Go to a Jolibee or a McDonald's in the Philippines, and they won't even bother to ask “do you want fries with that?” The staple of their diet, as with most of the Asia-Pacific region, is rice. Even in the diaspora, Filipino households keep it in bins, the kind that would otherwise hold potatoes. Sal buys her rice in twenty-five pound bags. She has never fixed a meal without it.
Filipino cuisine, for the most part, is influenced by the Spanish, and to a lesser extent, the Chinese. (They use this marinade for chicken that makes it almost taste like pork; I forget what it's called, but it's really yummy. Anyway ...) This tutorial also emphasizes the use of a fork and spoon for eating. I don't recall ever seeing Filipinos using chopsticks, even though many of them, including Sal, are at least part Chinese.
Sometimes, though, they eat rice with their fingers. Didn't see that one coming.
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