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Fish and seafood from Philippines

Burong isdaburong isda

Salted pieces of freshwater fish are mixed with plenty of cooled cooked rice, packed into a sealed jar and left for about a week. Lactic bacteria ferment the rice, and the mix turns sour, falling below pH 4.0.

Fully documentedFish and seafood7 days

Recipe

Burong isda, a photo from Wikimedia Commons
Photo: Judgefloro, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons
Amounts from a sourceA 750 g case-study batch from Bicol (Cabal et al. 2024), with rice and fish at 65 to 35. A lab burong bangus used 29 % milkfish, 69 % rice and 2 % rock salt; household recipes vary.
Fish, cleaned and sliced (tilapia in this recipe)35 parts by weight[cabal2024]
Cooked rice, cooked the day before and cooled65 parts by weight[cabal2024]
Salt10 % of the total mix75 g in a 750 g batch, split between the fish (50 g) and the rice (25 g)[cabal2024]

Total time across the recorded steps: 7 days

Start
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What changes: The fish is washed, cleaned and cut into slices

Step 1 of 4
Clean and slice the fish
Time
Not documented
Temperature
Not documented
Salt
None given
Acidity
Not documented
Which microbes the steps name, step by step
Lactic acid bacteria

Output: fish slices or fillets.

Flavour
Not documented
Texture
Not documented
Colour
Not documented

Microbes at work in this step

Not documented for this step.

Method

Measured measured in a studySet fixed by a specification or tested recipeReported one source reports itTypical a general value, not sourced for this fermentUnconfirmed not yet checked against a source

At a glance

Salted pieces of freshwater fish are mixed with plenty of cooled cooked rice, packed into a sealed jar and left for about a week. Lactic bacteria ferment the rice, and the mix turns sour, falling below pH 4.0. Made in 4 steps over 7 days. The longest step, pack into a sealed jar and ferment, takes 7 days (Orillo C.A. and Pederson C.S. 1968) and runs at 26–29 °C (Cabal M.S 2024). Salt is 2–10 % (Cabal M.S 2024). Leuconostoc mesenteroides, Pediococcus cerevisiae and Lactobacillus plantarum and Streptococcus first, then Leuconostoc and Lactobacillus from day 3, with Lactobacillus dominant at the end do most of the fermenting.

Key numbers
Main step7 daysMeasured[orillo1968]Pack into a sealed jar and ferment
Temperature26–29 °CMeasured[cabal2024]Pack into a sealed jar and ferment
Salt2–10 %Reported[cabal2024][arcales2018]Salt the fish
AciditypH up to 4Measured[orillo1968]Pack into a sealed jar and ferment

What makes this one different

Burong isda uses much more rice than fish and less salt, so it is a quick lactic ferment that turns sour in a week. Bagoong and patis are salted at about 15–20 % and are not soured by rice.

Related ferments

Variants

  • Red burong isdaAngkak (red yeast rice) is added, which makes the dish red (Wikipedia).
  • White burong isda (western Central Luzon)Made without angkak, so it is white (Wikipedia).
  • Burong bangusMade with milkfish.
  • Hingmay and kuyog (Bicol)Similar fish ferments of Bicol; kuyog uses small rabbitfish and ginger.

Safety

Burong dalag fell below pH 4.0 within a week in a 1968 study, under the pH 4.6 limit the FDA gives for growth of Clostridium botulinum, but it must be kept covered or yeasts and moulds grow. Until the mix has soured, the fish has no acid barrier. A lab recipe uses 2 % salt, well under the FDA's 10 % water-phase salt limit for growth of Clostridium botulinum type A (5 % for type E, which FDA calls the most common form in fresh and sea water), and the covered jar keeps out air at room temperature. We found no study that tested burong isda for the toxin, which you cannot see, smell or taste. Throw out any batch that a pH meter does not show below pH 4.6. No source we read says a low final pH rules out toxin formed before the mix soured, and CDC says not to eat food if you do not know whether it was safely fermented. A Bicol case-study batch at 10 % salt had an aerobic plate count of 2.1 × 10^7 CFU/g, above the 5 × 10^5 CFU/g guideline of the Philippine FDA, with E. coli under 25 CFU/g. Clean fish, clean jars and enough salt matter. The fish is not cooked in this process. FDA says brining and pickling do not eliminate parasites in fish, and that fish raised in fresh water may carry flukes, so cook burong isda through before eating it. That advice is for the parasites, not the toxin.

History and sources

Every number is labelled with how it is known. How this atlas is made

History
The sources we found do not record its history.
Starter
The sources we found do not say how its fermentation begins.
  1. [orillo1968] Orillo C.A. and Pederson C.S. 1968, Lactic acid bacterial fermentation of burong dalag, Appl. Microbiol. 16(11):1669–1671, doi:10.1128/am.16.11.1669-1671.1968 (abstract)paper
  2. [olympia1994] Olympia M.S.D., Ono H., Shinmyo A., Takano M. 1994, Lactic acid bacteria in a fermented fishery product, burong bangus, U.P. Research Digest 1(2):368–369 (AGRIS summary)paper
  3. [arcales2018] Arcales J.A.A. and Alolod G.A.L. 2018, Isolation and characterization of lactic acid bacteria in Philippine fermented milkfish Chanos chanos-rice mixture (burong bangus), Curr. Res. Nutr. Food Sci. 6(2), doi:10.12944/CRNFSJ.6.2.24paper
  4. [cabal2024] Cabal M.S., De Vera F., Tadeo D. et al. 2024, Burong tilapia, factors on the fermentation process and its microbiota, Samota J. Biol. Sci. 3(2):1–8paper
  5. [up2026] UP Office of the Vice President for Academic Affairs 2026, Burong isda has probiotic potential (on Veluz et al. 2025, doi:10.1016/j.microb.2025.100334)web
  6. [fda-app4] US FDA 2011, Fish and Fishery Products Hazards and Controls Guidance, 4th ed., Appendix 4, Bacterial pathogen growth and inactivation, Table A-1gov
  7. [s1] Wikipedia, Burong isda (red and white variants)wiki
  8. [cdc-botulism] US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Botulism Prevention (updated 26 February 2026)gov
  9. [fda-hazards-2022] US FDA 2022, Fish and Fishery Products Hazards and Controls Guidance, June 2022 edition, Chapter 5, Parasitesgov