Quirky Details

A delightful restaurant situated along quiet Luna Mencias Street in Mandaluyong City is "The Frazzled Cook." One can find some lovely eccentricities in the restaurant, including a whole shelf lined with Maneki Neko's (まねき猫, the Japanese cat), and Hello Kitty spoons. 

 

The interiors are cozy and elegant, an eclectic mix of period furniture and more contemporary furnishings. Books and memorabilia adorn the shelves. The menu brings to mind the down-to-earth goodness of a home kitchen with a lot of soul, that is. 

 

First the fennel bulbs energized their palates with a delicious fruit and walnut salad (Php200). Two big slabs of melon, mixed greens, walnuts, and a vinaigrette comprise a nutritious dish. The croutons taste like days-old butter garlic toasts, the locally made ones like La Pacita, which conjure cozy feelings of eating a home-spun meal. 

 

 

Next is the Potato and Basil Chowder with Prosciutto (Php150). The soup is hearty and very comforting especially on a stormy evening. The basil is just enough to provide a pleasant sweetness to the soup and the prosciutto adds a contrast with its innate saltiness.

Next is the tenderloin and sausage pizza (Php350). The pizza is good enough to serve 2 people, but a hungry stomach can devour it all. This is not authentic Italian pizza but a more domestic take on the dish. The crust resembles the ready made pizza crusts one can buy at the grocery store (like Bambi's). The real goodness of the dish though lies on the toppings. Generous portions of tenderloin chunks, chopped sausages, capsicum, and cheese is a definitely a treat. One can drizzle chili oil over it for more flavor. 

Last but not the least is Spicy Cajun Fish with Saffron Rice (Php375). A huge fillet of fish (most probably dory, 500g of it) placed on top of saffron-flavored rice. The fillet is rubbed generously with spices. A salsa consisting of onions, olives, and other spices enhances the flavors. A very tasty and spicy dish indeed! 

Overall, The Frazzled Cook is a very good restaurant; its ambiance and food both have a lot of character. And the fennel bulbs still have a lot of dishes to try out! 

Modern Chinese

An illustrious Chinese restaurant that is most frequented in the Greenhills area and that has been causing a bit of a traffic jam along Connecticut street is the Lugang (鹿港) Cafe. Opened for just less than a year, this restaurant, owned and managed by the Shanghai-based Bellagio group and with scores of branches in mainland China, has been definitely making its mark already on the local dining scene.

 

 

The restaurant is brightly lit and very welcoming, with floor-to-ceiling glass windows and a sleek and contemporary interior. The overall theme is metallic, with a touch of some traditional Chinese elements like the wooden door and the stone vase. One should be warned that the restaurant is intimidatingly noisy and bustling, like most Chinese restaurants are. Lugang Cafe more or less focuses on cuisine from the eastern half of China, and one can find dishes from Taiwan, Sichuan, Guangdong, and Beijing.

First on the list are the litte dragon buns (more popularly known as xiao long bao 小龍包, Php188). Seven succulent pieces of the dimsum snack are served on a bamboo container with a dipping sauce made from black vinegar and ginger. Tasteful broth is included inside the wrap and one must bite through it cautiously as it can be quite hot!

Next is the garlic pork roll (Php160). The fennel bulbs were expecting a spring roll, but to their surprise, it happens to be thinly sliced pork stuffed with bean sprouts, chives, amongst other refreshing vegetables. And speaking of refreshing, this dish uses meat to refresh the taste buds! The sauce is richly garlicky, and reminds one of the sauce used for lumpiang sariwa. 

A very tasty vegetable dish is the mixed mushrooms in XO sauce (Php280). It's served as a viand and the hint of garlic and chili goes very well with steamed Jasmine rice. The XO sauce (a mildly spicy sauce made from dried scallops) enhances the flavour of the dish with its blend of spicy and salty. 

Next is the beef with chinese crullers (Php290). The combination of textures and flavours makes this dish a very comforting one indeed! The heartiness of the beef, which is quite tender and dense, is supplemented by the cruller (a Chinese pastry which is deep fried and resembles a doughnut), which is crunchy and airy. The celery is a little contrasting detail but fits very well into the dish. 

 

A perfect way to end the meal and at the same time rinse the palate is green tea ice cream with red beans over shaved ice (Php180). Resembling the Japanese kakigori, this dessert is actually more like an afternoon refreshment than a meal ender, but does the same job very well. The green tea ice cream though tastes more like vanilla than green tea. 

Overall, Lugang Cafe is a great place to go to for delicious and affordable Chinese cuisine, with the milieu in mind, of course. 好之了！ 

 

Hungarian Rhapsody

When it comes to Central European food, perhaps the most iconic is probably Austrian and German cuisine. Sausage, pretzels, roast knuckles, and sauerkraut come to mind - not to mention the ubiquitous potato which appears in so many variants. Not so much of these can be had in Manila, more so that the restaurant Schwarzwalder (Black Forest) which for the last 20 or so years have appeased hungry locals with their cozy German food closed down. 

A rather new and quaint restaurant with great potential that serves Central European cuisine is Magyar (which means Hungary in the Hungarian tongue). Hungarian food is the main focus of the menu, but some pasta and pizza are also offered. The restaurant is located in Paseo de Magallanes, which can be quickly accessed through SLEX. 

 

 

In addition to a regular menu, the fennel bulbs were presented with an adorable scrapbook detailing the various dishes as well as insights regarding Hungarian cuisine, culture, and history.  

For starters, Langos (Php110 for an order comprised of two pieces) was ordered. Langos is deep-fried dough and eaten in Hungary as a snack and it is topped with cream and cheese. The texture is similar to that of a doughnut. 

Next is the beet salad (Php140). Mixed greens, beets, vinaigrette, cheese, nuts, and oranges are tossed together. This is delicious, and the combination of the sweetness of the beets and the sourness of the vinaigrette go very well together. One must be wary of the beets as it can stain clothes. 

 

Next is Lamb Paprika (Php325) which is lamb stewed in paprika and wine, amongst other flavorful ingredients. The taste does not differ much from the Filipino caldereta. It is served with spaetzle, which are soft egg noodles commonly used to accompany dishes in South German, Tirolean, Austrian, and Hungarian cuisine. Also, it is light, and one would need another serving of it to become full. 

 

The evening's piece de resistance however is the pork chop Debrecen-style (Php285). A generous portion of pork chop which seems to have been firstly fried and then baked to utter perfection is served over salad greens. Lightly pink meat is revealed once one slices through it and the taste is just to be savored. The taste of apples comes to mind. The Debrecener sausage (named after Hungary's second largest city of Debrecen, this sausage is heavily spiced with paprika, marjoram, and garlic) at the center is just heavenly. This must be the best pork chop dish in town!

 

And what a more fitting way to eat all the lovely Hungarian dishes than with a bottle of Czech-inspired beer (Php75). Note that this is locally brewed. 

 

For dessert, apple strudel (Php185) is a delight to be had. The thin layers of pastry have just the right texture and the filling, consisting of apples and raisins and spiced with cinnamon is just delicious. More so with a scoop of vanilla ice cream daintily garnished with a thin chip of dried apple.

 

More than a Coffee Shop

The fennel bulbs have lately heard about a nice coffee shop that offers more than what the other run-of-the-mill coffee shops can whip up. Subspace, located along F. Ortigas Jr. Avenue (formerly known as Emerald Avenue) in Ortigas Center does not just serve coffee, snacks, and pastries, but it also is a showcase of interior design. Customers get to sit on designer chairs and watch Korean shows and series being projected onto a white wall whilst sipping coffee. 

 

Coffee shops have been gaining popularity in Asian countries like Korea, Japan, and Taiwan, where tea is definitely more popular than coffee. A lot of these coffee shops have also become venues for interior design ingenuity and for exhibiting artworks by local artists. Subspace brings the same Bohemian feeling to Manila, and the result is a cosy nook with an ambiance where one can just revel and get transported to different spaces, as it were. The Korean soap-series, The Coffee Prince, comes to mind.

Now, the fennel bulbs have a favourite drink. 

 

It's a purple potato latte (Php125, small), which is coffee topped with purple potato flavouring (which we conjecture to be either in powder form or an essence). It's delightfully sweet, but the overall flavour of the coffee is preserved.

 

And a slice of carrot loaf (Php45) to go with the lovely coffee. 

Indeed Subspace is a place or rather a "space" where one can just have an intimate conversation with one's friends or just be alone and soak the good vibes.

Where Chocolate and Bagoong Meet

A very nice restaurant along Connecticut Street in Greenhills that has built quite a reputation is Angel's Kitchen. This restaurant serves home-style cuisine. However, its take on home-cooked dishes can be quite quirky, but definitely delicious, as we will soon find out.

 

For starters the fennel bulbs had a salad of mixed greens in mango poppy seed dressing with soft shell crab (~Php350). The dressing is a delicate balance of sweet and a bit of sour and goes very well with the crabs, which were fried well and are crunchy. 

 

Next is the pinakbet rice with bagnet (~Php380). This is the speciality of the house, and is definitely a must-try. In fact this dish is so popular it's actually award-winning. Pinakbet is a Filipino dish of Ilocano origins which primarily consists of vegetables, bitter squash (locally known as ampalaya) and okra sauteed in shrimp paste (bagoong). The rice is fried in the pinakbet and topped with bagnet (crunchy slabs of pork belly marinated in spices). But the quirkiness in this dish is really the condiment, which is chocolate bagoong! Bitter cocoa is mixed with sauteed shrimp paste, and the overall taste of their unlikely combination is something not to be missed.

 

Next is the beef pot roast (~Php420) in rich mushroom sauce. Perhaps a pitfall of ordering this dish is that they were quite overpowered by the pinakbet rice. Therefore it's highly suggested to eat the pinakbet rice last. The beef pot roast on the other hand was richly beefy. It seems quite likely that cream of mushroom was incorporated into the sauce. 

 

And the more delightful thing about Angel's Kitchen is that not only does it serve good meals, but it also serves great dessert. No one would have to go elsewhere to conclude a meal. 

And the very gracious daughter of the owner recommended the fennel bulbs to try a slice of Malakoff cake (~Php180). This is just sinfully delicious, with several layers of airy and crunchy cake, nuts, and dark chocolate. 

Angel's Kitchen truly lives up to its name.

Full Moon

Another restaurant near Little Tokyo that's very much worth mentioning about is Mangetsu (萬月), which playfully translates to full moon (満月). This restaurant is near the old Sango's burger restaurant in Mile Long Building along Amorsolo Street in Makati. 

And the fennel bulbs would commend Mangetsu as one of the best Japanese restaurants in town. The offerings in the menu are formidable, and the variety of sushi is quite good. Also on the menu is gratinated rice, and more traditional Japanese staples like rice bowls and sukiyaki. 

 

On the picture above are baby squids with chili miso sauce (Php350). The squids are tender and not at all tough, which is usually the problem with eating squid. The real thrill is in the sauce which is just a harmonious blend of sweet and spicy. There is also a strong hint of sesame. 

 

Next is beef packed with egg (Php300), cooked and served on a huge Japanese bamboo ladle. The dish is served piping hot, and the sauce resembles that of sukiyaki, only more copious. It's on the sweet side, probably with liberal dashes of rice vinegar and sake. The beef is also tender, and overall, a delightful dish. 

Next is assorted sushi (Php420). Included are sashimi balls, which are very visually appealing. Not to mention, the quality of the salmon and the tuna are very good. The flesh literally glimmers when lit. 

 

Next is tofu gratin (Php380). It's an inventive dish. Mozzarella cheese is used. Soft tofu is used and it all melts in the mouth. The dish is mild and quite delicate, and one can sense the milk in every spoonful of it. 

 

Lastly is the sweet potato ice cream (Php165). Homemade vanilla ice cream is topped with pureed sweet potatoes. The taste of the sweet potatoes totally complements the vanilla ice cream, and the result is a heavenly dessert that is truly comforting.

A delightful experience at Mangetsu, from appetizer all the way to dessert. :-)