when eating and how thrifty they can get. It also highlights how Filipino culture values food no matter how small the serving, making sure every piece and drop counts, and nothing goes to waste.

You probably get confused a lot by food containers inside the fridge.

This has been a consistent Filipino meme for now, as a gallon of Double Dutch ice cream in the freezer usually has 3 tilapias inside rather than the cold treat you were yearning for. It’s hard to figure what’s inside especially that the container is not transparent. It’s the same with how spacious containers often sit inside the fridge despite it only being filled with less than a quarter of its original contents. Imagine seeing a box of cake inside the ref to serve your friends who came over only to find out that there’s 1 slice left but there’s 6 of you to share. And sometimes, the feeling is never the nicest, but you can head to a sari-sari store to get what you need.

Placing the cooking pot inside the refrigerator instead of transferring the ulam to a food container.

First and foremost, this is not katamaran. Having a microwave isn’t always the preferred mode of reheating food inside a Filipino household, especially that it’s super hard to get grease out of the tight corners of a plastic food container. This is why Filipinos would prefer to reheat over the stove, as it gives them more control over the heating and that they’re sure to get a more even distribution of heat to their meal. Most of the Filipino families decide to cool down the pot where the meal is cooked in. Then they stick it inside the refrigerator until it needs to be pulled out to be reheated once again. The funny thing about this is that sometimes, a family member would dare take out a shred of meat from that said pot, and it usually leaves a hole in the pot easily indicating something has been taken out. Then, no one can usually admit it.

Keeping lots of foods until it gets expired

The Filipino race has this culture of snacking that is pretty widespread, and you can easily see proof of this as most local streets are clad with an array of carts that offer a convenient and affordable snacking experienceSometimes things get too stacked and some food gets blocked from the line of sight. By the time you get the chance to snack on it, it sometimes may be way past its due date. One thing that truly stayed for refrigerators in the Filipino household is Condura. They offer quite a range of refrigerators depending on one’s needs, as they have ones small enough for a three-person family and one’s big enough for a seven-person family. Condura offers long-lasting inverter refrigerators at the best prices possible, making sure every Filipino family would be catered to in the best way possible. Just check out those adjustable runners that can easily let you fit that pot of bulalo that you’re keeping for now ‘til you need to reheat it for tomorrow’s supper! To know more, you can check out their website to look into what Condura has to offer for your household!