when everyone is hurrying to grab themselves a cup of joe (or frappe) at Starbucks to get their cards stamped!  The Christmas promo for the 2010 Limited Edition Starbucks planner starts today (and ends on the 6th of January 2010) at all Starbucks branches in the Philippines.  Like the previous years, you get a free sticker if you get your cards early during the promo.

Accumulate 17 stickers and get your 2010 planner when you surrender your promo card.  You need 9 Holiday Featured Beverages (Dark Cherry Mocha, Toffee Nut Latte and Peppermint Mocha) and 8 regular beverages to complete the card.  Remember that bottled drinks, juices and bottled water are NOT included in the promo.

If you’re into collecting Starbucks Limited Edition Planners, I strongly suggest you to start getting those stickers now.  Enjoy your coffee!

I finally have Jamie Oliver’s Jamie At Home cookbook courtesy of The Boyfriend.  Thank you, thank you, thank you!

(Hello everyone, just a quick post for everyone about the latest restaurant I’ve been to last week! )

Zenses is a restaurant in A.Venue mall in Makati, which is known for serving food with a twist.  The chef who owns the place is interested in cooking and in chemistry, therefore merging the two together when thinking of dishes to serve in his restaurant.  Zenses is said to be famous for serving Liquid Nitrogen Ice Cream and Strawberry Ribs with Coriander, both of which I wasn’t able to try during my visit.  I’ll probably try them when I find myself back in Zenses.

When The Boyfriend and I were there that Sunday afternoon, we had the place all to ourselves.  I’m just not sure if Zenses gets packed during the evening, since they do have a small bar/lounge at the second floor.  We both decided to order a la carte, and not go with the lunch sets that they offer.  Please remember that the dishes were meant to be shared with your companions, as to avoid over ordering.

For drinks, The Boyfriend ordered Bottomless Iced Tea, which would cost you Php80.00.

The meal started with an order of Hakao, or shrimp dumplings (Php105.00).  There was nothing special about the hakao, except for their chili sauce which seems to have bits of meat mixed in as well.

Salted Fish & Chicken Fried Rice (Php265.00). It’s becoming increasingly difficult to find salted fish fried rice in Manila these days, so we jumped at the chance to order this when we saw it on the menu.  The serving was huge, and was probably good for 3-4 people.  It was pretty okay; it tasted more like Yang Chow Fried Rice with bits of chicken and salted fish.

Dragon’s Breath Chicken (Php315.00). Deep fried chicken chunks with peanuts tossed in some spicy sauce.  The nice lady who served us that afternoon told us that this was one of their best sellers.  I found the taste to be pretty standard, and it wasn’t as spicy as I expected it to be.

Sweet & Sour Pork (Php275.00). This dish was pretty decent, with slices of carrots, onions and pineapple chunks mixed in with the pork.  The serving was also big and it was more than enough for the two of us.  After eating a couple of pieces, I started to get a little tired of the sweet taste and opted to eat the rice on its own.

The entire meal was definitely filling, but there was really nothing special about the dishes when it comes to taste.  The things we managed to order tasted pretty much like the usual Chinese food that you would get in Manila.  What made the entire experience fun was going through the menu and reading uniquely-named dishes like Bacon and Egg Nitro Ice Cream and Tempure Lychee Overloaded with Curried Crabmeat. I’ll make sure to try these interesting dishes when I have time to spare and dine in the Makati area.

***Zenses: Neo-Shanghai Cuisine is located at the ground level of A.Venue Mall Makati Ave. cor. Gen. Luna St., Makati, Metro Manila.

After a month long hiatus from blogging, I’m finally back!  I do have a couple of things to share with you so just hang on.  July was a weird month for me; I was ill for roughly two weeks long and then I had to get myself back in tip top shape and adjust to a night schedule for work.  I’m finally a little more used to working nights again, but I still love my sleep and always enjoy an 8 to 10 hour sleep during the weekends.

Dad was also able to come home from China for a month long vacation and yes, we’re again able to dine out on Sunday evenings!  This makes me incredibly happy!  His first weekend back in Manila had us shopping in Megamall, and then having dinner at iRepublik, a Filipino restaurant serving modern Ilocano dishes.  It was our first time to eat there and we ended up ordering the following:

Seafood Sinigang (Seafood in Tamarind Soup).  This was pretty good, although the seafood included weren’t a lot. I think I would’ve enjoyed this better if it was pork instead of seafood.

Kare kare.  I have always jumped at the chance to eat this type of Filipino stew whenever we found one that didn’t include beef (I loved Beef Kare Kare when I was still allowed to eat it). Unfortunately, this dish was disappointingly bland and I didn’t enjoy it all that much, save for the bagnet (deep fried pork meat) on top.

Pinakbet. This is also another dish that lacked flavor, although I guess this would pass most people’s tastes.

Chorizo Paella. I enjoyed eating the rice because it was sticky, but I didn’t eat any of the chorizo.  Dad didn’t like this dish, saying he preferred the paella served in Spanish restaurants and said that the chorizo didn’t taste good.

Grilled Squid.  This was a pretty common dish among Filipino restaurants, so I have to admit that this wasn’t very special.  I did enjoy munching on the seaweed, though (the green stuff on the right side of the picture).

Bagnet Adobo Threesome. This is a dish consisting of bagnet, adobo rice and adobo flakes.  Personally, I think this was the best dish out of all the things we managed to order.  I really enjoyed the bagnet, even if I knew that it wasn’t the healthiest thing in the world.

If I find myself back at iRepublik, I’d probably end up only ordering the Bagnet Adobo Threesome.  Actually, I’d probably order bagnet in any restaurant that I see serving them!  I didn’t know that bagnet could be so addictive….

*** iRepublik is located at the ground floor of CKB Centre, Scout Rallos St. cor. Tomas Morato Ave., Quezon City.  It’s located on the lot where Heaven and Eggs previously stood.

Mom stumbled upon another article saying that dark chocolate is a good source of antioxidants and that adding it into one’s diet can really be beneficial.  Mom then asked me if there are any dark chocolate variations of M&M’s, her ultimate chocolate indulgence.  I answered yes since I remember Mons bringing a couple of them home before.  To prove it further, I searched it on the net:

During my search, I stumbled upon a game from M&M’s called 50 Dark Movies, Hidden in a Painting.  You’re supposed to name 50 movie titles using the visual clues in the painting.  If you’re the type who’s really into movies, then I think you won’t have any problems with the game.  As for me…well, I’m not even going to tell you how many of them I managed to figure out.  Suffice to say that my first try was an epic failure! Hahaha!  Go ahead and try the game yourself by clicking here. Have fun!

P.S.: I love the creepy music in the background while you’re playing the M&M’s game, I have no idea why.

Hello girls and boys, I do apologize for not being able to update this blog for the past few weeks.  There were days wherein I was feeling under the weather and then there were days when I was just busy preparing for an out of town trip my friends and I had last week.

Anyway, enough with the mindless chatter.  I haven’t been able to cook and/or dine out at any amazing restaurants for the past few weeks so I’ll just show you some of the goodies an Aunt of ours brought us from Canada.  My Auntie Julie is my mom’s best friend since high school and she’s living in Canada for the past 23 years.  She does come home to Manila once in a while to visit and she’s always been the one to introduce us to delightful snacks that would eventually find their way to our own supermarkets’ inventories (a good example was a nougat product from Canada that was nonexistent in Manila until The Landmark started selling them in their grocery; I apologize for forgetting the name of the product).  This time around, Auntie Julie brought us the following items:

Walkers Pure Butter Shortbread, Breton Whole Wheat Crackers, Milkfuls caramel candies with milky centers

Planters salted Macadamia nuts and Dare’s Vinta crackers

We have yet to try each of these items and see which ones become our favorites, but I have to say that Pointyman and I are taken by those caramel candies simply because they come in the cutest packaging!

And of course, who can forget about the stuff for the girly girls in the family?

Victoria’s Secret Love Spell hydrating body lotion and La Senza’s Heart Song body butter

My Mom and I love the smell of these lotions and we’ve started wondering where we could score these in Manila.  I have to tell you that I’m already satisfied with using my handy Jergen’s Original Scent lotion for everyday, but sometimes I admit on going a little extra and these two products from Auntie Julie’s definitely fit the bill!  The only problem is once they’re both emptied, where will I be able to get them?  I don’t see the Love Spell when I take a look at Victoria’s Secret products and I haven’t seen the local La Senza shop sell anything else apart from lingerie and pajama sets.  But who knows? I might chance upon them one of these days!

Thank you very much, Auntie Julie!

For my Mom’s birthday three days ago, the family and I decided to have dinner at Cyma at Trinoma.  You’ve probably read so many times how much we enjoy dining there and here’s one of the reasons why: their Greek roasted potatoes.  I wanted to try making those potatoes at home, but I haven’t really thought of the right way to go about the process.

Lucky for me, I turned the television on at just the right time to catch Chef at Home at the Asian Food Channel two nights ago, and Chef Michael Smith was preparing Greek Potato and Spinach Salad (click on the link to get the recipe off his microsite at Food Network Canada).  After watching him prepare the dish, I decided to use Chef Smith’s recipe as my guide in trying to make a home-made version of Cyma’s potatoes, and here’s what I ended up with:

I followed most of the things Chef Smith did, but I didn’t prepare the potatoes with spinach.  I also minimized the amount of butter and salt used in the recipe to make it a little healthier for my Mom to eat.  The verdict?  It didn’t taste exactly like the ones they serve in Cyma, but it was pretty close!  Everyone enjoyed it as part of our family dinner, but Pointyman did say that he found the sourness of the lemon a little too sharp to his liking so I might have to do a little adjusting here and there when I prepare this dish again.

I know it’s been a while since I last posted items we ordered from restaurants and so here I am with one for you lovely people! *grin*

My family and I decided to have breakfast at Conti’s Trinoma this morning after Mons said that their Malunggay (Moringa in English) Omelette was very good.  This was the first time that I actually had breakfast at Conti’s since I normally just have lunch there with family or friends.  Let me show you what we ordered:

Malunggay Omelette with Toast (Php145).  You can choose to have rice instead of toast.

French Toast (Php105).  This is what I had.  Pretty tasty and filling.  My mom loves the sausages!

American Breakfast (Php105).

Hot Chocolate (Php55).  Definitely a winner!

I must say, the food is pretty good and yes, that Malunggay Omelette is yummy.  By the way, the entrees that you order for breakfast will NOT include drinks, so you do have to order coffee, tea or hot chocolate.  I really enjoyed the hot chocolate since it was very rich and it kind of reminded my of the drinks I had when I was younger.  Mons’ coffee came with a one-time complimentary refill, so for Php55 I guess that was well worth it.

I have to admit though, the food was really good but what really made our breakfast delightful was the good conversation.  I hope we have more breakfasts outside the house in the future.

**Conti’s can be located at Trinoma Mall, Serendra, Connecticut Street in Greenhills and at BF Homes Commercial Center in Parañaque.

I spent the last few days of the Holy Week in Subic with The Boyfriend and his family.  I had a great time at the beach as there were not a lot of people during our stay and it was a newly opened resort.  My companions also did a bit of shopping here and there, purchasing souvenirs and clothing.  There was one pair of shoes at the Freeport that I really liked, but they didn’t carry my size.  =(

However, things took a turn for the better when I managed to buy these delicious chocolates at The Royal Subic Duty Free.  They cost a bit less than what I would’ve paid if I bought them here in Manila, and since I was already there in Subic, I just couldn’t resist!

Note: That Swedish chocolate Daim (red bag) is my personal favorite!

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I would also like to share that Open Game Table: The Anth0logy of Roleplaying Game Blogs, Vol.1 is now available for purchase.  It costs $22.95 if you purchase it through Amazon.com.  I’m just not entirely sure if a bookstore or a hobby store will be selling the book here in Manila.

Congratulations to my brother, Pointyman, whose article is featured in Open Game Table Vol.1.  One of your other literary pieces was in Philippine Speculative Fiction, and now this?  You make us proud.

I was having a great time in the kitchen since being able to purchase fresh parsley from the market the other day, and after using some of them in my corn chowder, I decided to try making my own Shirazi Salad. It’s a salad made primarily of cucumbers, tomatoes and onions.  I remember reading somewhere that this type of salad is a favorite in the Middle Eastern countries.  Here’s a photo of the final product:

I ate the salad during lunch with my pan fried tangigue (Spanish mackerel), which I have pictured below, while Mom and Pointyman had it with rice and steamed shrimp.

I really enjoyed the salad, especially since the lemon juice I used gave it just the right amount of tanginess.  The rest of my family will definitely being seeing more of it in our future meals together!