Shared Food, Shared Stories: Celebrating Filipino Culture at Bonson

Food has a special way of bringing people together – and at Bonson, our cultural food sharing days have become a great opportunity to learn more about the people and cultures that make up our team.

On 5 August, we once again gathered around the table, this time to celebrate Filipino culture through food, conversation and shared stories.

A growing part of the Bonson family

Today, 11 Filipino team members work across Bonson in a diverse range of roles, including Sales, Customer Service, R&D and Production, with packers working across both our day and night shifts.

Our longest-serving Filipino team member is Pol from the NZ Sales team, who joined Bonson in 2017 and has now been part of the business for nine years.

From early 2023, our Filipino team grew as more team members joined our Production team as packers, followed by Smyl in Customer Service and Justin in R&D.

There is also a great story behind how some of those connections have developed. Some team members were already friends prior to joining the company. After starting work at Bonson, they recommended the company to friends, who subsequently joined the team themselves. It’s a simple example of how our team has grown through personal connections and recommendations.

Sharing a taste of the Philippines

For this year’s Cultural Food Sharing Day, the team put together a selection of some of the Philippines’ most popular dishes, along with Filipino snacks and desserts. The dishes were deliberately chosen to give their Bonson colleagues an opportunity to experience some of the flavours of the Philippines and learn a little more about Filipino food culture.

And there was certainly one crowd favourite – the pork skewers proved particularly popular with the wider Bonson team!

In their own words: Pol, Justin and Smyl

We asked a few of our Filipino team members to share the dishes and traditions that mean the most to them – and why food plays such a central role in Filipino culture.

Pol, NZ Sales team

Pol’s dish of choice to introduce to colleagues is kinilaw – a traditional Filipino dish made from raw fish cured in coconut vinegar, never cooked with heat, and flavoured with ginger, shallots, chilli, salt and calamansi. Kinilaw is particularly associated with the Visayas and Mindanao regions, especially coastal areas where fresh seafood is abundant. For Pol, it’s also the dish that reminds him most of home.

On what sharing food represents in Filipino culture, Pol put it simply: “Sharing food is an integral part of our culture. It is a way of saying ‘you are welcome’, ‘you are part of us’.”

He also shared what it meant to watch colleagues take part in the day: “It is heartwarming to see colleagues enjoy the lunch as they get to experience a taste of Filipino culture. Food is the Filipino love language.”

Justin, R&D team

Justin’s pick for colleagues to try is Chicken Adobo – one of the Philippines’ most iconic dishes. Chicken is slowly cooked in soy sauce, vinegar, garlic, bay leaves and black pepper until tender and full of flavour. As Justin explains, it perfectly represents Filipino home cooking – simple ingredients transformed into something rich, savoury and delicious – and it’s a great introduction to Filipino cuisine because the flavours feel familiar while still being uniquely Filipino.

For Justin, the dish that most reminds him of home is taho – a warm Filipino street snack made with soft tofu, sweet arnibal (caramelised brown sugar syrup) and sago pearls. He recalls hearing the taho vendor in the mornings as a child and enjoying a cup with his family, memories that still bring him happiness today.

Justin also spoke about the importance of sharing food in Filipino culture: “Sharing food is a big part of Filipino culture. It’s our way of showing love, hospitality, and bringing family and friends together. There’s always enough food for everyone!”

The lunchroom itself carried a piece of home too. The team put up colourful banderitas (small flags), just as they would during a fiesta back in the Philippines – a community celebration filled with food, music and fun, where banderitas are traditionally one of the first decorations to go up. For Justin, seeing them strung up around the room brought back memories of home.

Looking back on the day, Justin said what he enjoyed most was watching colleagues try a variety of Filipino dishes and desserts – and even a few Filipino words. Colleagues were curious about which dish was the most “traditional,” and as Justin points out, the honest answer is that they all are – each one a food you’d commonly find at Filipino family gatherings and celebrations.

Smyl, Customer Service team

Smyl’s pick for the Bonson family to try is lechon – a whole roasted pig that symbolises abundance, prosperity and joy, and is often the centrepiece of Filipino celebrations. Having lechon at an occasion is a sign of deep hospitality, and for Smyl, it’s also a dish that reminds her of family back home.

For Smyl, sharing food is a trait every Filipino should carry: “Sharing food shows our hospitality and how we welcome guests to show their inclusion to our family. Sharing food shows our love and represents unconditional generosity and family unity.”

She also shared a tradition that shaped the day itself: before the team began eating, they said grace, thanking God and those who had prepared the dishes.

Looking back on the lunch, Smyl said seeing the wider Bonson team enjoy the food filled her heart with joy, and that it was a pleasure to share the day and spend time bonding with colleagues.

More than sharing a meal

At Bonson, these cultural days aren’t simply an excuse to enjoy some delicious food – although that’s certainly a bonus.

With people from many different cultural backgrounds working together across our business, they give us an opportunity to stop, connect and learn something new about the people we work alongside every day.

Food provides an easy way to start those conversations. A dish, snack or flavour can open up stories about home, family, celebrations and traditions that we might otherwise never hear.

Our Filipino Cultural Food Sharing Day was another chance to celebrate that diversity and recognise the contribution our Filipino colleagues make across Bonson.

A big salamat to everyone who organised the day, prepared and shared food, and helped give the wider Bonson team a taste of Filipino culture.

We look forward to seeing which culture – and which flavours – we will be discovering next!