Posts Tagged ‘comfort food

04
Nov
12

MY WIFE’S CULINARY PROWESS PART 2

For five years of this blog’s existence, few loyal readers have witnessed how the love for food binds my family and I together. Tina, Gabby and I certainly love to eat! And our tastebuds have the same preferences either dining out or just eating within the comforts of our home.  Although I know how to perk up some tasteful dishes too, the credit goes to my loving wife who devotes so much of her TIME and EFFORTS not only at work but at the kitchen department to fill up our tummies with not just mediocre cooking but feasts that we usually crave for!

Here are some of her masterpieces, at least for Gabby and me!

This dish has shrimps, green bell pepper in light and sweet soy sauce, if not oyster sauce. It’s too delicious, I forgot to ask her what it’s called! :D

shrimps in oyster sauce

Vanhouten, sometimes Cadbury Chocolate Chamorado at Tuyo is one of our comfort foods! Even Gabby became biased with Champorado at Tuyo!  Yes, our 8-year-old kiddo loves tuyo, he eats it also sans champorado but with rice and dips its shredded bits on vinegar!  Regardless of the weather -rainy days or even when the sun is out; for breakfast or as late afternoon snack, this combo remains a personal favorite!

champorado at tuyo

Ebi Tempura and Chicken Cordon Bleu. All.From.Scratch!

prawn tempura and chicken cordon bleu
ebi tempura
prawn tempura

This one needs no introduction. Pass the vinegar, please! And let’s eat with bare hands, c’mmon! ;)

crabs

Bistek Tagalog with Blanched Veggies. I’m salivating now.

beef steak and blanched veggies

Some photographed pasta dishes the past months include this Crispy Noodle…

crispy noodles

and the classic Creamy Carbonara with homemade Garlic Bread that she made for our birthdays (Gabby’s last October, and mine’s September). While Gabby dislikes bacon and only wants the pasta and the creamy cheesy buttery sauce, I love it up to its last bacon bits. LOL! :P

creamy carbonara with home made garlic bread

For dessert, Maja Blanca con Maiz

maja blanca maiz

For someone like Tina who doesn’t have formal background in culinary arts, and for Gabby and me, those dishes are already superb despite its few imperfections. As mentioned, hours are usually spent in preparing them. Time and efforts for the family are always priceless!

With those few compiled food photos, one of my suntok-sa-buwan-wishes of putting up our very own food place someday lives on. Let’s see if it will materialize someday. Who knows what destiny brings? I am only sure of the fact that we love food and we like to eat – a lot!!!

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Part 1 of this blog’s series here : My Wife’s Culinary Prowess

_________________

02
Jun
10

NOT JUST ANOTHER YOGURT

Apparently, rainy season has arrived, but that doesn’t mean we cannot enjoy our favorite sweet cold treats. Other than the very Pinoy, HALO-HALO and those irresistible delights regardless of season— ICE CREAM; my family and I also love YOGURT.

Last Saturday, Tina, Gabby and I had our lunch at Pancake House in Bonifacio High Street. Pancake House is one of our family’s favorites and it was only last weekend that we got to try their latest offering : the GURTSPancake House’s Frozen Yogurt.

Gurts is creamy and cool 98% fat-free frozen yogurt.

I don’t know about you but my wife and I like our yogurt with tangy taste. For us, it what separates yogurts from ice creams and again, we like them both. :)   Gurts frozen yogurts have this sour taste that we look for in a scoop.

Gabby was first to choose his Gurts. He wanted a D-I-Y gurts and pointed directly from the menu the plain regular yogurt (PhP 78+) and our “little chef” also selected White Chocolate Chips (PhP 20+) and Leche Flan (PhP 38+) as toppings for his gurts…

Then Tina and I first thought of sharing a medium-sized yogurt (PhP 108+) because the family-sized (PhP 150+) is bigger than our appetite, but we settled for regular Blueberry White Chocolate Chip Cheesecake (PhP 155+) because the medium for that flavor wasn’t available.  Unlike Gabby’s yogurt that he got to choose his own toppings, ours was a straight-from-the-menu Gurts with cheesecake chunks, generous volume of blueberries, and white chocolate chips…

Yummy! :)

And I almost forgot what we shared for lunch, LOL! :) We had a family-sized CARBONARA (PhP 302+) and my personal favorite, PAN FRIED CHICKEN (PhP 189+). It’s one of those commercial crispy fried chickens that I like with its original gravy with smoky taste.

Yes, my family and I like home-cooked chocolate porridge or champorado with milk and tuyo flakes (dried fish), arroz caldo or goto with egg, hot delicious chicken mami and other wet season staples. It might sound weird to you but we also consider ice cream and yogurt as our rainy-day-comfort foods too. And why not, they never fail to brighten up those gloomy days. :)

31
Mar
10

I’M HOME

I am home now!  :D   I had to cut my Tokyo trip shorter to a couple of weeks instead of 30 days because of an internal problem that I’m not in control and I cannot share publicly.  I never failed any training because there was none for me to begin with.  Nonetheless,  I have experienced the worse and the best of Tokyo and will continue to share them here on the coming days.

TOKYO DISNEYSEA will be my next post so be sure to visit my site again.  To my kind readers, I’ll swing to your blog soon.

For now, I’m sharing you the things that happened yesterday…

Tina herself, did the  rescheduling of my flight with PAL last Sunday in less than 5 minutes.  I had enjoyed my 1-hour trip from Tokyo to Narita Airport terminal 2 via the very efficient Narita Express.  Ticket from Shinagawa to the airport costs Y3,310 (PhP  1,655).

Some people told me that flights are fully booked until April but these pictures will speak for themselves…

It’s Holy Week and time to reflect on things so I’ll try to avoid rants…Moving on..

My meal at 36,000 feet before heading home…

Beef stew with blanched carrots and okra;  served with Japanese noodle soup, bread and butter and mung bread; orange juice and coffee.

The flight went OK except for bumpy descent and hassle of an hour of waiting for my luggage at the NAIA terminal 2.  To PAL : improvement is much needed!

Traffic at EDSA was minimal so I reached our place in Quezon City in less time I expected.  I just dropped off my luggage and bags at home and headed straight to Gabby’s big day…

I can’t imagine myself missing this moment.  I brought to the graduation venue Gabby’s most requested pasalubong; PSP with 4 gig memory stick which I bought from AKIHABARA ELECTRIC TOWN.  A 3rd honorable mention-Kindergarten graduate and a very adorable son deserves more than this.

After the event, we had simple dinner at KKK in SM Cubao… I was craving for Pinoy food for 2 weeks and these were very comforting…

The smart kid requested for Halo-halo…

We shared Nilagang Bulalo, Buko Pandan Juice, Halo-Halo Mestiza, Kaning Puti and Kare-Kareng Baka ng KKK…

Nothing beats the comfort of being HOME. :D

Time to avoid meat...Have a blessed Holy Week everyone!

Stay tuned for my next posts : TOKYO DISNEYSEA and so much more about Tokyo…

 

19
Jul
09

GELATONE’S GELATO

IMG_2792

I don’t know about you but regardless of the weather, ice cream is always one of my comfort foods. :)

Half hour before we went to Greenbelt Cinema 3 to watch Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince yesterday (scroll down below for the post),  our son Gabby was begging  us requesting for ice cream.  My wife Tina and I, as usual, were too weak to resist, we immediately gave in to his want. 

Our immediate choice was to try Cold Rock Ice Creamery (from Australia) located at level 3 of Greenbelt 3 and  it could have been our first time there.  But when Tina  was about to enter, I saw a posting at  its glass doors prohibiting cameras inside.   Why Cold Rock?  Don’t you want free advertisement without frills on my blog?  Well, whatever your reason for such regulation I wouldn’t care less, and it  wasn’t our lost but yours…:)   One establishment’s loss is another’s gain…Cest la vie!

So we had to go a level down the escalator and settle for an incomparable ice cold treat BETTER THAN ORDINARY ICE CREAM - what else but gelato from GELATONE! 

It wasn’t our first time to try Gelatone but it took us a while to go back.  We already tasted some flavors of this Italian frozen dessert  (called gelato)  a couple of years back with our friends of more than 16 years who then were back in Manila for vacation. Gelatone since then, serves cold yummy treats but their small dining place is warm and perfect for small conversations between friends and families

Even though I didn’t notice any apparent change in its interiors,  it remained simple and comfy all these years. 

1  2

Fair service + best gelato  = more than enough reason to keep coming back to Gelatone!

Customers have  options in Gelatone -  Order gelato outside on a cup or cone and off you go, or to have it as dine-in, just choose the flavor from the frozen glass stall outside and a wait-staff will bring it to your table.   If the order is for dine-in, a choco-stick will be served with the scoops on cups, but if it’s  a dine-in gelato on a cone, the cone is also served with the cup. Get it? Of course, LOL.   BTW, they also serve pasta and some sandwiches.

The hardest part in Gelatone : selecting from the wide array of flavors of gelato!  Looks like everything is a must-try!

IMG_2801  IMG_2802

Don’t get me wrong because I still LOVE regular ICE CREAM even YOGURT too.  I can’t imagine a world without them :(   For a kid-at-heart but a huge  man-at-stomach like me, these desserts mean HAPPINESS!  I am not bias with any of them however I’ve learned long before that gelato has less air than ordinary ice cream, making it more compact so what you’ll get is more of its delectable goodness compared with regular ice cream; it’s just all in the process of making this yummy dessert.

We tried these flavors for dine-in yesterday….

3

Gabby had his scoop of  BUBBLE GUM….

4

Our son enjoyed this flavor he even licked drank its last drop!  On the opposite table where we were seated inside Gelatone, a kid with his European-looking mom, was also savoring the same flavor.  Does it really has that appeal on kids?  It tasted like, well, Bazooka-bubble gum the way it should be.  At least the bliss that it brings to our own kid is priceless.

I ordered a scoop of this gelato of HAZEL NUT with DARK CHOCOLATE called BACIO NERO.  Pangalan pa lang ng flavor, ang sarap na!  Excuse me, I’m drooling as I post this, I need to wipe my keyboard, LOL.

5

I like chocolates so much that I wouldn’t pass an opportunity to enjoy it.  There was no regret in ordering this, it’s a superb palatal stimulus but I was happier to taste Tina’s choice…

6FRUTTI di BOSCO  or MIXED BERRIES SORBET was a winner among the 3 scoops we had.  It can deliciously clean your palate.  I love the berry-flavor that’s neither sour nor sweet; it was just heavenly, lol. :)

Each scoop of gelatone costs PhP 100 inclusive of VAT if ordered in cups and + 10% service charge for dine-in.

These are proofs of how my family happily spent our thirty minutes before we headed to Hogwarts yesterday :)

IMG_2789  IMG_2795

GELATONE, Level 2, Greenbelt 3,  Ayala Center, Makati City.

13
Apr
09

COMFORT FOOD ARAW-ARAW!

My wife, Tina texted me this afternoon while she was on-way home from her 6am to 2pm shift in the Operating Room of a private hospital in Quezon City as a clinical instructor, to ask me if I wanted to try eating snacks at PenPen. We’ve been reading about this “comfort food place” from other blogs & we’d like to experience it ourselves. Since I’m enjoying the last day of my off from work, & my son Gabby also wanted to eat out (he’s craving for chocolate frapuccino of Starbucks Coffee, one of his favorite at his age of 4), we finally gave it a try.

I found PenPen as an upscale carinderia . The place can be spotted easily. It is a small airconditioned eatery located in a corner of a street from Tomas Morato in Quezon City where we live few kilometers away. The entire place, I guess, can only accomodate 30 to 40 people at its first floor (I’m not sure if they also allow dining upstairs) with 6 to 7 palo-china tables & chairs, which I like, they’re homey!  The yellow-painted walls are nearly bare except for few frames of the house specialties. Do not expect interiors similar or at par with other restos along Morato, you won’t find it in Pen pen. But as I have stated, it’s homey & comfy, perfect for barkadas (friends), small families who are looking for an affordable daily dining place.

img_02822

PenPen offers Pinoy staples like pan de sal with choices of palaman (filling), crispiest liempo (deep-fried thinly sliced pork belly), & spicy bicol express (pork cooked in spicy coconut milk) to name a few of their specialties & other usual favorites. It’s owned by the wife of the veteran Philippine actor, Mr. Pen Medina (hence its name!) & their son, Ping, who’s a character actor in TV & most indie films, also helps out.

We tried PenPen’s crispiest liempo, PhP 125.

img_0283

It’s cripiest, yes! but don’t expect that it’ll be served in a huge platter, LOL.
C’mmon, with prices of a kilo of pork & cooking oil nowadays, what can you expect from its serving?  You get what you pay for, of course. But I cannot say anything bad with its taste.  It’s saltiness is best dipped in vinegar & you’ll be sky-rocketted to the seventh heavens! Just be  careful with atherosclerosis, hypertension & other cardiovascular disorders that may result from too much intake of these fatty & salty foods. Ouch!

Then we ordered pan de sal which were so affordable at PhP 45 each.
I had the pan de sal with special home-made ham…

img_0287
I like it ! It’s a breather from the usual hamburger of commercial fast foods.

But my wife Tina was a bit disappointed with her pan de sal with kesong puti (white cheese). The bread was good, but the slice of kesong puti was so thin she barely tasted it. Plus it was described in the menu to be served with pesto, but there was none. =(
img_0291

Nonetheless, PenPen is better than other eateries around.
They also accept catering.
and to my surprise, Pen Pen  also offers wi-fi access!

Burp!

——————
PenPen
105-C Scout Castor Street,
South Triangle, Quezon City.
411-41-57.

02
Apr
09

FOOD TRIP

Both Tina & I were off from work so we brought Gabby to Greenhills today
& had lunch at Le Ching Tea House in Shoppesville.

Le Ching Tea House offers very affordable but authentic chinese dishes.
It’s a good place to munch on comfort food if you dig chinese.

Anyway, here’s a peek of what we had for lunch today….

beef wanton noodle soup

beef wanton noodle soup

The steamed dumpling that is uncommon in most local chinese resto here can be enjoyed in Le Ching.

eye love shrimp cheongfan

eye love shrimp cheongfan

As written in Wikipedia, and I quote:
“Dim sum (literally meaning “touch the heart”) is the name for a Chinese cuisine which involves a wide range of light dishes served alongside Chinese tea. It is usually served in the mornings until noon time at Chinese restaurants and at specialty dim sum eateries where typical dishes are available throughout the day. Dishes come in small portions and may include meat, seafood, and vegetables, as well as desserts and fruit. The items are usually served in a small steamer basket or on a small plate. Yum cha (literally “tea drinking”) is the term used to describe the dining session, especially in contemporary Cantonese.”

Another bestseller dimsum from Le Ching is their Bola-bola siopao..

bola-bola siopao : savor every bite !

bola-bola siopao : savor every bite !

Then we had another favorite dumpling, hakao or shrimp dumpling…
In Le Ching, the shrimp is generous per serving, less of extenders.
Tina ordered chicken mushroom rice, I ate spareribs rice
which were both rice toppings
served in little aluminum bowls (that looks like smallarinola, lol)

more delish with chili soy sauce + calamansi !

more delish with chili soy sauce + calamansi !

Burp!

The entire meal only cost us PhP 642, inclusive of taxes & charges
& a can of dalandan soda, a bottle of soya milk & a glass of iced tea.
Cheap, right?
Good food need not always be expensive.

Le Ching Tea House
8-10 Level A, Shoppesville Arcade
Greenhills, San Juan City, Metro Manila.
___________________

Before we left the house this morning,
I received another package sent by my wife’s aunt (again) from London
who came home recently for short vacation & asked prescription from me.
It was my second package from her that contained sweet treats.
These were the contents of her gratis…

thanks, Tita Marie !

thanks, Tita Marie !




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