Tuesday, June 26, 2012

Rainy Season Treat -Soup!


The rainy, muggy weather is back. We're getting a lot of clouds and drizzle, and this means another round of rainy day food trips. What do you like to eat on rainy days? Most of us would enjoy something hot or warm like a cup of a favorite caffeine. Or maybe a bowl of hot soup. I like soup. It goes fast when I'm really hungry and satisfies every bit of my cells instantly. Must be why instant noodle soup is a popular staple food among the masses, but that's another topic :P

My all time favorite soup would be the Filipino favorite- sinigang. Steaming hot, sour and salty. I should be looking for my sinigang restaurant favorite. But since I got married to M, I've been getting used to all things spicy. It took me some time, but this muggy weather is reminding me of that bowl of spicy Laksa in Toast Box.

Laksa

As you can see from the date on the photo, we had this soup early this year. Quite a late post. This bowl is full of seafood and dumplings, the broth a spicy hot and creamy coconut broth. The bowl  should be so good with rice, but I don't think they serve rice.(I think I've become really insistent with the rice issue.hehe).  I can eat this thing in between gulps of water,while panting and catching for breath. We also had...

Floss Toast Sandwich
I like toast and I like pork floss. So this sandwich should be good, right? Right! This one's great with the Milo or Horlicks Dinosaur. And the soup above should really have a cup of rice beside it. Maybe someday they can serve rice? 
I want to go back soon. Enjoy the clouds, everyone :)



Friday, June 22, 2012

BHS Central Find Number 1


I had the busiest 7 weeks to date. It had been a series of events and family visits since May, and although it was fun I missed the blog. :D I did.

M and I went to a lot of food trips- two summer weddings, an office outing, and another getaway to one home province. In between,  we went out to food trips with family who visited the metro. It was a busy summer!

When we visited Bonifacio High Street Central we were happy to find new places to eat. It's so nice there. There's an arena and at the bottom of it is an interactive fountain, much like the one in Market Market, only bigger and nicer. :) Kids go crazy over this thing.  





We looked up Our Awesome Planet, and found a good review of Stella, and so in we went.




Stella is a wood fire bistro, with a very elegant and light interior. I usually associate bistros with dark wood and hardwood furniture. Not this one. It seemed like a French cafe, actually. There was an adjoining bar on the other side of a wall with a tinted glass window- so we can fairly see what's happening  in the bar while we're having dinner.  Oh, and according to pareng Google, stella means star-this explains the star up above the top shelf.:) 



For starters, the waiter handed us a basket full of bread and made us pick one  piece of bread each.  Complimentary. Kind of awkward  this way of picking just one piece from a basket full of bread. This is the first time I've seen it done this way. I wish I didn't have to pick if I was getting just one piece. I wish they would change this. Or maybe we could pick from a menu instead of from the basket, if picking is part of the deal. Anyways, I picked a mini baguette, and M got a tomato bread. His choice was way better.

This was the dip for the bread. 
 Bone Marrow (395)
with a yummy Rosemary Sultana Compote, Gremolata, Herb Garlic Focaccia Crisps.


If there was any reason why we picked this restaurant for the evening, it was because I wanted to try this dish.   It wasn't roasted enough for me. But I did like the accompanying sides. 


Mediterranean NZ Lamb "Shepherd's Stew" (495)

This was M's dish. It didn't look large enough for him at first, since this bowl is a little small, but under the pumpkin puree is a lot of lamb meat. I think this was okay for him. Not amazing but better than the other dishes save for...

Stella Salad (295)
My order. I was going to make do with salad for the evening since it had bacon in it. But it looked so inviting that I had to share with the three of us. This salad is good. It had a light and creamy dressing, the bacon crisps were wide and salty good. So I shared, and I think I shouldn't have. Hehehe.


California Style Baby Back Ribs (395)
This was the other meat dish on the table. It was very big and tender. Sadly though, the sauce wasn't smoky enough for me. It was too tomato-ey. A good spicy and smoky sauce would have been perfect. The sauce does remind me to be more Middle Eastern in flavor. I think most of their dishes seem that way, including the lamb.

After dinner, we walked to a Happy Lemon outlet at the High Street. This was going to be my first time to try one and so I got their most popular flavor-

Green Tea with Rock Salt and Cheese

I admit I expected to be weirded out. But I liked it!:D
The cheese was a very light and frothy creamy milk on top of a strong and iced Jasmine green tea.
Refreshing! So glad we don't have to drive to faraway Mandaluyong just to try this. :D



Rock on.