paella like no other

Casa Armas is it.

bf & i are regulars at their malate branch.  i love their paella valenciana. the rice is cooked just right, you get nice portions of meat and seafood, and the tomato sauce gives the dish that perfect flavor - although i always ask them to make our paella extra saucy. yummm.

bf loves the oreja. it's pig ears fried to a crisp.  he says its delish. i just take his word for it.

we also love their chorizo frito, croquettas and lobsters thermidore. their cochinillo is tender and juicy and the chicken iberico is absolutely divine. although you have to order the last two at least a day in advance.

in an attempt to be fair, bf & i tried other spanish resto's but none of them has come close to Casa Armas. believe me, if your craving for spanish food. there's no where else to go but Casa Armas.  if you don't believe me, try it yourself. 

btw, their malate branch is the best. jupiter is second. i heard they have an alabang branch but we haven't gone there yet. i think i already know where dinner will be tonight :D

zucchini's - it's not just a vegetable

we've passed this restaurant so many times before, when it used to be located along timog avenue, and i know i've always wanted to try it but somehow we always skipped it. around early december of last year, james and i noticed that they had transferred to a bigger place but it was no longer along timog avenue. the look of their new place seemed more inviting so we finally decided to go. WE SHOULD'VE GONE SOONER.

it is, undoubtedly, one of the best restaurants in manila! the service is great, the food is delicious, and the ambiance is just perfect. when my brother called asking where he could take his wife for a cozy, romantic birthday dinner but they didn't want to go to a hotel, i told him zucchini's would be perfect. true enough, i got a text from him while they were having dinner saying "this place rocks!"

the price? if you're going for the full course dinner for two - soup or salad, entree, dessert, coffee, plus a bottle of wine - be prepared to shell out at least five thousand bucks. but believe me, it's worth it! i love the lamb, james always orders the steak but just so you know how great this place is, go there and check the menu out yourself.

a taste of cebu

just spent five days in cebu, queen city of the south, to attend a seminar. i wasn't able to go out, especially to eat in as many restaurants as i wanted to but here's what i learned about cebu's flavors. in the hotel where they held the seminar, they served us what they called "mandaue" bibingka because its original recipe came from mandaue city. immediately i caught a whiff of coconut. not good. i am not a coconut fan because of what it does to my tummy. i do not want to explain, thank you very much. but still i tried it. it was so dry and flavorless. i mentally added it to my yuck-never-again list. tuesday night, i went to my godsister, Georgia's, restaurant "Cafe Georg" in Banilad. I will be the first to tell you if it's awful, believe me. i had their mushroom soup... nothing spectacular. my main course was the beef lasagna. yummy. the thick slathering of bechamel and cheese on top was just heaven. they didn't scrimp on the beef and tomato sauce either. for dessert, i had mango tart. That was the best part of my dinner. IT WAS DEeeeeLISH!!!! next night, georgia took me to a restaurant called "chika-an sa cebu"... lots'a people. i found out later that you had to have a reservation coz it's always jam packed. out of everything georgia ordered, the best was their sisig. it was nothing like i've ever tasted. for dessert, georgia said i had to try the mandaue bibingka. uh-oh. but not wanting to be rude, i swallowed hard and took my first bite. heyyy... not bad. this was not flavorless at all. it tasted more like ground rice bibingka with just a hint of coconut, not coconut in your face taste. they added cheese on top which, i think, made it even better. mandaue bibingka is now on my for reconsideration list. thursday night, our office's local boss took us out to dinner at this place called neo-neo. again, it was their sisig i loved. an all together different way of cooking but it worked. contrary to the usual, this sisig was sizzling in its own sauce. no egg, no mayo, just it's own flavors to carry it through. sadly, i was not able to eat the famous cebu lechon. i found out a bit too late that just a few meters away from our restaurant was CnT lechon, one of the best cebu lechon roasters in town. before going home, i knew i had to buy pasalubong. so off to shamrock i went for the best otap. another brand of otap is sugbu, just as yummy but not as expensive. lastly, i just had to buy dried mango. for this, there's no where else to go but R&M's. internationally acclaimed and competitively priced. cebu wouldn't be cebu were it not for its dried mangoes. bottom line, i will return to cebu to eat cebu lechon! hear that, james?

doing it all over again

last year, i took the time and made the effort to type all the recipes i could remember in my office computer with side comments, hints and all. recipes my mother made me learn, recipes my grandmother reluctantly gave, recipes i discovered on my own in an effort to come up with a meal in 15 minutes flat and recipes i saw on tv which i kind'a tweak to suit my own taste.
sadly, they're all gone. BURNED. to the ground. in the office fire.
i promise myself that i will do it all over again. i will try to remember each and every recipe i wrote. aside from it being fun, i guess it's because i want to leave a little something for my future grandkids. hell, if they're my grandkids they had all better know how to cook.

what happened to italianni's

saturday night. the burning question was "where do we eat?" i smiled ever so cutely at James and said Italianni's. yes! he agreed. so off we went to Italianni's greenhills. the first thing we noticed was the new and supposedly improved menu.
hhmmm... new dishes. okay.
hhmmm... new prices. a little higher than before but still okay.
hhmmm... HORRORS! They no longer serve Coke!! They changed to... Pepsi!!!

WWWWWHHHHHHYYYYYYYY?????

inhale... exhale... inhale... exhale... don't panic... don't hyperventilate.... don't scream...

WWWWWHHHHHHYYYYYYYY?????

Why NOT Pepsi? Because:
1. As it is soda is sugar overload. Pepsi is double sugar overload.
2. Pepsi doesn't give you the same burping satisfaction.
3. Pepsi doesn't taste good with Chicken Parmigiana.
4. Remember the 349 Fiasco? Pepsi just can't be trusted.
5. I detest white trash Britney Spears, faggy Michael Jackson and (GASP!) trying hard Jericho Rosales.

The horror I had to endure without a glass of Coke that night was made even worse by bad service from the greenhills crew. The food took so long to arrive and getting the attention of a waiter took forever. I swear, the tomas morato crew is by far more efficient and attentive.

To the Bistro Italiano Management:
BRING BACK MY COKE!
COKE! COKE! COKE!

chili's

i've been eating at chili's for... quite awhile and i've always made a mental note to write about them for... quite some time, well... i finaly will now =)

when you go to chili's you know you gotta have a bowl of their piping hot chili. i know chili is supposed to have beans in it but, i DON'T LIKE BEANS! other restaurants that serve chili have beans pre-mixed in it so there's no two ways about having your bowl of hot chili. with beans period. gross! what's worse, their chili tastes awful. double gross! anyways, back to chili's chili. their chili tastes and smells good. when that bowl of chili is placed in front you, a strong but appetizing aroma wafts up your nose, affecting your olfactory thingamajiggy which in turn hotwires your brain into hunger mode. aahhhh..... other than chili, i like their chicken crispers (this guys aren't kidding when they say crispy), beef salpicao (sometimes the cubes are just a little too big), mushroom jack fajitas (more pita bread please), and of course, their molten chocolate lava cake (WOW!). what i like to do is either order a bowl of chili and the molten chocolate lave cake or chicken crispers and molten chocolate lave cake. really, a meal at chili's isn't complete without the molten chocolate lava cake.

the staff is, yes, friendly and the toilet is clean.

but still, i wish...
... chili's would have a discount card.
really, guys, i eat there a lot. you could show some appreciation for the customer who continuously patronizes you.
... more caramel on the molten choco lava cake.
or you could have us choose between chocolate or caramel topping on the ice cream

that's why they're called creamy

i've always loved cream soups. carrot, pumpkin/squash, tomato, celery, mushroom, even peas (which ordinarily, i loath with a vengeance). chowders are also wonderful. as long as its creamed, i'll have second helpings please. the problem with creamed soups is that they're not always creamy. i hate it when my cream of pumpkin is runny. there's a reason why its called CREAM in the first place. a lot of times i want to run into their kitchens and scream at the cooks but because they might spit or do some other nasty thing to my entree, i don't. bummer. i'm guessing that maybe the soup they have on stock just got too creamy so they had to water it down a bit, but that's no excuse. look, dudes, i'm paying for CREAMed soup!

ATTENTION ALL CHEFS!!!
Please make sure that creamed soups are served creamy. otherwise, take them off your menu and just serve consomme's.

now, please don't sneeze on my pasta.
thank you.