The Market Cafe in the new Hyatt Hotel & Casino (right beside our corporate offices) is undoubtedly my favorite restaurant at the moment. Unfortunately, I could only eat here once in a blue moon because of its five-star hotel prices. Come to think of it, $20 is not too steep for a buffet with great selections but still I want my expense account (ugh!)
I totally love the raspberry iced tea (they also have guava iced tea, and the apple-celery cucumber juice which I still have to try.) Featured in the crustacean bar are the shelled prawns and oh-so-fresh oysters which are shucked in front of you. The chef is so meticulous that he has to have it laboratory-tested before being flown to Manila.
The cafe also has a Western kitchen offering a variety of roasts, make-your-own pizzas baked in a genuine wood-fired oven, an antipasti bar, an authentic Chinese Kitchen manned by Hong Kong chefs, a Japanese Kitchen with all those sushi, sashimi tempura and yakitori as well as a full counter filled with all those sinful desserts. What is good about the cafe is that most of the food is cooked in front of you so it's fast and fresh.
My friends are treating me and giving me my present a month after my birthday. Why oh why...do you think that can double as your Christmas gift?? har!har!har! Anyway, it was better late than never when Notty, a.k.a. the Great Procrastinator, brought me to a sumptuous buffet lunch at the Cafe Coquilla of the Manila Pavilion Hotel.
I loove buffets although am trying to cut down on it. I think it is still the best way to discover new dishes and presentations. After sampling the high-quality specialties of the Market Cafe, this one rather pales in comparison. The roast lamb was not tender and the entrees looked like they were dying of dehydration from the heated-up chafing dishes.
The ones shown on the plate were the only ones I liked aside from the soup (clockwise): grilled tanguigue, grilled chicken with sate sauce, milkfish or bangus and smoked tanguigue which is such a favorite Filipino appetizer of mine, I could eat it in kilos.
Thanks for that sweet thought Notty:)
We stumbled into Oody's just when we thought we didn't know where we were going to eat that day. It turned out Mayan would treat us for her birthday. The resto, which is located in a mall has tastefully modern Oriental interiors befitting the Asian fusion items on the menu. For this meal, we ordered Vietnamese spring rolls, chicken barbecue and Thai noodles with honey-stewed beef soup.They were all good.
But the star of the show was the crispy catfish salad which thrives in fish water in the Philippines. I was kind misled by the beautiful poster on the wall..I thought it was really the whole fish I was going to eat. It turned out they only retained the head and the tail, the rest of the meat was flaked and fried to a crisp and mixed with the onions, tomatoes, green mango, and sweet-spicy vinaegrette dressing. Heavenly! Once again it made me believe that salads are good.
When I am not brownbagging my lunch, me and my officemates walk down to the nearest value-for-money resto from our office.Lau Chan Hotpot along Mabini St., which I earlier wrote about for their delicious shabu-shabu, also has a lunchtime promo at an unbelievably low price of P65 (a little more than $1).I say 'unbelievably' because their servings are big enough to fill you up; add another P10 and you get fried rice mixed with scrambled egg.
Photo shows their rice and chicken with tausi (fermented soy beans) which I chose yesterday. Aside from this, they have 35 or so items on their affordable lunch menu containing favorites like peking duck, assorted cold cuts, asado, chopsuey, beef brisket and even squid curry.
Long live, Lau Chan!
