Lakbayan

   My Lakbayan Grade is B-. I am glad to have come across this site because I lost my Philippine map with colors of the places I have visited. Though not as colorful as my map, this is better because it shades the places I have "gone" to depending on the degree. From I live/have lived here to Never set foot there. 

   How much of the Philippines have you visited? Try it out and see what your grade is. Just click on the map.

Kids say the darnedest things

My daughter came home brooding after her Christmas party at school.

Cheska: Ang daya ng classmates ko. Marami silang prizes sa games. Ako wala.

Me: Bakit wala kang prize?

Cheska: Kasi lagi kaming talo sa games. Ang daya nila. Hmpp.

Me: Ganon talaga. You can't always be a winner. Magaling sila sa games, ikaw magaling sa klase.

Cheska: No mama, mas maganda ako sa kanila.

That's coping mechanism for a six year old.

Me: Cheska, do u miss me sometimes?

Cheska: Yes. Lalo na pag overnight ka sa work.

Me: Mmm, minsan kasi kelangang mag-overnight sa work para may money tayo.

Cheska: Mag-overnight ka kaya everyday para much money tayo?

Last school year while doing her assignment in Language and Spelling….

Teacher Edna ( is    are)  helpful.

Cheska: You know mama, Teacher Abby is not helpful.

Me: She helps you and your classmates at school right? She teaches you many things.

Cheska: No. Sabi nga nya yung di pa tapos mag-write sa diary maiwan.

Abe means good food (?)

    Abé means good Filipino food.(http://anton.blogs.com) Probably. But good is never good enough for me. My friends and I like to say “nothing spectacular” if the food is not worth coming back to. Abé’s certainly fit the bill.

     Though we often dine at Serendra it was our first time to get out of our comfort zone (Contis) and dined at Abé just across. We had:

Hearty soup dishes

Suam of fresh native corn (Php 85) – minced and sautéed fresh young corn in light broth. Good enough. But like I say, good enough is never good enough. In fact my yaya’s version of this soup is better.

Abé’s specialties

Binukadkad  na pla pla (Php 275) – a Bistro Remedios original, overgrown tilapia butterflied and fried to delightful crispiness, served with balo balo relish and mustasa leaves. There’s nothing special about this dish except for the presentation. I guess the balo balo relish was the fermented rice. It was tasteless. There were no mustasa leaves.

Old Spanish heritage

Calamares en su tinta (Php 150) – fresh squid sautéed in olive oil and its own ink. They ought to add spices on this one.

Artists’ and Writers’ favorite dishes

Kare kare ala Bistro Burgos (Php 375) -  “The kare in the old Bistro Burgos was unforgettable.”( Adrian E. Cristobal) The kare kare version that I don’t like. Meat, veggies and sauce cooked separately. They just make fleeting acquaintances on the plate right before being served. The bagoong came 10 minutes late to the party, after all the veggies have gone. As a whole, this kare kare is good only for photos, not for the taste buds.

 Crispy tadyang “d’ original” (Php 395) – A Bistro Remedios original, marinated beef ribs deep-fried to delicious crispiness. Widely copied but in vain. I practically called every waiter and waitress following up on our order. I almost lost my temper and appetite waiting more than 30 minutes for it. Who would want to copy this dish? It was crispy all right, but not delicious. Definitely not worth the wait and the 395 pesos.

    For refreshments I had Tamarind shake. Someone told me it tastes like Knorr sinigang sa sampaloc mix. Sinigang is my favorite anyway, and we use Knorr for it. In fairness, the shake didn’t taste like Knorr at all. It’s delicious I almost forgot that their food weren’t. It’s made from real tamarind you can even see the brown bits at the bottom. I, however, could imagine drinking a sweetened cerumen shake.

    Eeoow!

Dining disappointment

    Amici di Don Bosco is on the news lately because of its acquisition by the former owner of Red Ribbon. It is one of our “go to” places, our default when there is no new restaurant to try. A magic word to achieve consensus on where to dine. The restaurant is located at Arnaiz Avenue (Pasay Road) corner Chino Roces Avenue (Pasong Tamo) but Lisette and I walk all the way to Walter Mart across the street for their gelato. At Walter Mart, you can have Amici gelato for only Php 10 per scoop whereas the price at the restaurant is pegged at Php 35 per (bigger) scoop. For crossing the street we get three flavors of gelato for Php 30.

    Not anymore. Gelato prices are at Walter Mart and at the restaurant are now the same. Php 45 per scoop.

    We dined at Amici this afternoon to see if the new owner made significant changes besides the price of gelato. We weren’t disappointed. The restaurant has a fresh look on it, more red and green rather than the usual brown. It still looks like a canteen but brighter. Like an old furniture that has been polished.

    Lisette had lasagna spinacci and I, spaghetti vongole e gamberetti. Both were big disappointments. I never liked their spinach lasagna so I guess it hasn’t really changed. The serving size of my vongole shrank by 25 percent. Yes, we noticed that. The prawns were down from 3 to 2, mussels from several to zero. This must be what one of the new owners meant when he said they streamlined the menu.

    You can no longer enjoy watching your pasta cooked right before your eyes. Their kitchen is tucked at the back because they “standardized the food preparation and presentation”. As a result the food no longer tastes special. It became standard. Just one of those…

    Amici is now officially dropped from our default restaurants list. 

Best carrot cake ever

    I’ve finally managed to get started on baking, thanks to PLDT.  It was an internet-less (and phone-less) day and my daughter got bored early in our tutorial. I was supposed to finish some work at home but the carrots in my fridge were much more appealing. They’ve been there a long time, their transformation was overdue. Here is the recipe for best carrot cake ever from allrecipes.com. The cake I made was moist and  really delicious it could rival the carrot cake from Cristina’s at Powerplant’s Baker’s Dozen fair.

INGREDIENTS

• 6 cups grated carrots

• 1 cup brown sugar

• 1 cup raisins

• 4 eggs

• 1 1/2 cups white sugar

• 1 cup vegetable oil

• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract

• 1 cup crushed pineapple, drained

• 3 cups all-purpose flour

• 1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda

• 1 teaspoon salt

• 4 teaspoons ground cinnamon

• 1 cup chopped walnuts

DIRECTIONS

1. In a medium bowl, combine grated carrots and brown sugar. Set aside for 60 minutes, then stir in raisins.

2. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Grease and flour two 10 inch cake pans.

3. In a large bowl, beat eggs until light. Gradually beat in the white sugar, oil and vanilla. Stir in the pineapple. Combine the flour, baking soda, salt and cinnamon, stir into the wet mixture until absorbed. Finally stir in the carrot mixture and the walnuts. Pour evenly into the prepared pans.

4. Bake for 45 to 50 minutes in the preheated oven, until cake tests done with a toothpick. Cool for 10 minutes before removing from pan. When completely cooled, frost with cream cheese frosting.