Foodventures: Salcedo Market

One of my favorite haunts in Manila is Salcedo Market. I tried to come by as often as possible even if it's actually really out of the way for me to go. It makes my weekend cheat days so worth it!

I'm always the last to sit down at the market. At restaurants, I'm also always last to order. With so much good food out there, how on earth do you pick just one?

Answer: At this weekend market, you don't. You just need to decide what order you want to eat all your food in.

As I walked around, I decided to take photos of some of the things you can try at the market and fresh produce you can take home.


TAKOYAKI- Japanese Octopus Balls. Obviously not the "balls" you are thinking. Or maybe that I'm thinking. haha.


Fresh Native Tomatoes and Okra


Cute little pumpkins!


Hungarian Sausages. Yummmm.



Paella Valencia--- well, the tail end of it.

But what REALLY made me happy today was this:

Holy Crap. Before today, I had been craving for Paella Negra for months without being able to feed that desire. So when I saw this at the market today, I pounced on it.

Squid Ink rice, a generous amount of aioli and a squeeze of lime/lemon= Heaven.


Now this is all I want to eat. I think I will buy a Paellera and start experimenting pronto!

It was a nice sunny day too and it started raining right when we left. Good times! :D

Let's Eat!!!

Guests enjoying the food! I was still in the kitchen at this point hehe!

GOURMET KITSCHEN Urban Dinner 1 : The aftermath

My last post was about the upcoming Urban Dinner that Banj Albano and I had been talking about for months, and well, it finally happened last night! After figuring out the menu and deciding who to invite, we settled on the October 21st date and waited for the invitees to respond. Aside from a few who had to decline due to schedule conflicts, most people said yes.

The menu revolved around the Filipino Fusion theme. More than anything, I think the food was Filipino served in an unexpected way. Instead of regular kare kare, I fried veggies and served it with a spicy peanut "kare kare" dip, Sinigang had no soup and was instead served as a roast with tangy sinigang gravy. I made adobo but twisted it up with maple and thyme-flavors I usually add when I'm roasting pork. Also, I did bangus belly ala pobre but added an extra dimension with a sage butter Teriyaki sauce. Lastly, I made longanisa and quezo de bola spring rolls drizzled with Balsamic vinegar reduction, as well as champorado ala mode ( with queso or ube ice cream) for dessert.

The guests included Cesca Litton, Shawn Yao, Gabe Mercado, Don Puno, Erika Aquino, Pat Malay, Sarah Meier and Rev Naval. It was intimate enough that everyone got to talk but the cool thing was that not everyone in the group knew each other. Some did, some had met once or just knew of each other prior to the dinner.

Here are a few photos of the night :)


Starter: Fried eggplant and Sweet Potato with Spicy Kare Kare Dip


Longanisa and quezo de bola spring rolls with balsamic vinegar reduction


Sinigang Roast Chicken w/ Tangy Sinigang Gravy


Bangus Belly ala pobre with Sage Butter Teriyaki Sauce


Slow cooked, twice fried maple thyme adobo


Champorado with Queso Ice cream (sorry kinda melted shot!)


Gabe Mercado, Shawn Yao (with their take home Birthday Cafe cupcakes) and yours truly!


Erika Aquino enjoying the fare


nomnomnom!


We're definitely looking forward to the next one! Let me know if this is something you are interested in being part of!

Cheers!

Gourmet Kitschen Urban Dinner

The first ever Gourmet Kitschen Urban Dinner is happening this Thursday, the 21st of October!

I am thankful I have friends who no only love to eat, but love everything that goes with eating- like the conversation and sense of community you feel when you are breaking bread with people. Sometimes you don’t even really have to know the person eating next to you. Through food, you end up talking and through that, you may find similarities and common friends and interests.

My friend Banj Albano and I have been talking about this for months. Since I like to cook, we figured we’d have a monthly gathering of people who may or may not know each other, but we feel might have like minds or might be able to offer something to everyone else.

The set up is this-We will charge a set amount per head for ingredients and I’ll do all the cooking. We host the dinner and bring people together. Bring your own bottle to share and let the rest of the evening flow. This Thursday is our first day- and we are nervous but excited (well I am, at least! Im cooking! haha) The first is Filipino Fusion, and while some are really considered “fusion”, others are more a different way of serving and eating your favorite Filipino dishes!

ON THE MENU:

Starters: Longanisa and Quezo de Bola Spring Rolls drizzled with Balsamic Vinegar reduction


Fried eggplant and sweet potato with kare-kare dip


Mains: Sinigang Roast Chicken with Tangy Sinigang Gravy

Slow cooked, twice fried maple thyme adobo


Bangus belly with garlic terriyaki glaze

Dessert: Dark Chocolate champorado ala mode (w/ choice of Mantecado or Ube ice cream)

Drink: Pandan Iced Tea and BYOB to share :D

Stay tuned for post-dinner review and photos! And for the next Urban Dinners to come!

Resturant Rave: LU

I had been wanting to try LU out since it opened and finally got a chance to when I met my ex-workmates for brunch today for a little bit of catching up and Saturday pigging out.

Now I’m supposed to be on a healthy food trip, but I knew this weekend would ruin my plans. I had this brunch and a kids party today AND a wedding of one of my college buddies tomorrow. What diet? I will resume again on Monday.

So, after a few days of wheat, cottage cheese, salads and baked fish, I had a nice lamb stew at LU. It was Moroccan Style Lamb Stew with apricots and prunes and served with harissa couscous. My tummy and taste buds were definitely very happy today.


Moroccan Lamb Stew with Apricots and Prunes w/ harissa couscous

Also try:

5 cheese Truffled mac n’ cheese. OHMYGOD. I had a bite of this. Deadly. Worth it though.


FRIED Hainanese Chicken. I had a bite of this too. Crazy good!!!

but the piece de resisitance I must say is the dessert—- do NOT miss:

Peanut butter and jelly tart. Friends, this is 5000 calories. Dead serious. Get it to share. Unless you are trying to gain weight in a major way. This tart was split between 5 people. Damn, that’s still 1000 calories!

Lu is good for dining with friends, so you can order a lot of different things and taste and share! I would come back here :)

For table reservations, call (02) 403-3991. Lu is located at G/F Joya Bldg., Joya Drive, Rockwell, Makati City, Metro Manila

Resturant Rave: Cafe by the Ruins

Baguio is one of those places that you never want to change. You want to go there and feel the familiar cold, pine-scented breeze, see the horses in Wright and Mine’s View Parks, buy ube and strawberry jam at Good Sheperd Convent and buy strawberries, blankets and walis at the Public Market. Although there have been many changes and new establishments popping up every where in the mountain city, a few restaurants are still must-visits every time I am up there.

Cafe by the Ruins is one such restaurant I can visit over and over. A few years ago, it got a face lift, but the food has remained predictably good. I have yet to have a disappointing meal from here (knock on wood!)

Don’t be afraid of carbs-start with one of the yummy freshly-baked breads, you won’t regret it. My personal favorite is the Kamote bread, which you can get with butter and jam or cheese- or both :)

I usually order the fish roe pasta (Abdul ordered it this time around) but I was pigging out the entire day and couldn’t decide what I wanted. I ended up picking the Vegetable Tempura with Mountain Rice. The tempura included mushrooms, zucchini flowers and sweet potato. It was good but I didn’t finish it because I was seriously still so stuffed from the previous afternoon’s food fest.


There is this other thing I ALWAYS order, but I can’t for the life of me remember exactly what it’s called. I’ve tried googling the Cafe by the Ruins menu to no avail. Let’s just call them Bangus Spring Rolls. They are little bite sized pieces of yum. It comes with this strong vinegar ( I don’t like vinegar) but I eat mine plain.


Don’t forget to grab some more bread and pastries on your way out—-basil bread, croissants, chocolate croissants and biscuits all get my vote! Enjoy!

Kitschen Chaos: Queso-rap!

I was going to make tacos for a quick and easy dinner, but needed something else to go with it. I didn’t wanna make anything complicated because it would totally defeat the purpose of my easy-to-make supper.I found some Tostitos Hint of Lime chips in our pantry and decided to run with that. Making this appetizer dip is insanely easy and the results are awesome!

1 225gram bar of cheese (cheddar or monterey jack) although use whatever you prefer, 1 large green chili (de-seeded, unless you wanna die of heat-then by all means keep them there) 1/3 c beer, 1/3 c chopped onions, 1 Tbs chopped garlic, 1/3 c store bought salsa, 1/4 c chopped coriander (cilantro/wansoy), salt and pepper to taste.

1. Prepare everything you will need because you have to work pretty fast.



2. Saute onions on medium heat until they soften. Add chopped chilis and fry for about a minute. Add beer and reduce.

3. Add cheese (grated or cut into cubes) and allow to melt.

4. Mix in salsa and coriander.

5. Transfer into a bowl and garnish with more coriander.Serve with Hint of Lime chips.


I would have added Spanish Chorizo to this recipe but Abdul was over and all the pork I would have used had to stay in the fridge. Aaah, interfaith relationships ;p