Steam buns are quite popular here in the Philippines, because it is tasty and nutritious. They are consumed as breakfast together with congee or noodles, or during mid-day snack together with tea or cola. It is commonly sold in the street and in convenience store. When comparing to the Chinese baozi, siaopaos dough here are high sugar and usually include some fat, close in tradition to neighbouring Guang-dong.

In the Philippines, the most popular filling would be the asado, which is pork stuffing with sauce, as well as be bola-bola, which is ground pork. Other popular items include spicy asado and vegetarian pao. Pao are also available with sweet fillings, although they do not represent as many as savoury fillings, they include red bean pao, ube pao (purple yam), and mung bean pao are also available in the market. Though pao is considered as staple, the market is innovative, and we have seen new product development including pizza pao, or asado with bola-bola two filling in one pao.

Siaopao market enjoys a good growth, and some successful clients of ours have grown into an industrial producer in the Philippines. For instance, one client, originally had 40-50 employees, wrapping 10,000 to 20,000 pao a day. Now, with our machines and following business development, they are now producing 100,000 to 120,000 pao a day.

As for other fermented dough products, a good siaopao is produced with the right control of temperature, the finished product is expected to be of white color, and consumers enjoy the skin (i.e. the dough part) to be sweet. They like the meat filling to be chunky.