Tuesday, December 23, 2008

Happy Holidays!

I am now in my hometown - Cagayan de Oro City. We are happy to be home!
Tonight is going to be Christmas Eve and everyone is in a rush. Everyone's so busy attending to family celebrations, and I'm sure a lot of food trips are involved. This season always brings the best in everybody, everyone's so happy and generous. I wish everyone all of this and most of all- the blessings that come with this joyous occasion, a happy remembering of the birth of the Saviour Jesus Christ.
More than all the happy foodtripping (but of course!), may our celebrations reflect the real reason for the season.
Happy Holidays, everyone! See you next year!:)

Tuesday, December 16, 2008

A Little Exotic


I've always been curious of the Banana Leaf and Curry, but I was afraid the food would be a little too spicy for me. I get these weird little notions sometimes. Anyways, we finally got to try it when Mark had to got the Manila area to meet a client. Since it was too late to go home and cook dinner, we decided to eat inside the Robinson's Place Mall, and found the Banana Leaf and Curry right near the escalator leading to one of the parking areas.

I was still too apprehensive to try anything big. Mark had a curry meal (although I wasn't able to take a photo of it, dang!), and I ordered the Lemongrass Tea and had some of the appetizer- Cheese Balls.


Nope, I didn't enjoy this. It was to exotic for me. Hehe




These balls were surprisingly yummy.
Cheesy and full to the bite. I wanted to order more,
but it was too expensive for its size.


Thursday, December 11, 2008

My Favorite Steak Restaurant


Set atop Greenbelt 3 and overlooking the Greenbelt compound, we have found our favorite steak restaurant. Not only that, we love its location and its view... plus the Spanish mosaics on the wall.
Gaudi for me, is one of the best restaurants in town. Not only is their steak the yummiest, and their paella the best (well at least until I get to taste Senor Alba's), their service is really great!
Simply put, we just love Gaudi!!

We first had our Gaudi experience around 2 years ago. Since then, we've been just salivating over the thought of their Chuleton Villagodio- hands down my favorite steak dish. On this particular evening, we shared these treasures with Mark's Papa and sister. Let me show you what I'm talking about.


This is their bread- a big basketful of goodness.

Plato de Ibericos (P415.00)
The appetizer, an assortment of tapas and cheese.

Some buttered potatoes

Roasted pimientoes


Aaaaaah...
The Arros con Marisco (P700)!
This blurry picture contains mouthfuls of yummy saffron flavored rice. So much better than other paellas in town (again, until I try Senor Alba's).

Here comes the piece de resistance.. tadaah!
Blurry pictures (I was shaking with excitement, sorry!) of The Chuleton Villagodio.

Chuleton de Villagodio (P2597/1.06)
Perfect cuts of super tender Angus Beef , sprinkled with coarse sea salt, ....


... and grilled on a stone plate set on top of a tiny gas burner.

The blurry pictures doesn't stop me from remembering
how mouthwatering this experience was!

The Chuleton Villagodio is an experience worth having, albeit a very expensive one.
The order is charged per kilogram and there are different cuts of the meat. The servers will kindly show you a plateful of the raw version before they pre-cook it , so you can choose which ones you prefer (then you can have a chance of ordering the smaller, and maybe less expensive cuts, yay!).


And because Mark's sister was with us, it seemed fitting to order dessert with her around!
We wanted to try all their desserts, so we ordered the ....

Detodunpocu- a dessert sampler. What a big load of sweetness!






Oh, hello there my lovely choux!


The Chocolate mousse was also good!




Monday, December 8, 2008

Diet Dessert

The holidays are coming, and you know what that means.... FOOD! Lots of it!;)

How to keep shape while enjoying all the edible delights is a struggle for me, especially since I've been hankering for blueberry cheesecakes for weeks. It started with staying at coffee shops, and there being nothing more interesting there than the smooth cheesecakes on display. So, whenever my Mark and I have the chance to rest our weary feet in a coffee shop, we order a slice of a cheesecake.

At the Robinson's Place in Ermita, we chanced upon the Sugar Free Blueberry Cheesecake at Cheesecake, Etc.


It was creamy, and speckled with blueberry bits, with a lot of blueberry glaze on top. It wasn't sweet enough for me (since it was sugar free, duh!), so I can't say it's my favorite. I did like the lime glaze on the side, and I think it balanced off the creamy cheese.

Hmmm... to more Blueberry cheesecake adventures!

Friday, December 5, 2008

A Little Formal at Aubergine

My Mark and I went out for dinner one week night, this time with his mother, where we chanced upon Aubergine at The Fort.

We were a little intimidated by its classy interiors, but food is food! We just wanted to eat good food, and felt better after thinking that. We were first seated at a table near the kitchen glass windows, where we could see the action. But alas, the chairs were too soft and were too low for the table so it didn't make for a very comfortable eating position. So I bade goodbye to the good kitchen view, where we saw the pristine white chef's uniforms together with ISCAHM students, and the stainless steel counters. Sigh for the view :) But it was indeed better to eat at the second table, which was situated right beside the floor-to- ceiling glass-covered wine chiller, another sight to behold.

I dare say the food we ordered for the evening was good. Expensive, but good. I loved the tableware and service was mainly good. Let us get on to the most important part... the food! We had the following:



Tuna Tartare
This one was compliments from the chef,
since my Mark ordered one of the evening's Chef's specials.
All three of us had a serving of the tuna tartare. The tuna was soft and fresh. It was a lovely start.



There was yummy bread (although I wasn't able to take a picture of it),
which was accompanied by a duo of fresh butter and a pesto cream sauce.
The latter was really creamy.

Mark likes oysters a lot, and cheese a lot...
so he ordered these Baked Oysters (P480).
I liked them. They were good!
I actually prefer my oysters grilled with lots of garlic...
but the cheese they placed here were not too much,
and complemented the spinach leaves inside it.
My mouth is watering now, just by remembering it!


Grilled Fillet of Chilean Sea Bass (P980)
This was my order. I wanted something different from the usual steak, and ordered this nice, and creamy fish dish. MunchPunch provides a menu for Aubergine, and the menu describes the sauce accompanying this as tomato fondue and boullabaise broth. The mashed potatoes were also incorporated in the broth... so what may seem as a light dish.. was actually quite heavy!

Chef's Special
This is one of the three Chef's specials for the evening, which the waitress offered
to us on a blackboard menu. Hehe. I couldn't quite remember the dish's exact description but I remember it having some Wagyu steak, Prawns and Foie gras. The foie gras, my husband enjoyed very much. It was creamy and well cooked, but not dry. It didn't have any bitter liver taste and was actually quite sweet. He's a fan now of their Foie gras, which I read somewhere is actually one of Aubergine's specialties! Yum!



My mother-in-law ordered this yummy Angus Beef Rib Eye.
It was good and well.... I love beef!
So I wish I ordered this too.
But I luckily got a bite of it! Thanks Ma!:)

They also served us a complimentary dessert from their Patisserie.. a trio of macarons in lemon, cherry and chocolate flavors. I think they need to improve on their macarons though. I've tasted Bizu's and I really love their macarons.

So there.. we were in la la land for an hour or so, eating lovely food in a lovely setting. The interiors were very classy, and the location is not that easy to access, as it is located at the 2nd floor of the 32nd&5th building at the Fort Bonifacio in Taguig City. Most of the people there were foreign businessmen, so I suggest you dress properly in going there to avoid the discomfort I felt when I was there! Hehe.

Thanks Ma! Hehe.