Product Feature: Kyuree

Ginger has numerous known benefits. It adds a particular spice to your cooking and drinks. Based on the 2020 study “Ginger on Human Health: A Comprehensive Systematic Review of 109 Randomized Controlled Trials” published in Nutrients journal, it also improves cardiovascular and digestive functions, eases nausea, reduces inflammation, among many others. In the Philippines, ginger is famous for such therapeutic effects, but its international potential is still untested. Enter Kyuree. 

Kyuree is a subsidiary of Cavite-based Delfa’s Food Products Inc., which Adelfa Nuestro founded in 2007. Nuestro used her mother’s recipes to develop and sell traditional ginger tea or salabat. Fueled by her success, she experimented by adding more ingredients, making a 5-in-1 to a 7-in-1. By 2007, a zippy 12-in-1 ginger-turmeric drink superseded her pilot product. It would become the framework for Kyuree, an export-ready, fermented version of Delfa’s bestseller. 

“The fermentation made the flavor more subtle,” says Delfa’s current CEO Isabel Punzalan, who is Nuestra's daughter. “Filipinos are used to the bold taste of ginger, but foreigners are not, which is why we created this milder version," she adds.

Thanks to Punzalan’s more aggressive marketing tactics, Delfa’s has been available on the international market—including Amazon—for several years now. However, she hopes that Kyuree could take their brand further, especially now that turmeric is quickly developing a reputation as a health booster. Based on the 2017 research “Curcumin: A Review of Its’ Effects on Human Health” on Foods journal, this ginger-like spice is high in antioxidants and is anti-inflammatory. It has helped patients with metabolic syndromes, arthritis, hyperlipidemia, among other discomforts. 

Kyuree is still in the testing phase, but Punzalan says several of Delfa’s 12-in-1 ginger-turmeric drink customers have attested to its health benefits. “They said it helps with their pain, arthritis, uric acid, cholesterol. They would show us laboratory and blood chemistry test results. They would show us ultrasound images of crystals clearing up,” she shares. 

Nuestra had been attending DTI and CITEM's seminars since the advent of her business, so when the organization began looking for participants for their Value Food Innovation Program (VFIP), Punzalan was quick to suit up. It was a chance to improve her beverages—including their packaging, which would be conceptualized by the Design Center of the Philippines. The flavors were there; they just needed a little polish. 

Punzalan has been in charge of Delfa’s—and now Kyuree—since 2012 and while she has expanded the business leaps and bounds, she knows there's a bigger stage for ginger and turmeric.