Philippines 2015: Day 2 (Roots Market Bistro, Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf, Legend HK Restaurant)

Day 2: Dec. 27 (Sunday)

We were supposed to go out of town, but my parents (mostly dad) were lazy, citing that traffic would be severe and we’d waste lots of hours on the road. I think he just didn’t wanna get out of the house. Mom and I decided to go to Greenhills instead. I was trying to see if there was anything worth buying – clothes, shoes, or accessories, but I didn’t find stuff I wanted to buy. Huhuhu, failed shopping trip. Mom and I also couldn’t find the stores we went to last year, so we decided to just call it a day. We walked to Promenade and had lunch at Roots Market Bistro because I wanted to try their food. It’s pretty good. We ordered their signature pork chop dish, and we also ordered a prawn pasta dish.

After that, we decided to go to Robinson’s Magnolia to see if we could buy anything from the sales. I ended up with nothing, while mom got a top from Cotton On. After walking around the mall and going into different stores, we bought Popcorners from Healthy Options before settling into The Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf for afternoon tea. Mom had the Matcha tea latte, and I had the African Sunrise tea latte. I don’t know if it’s because of my modified taste buds (HAHA) or because of the way the barista made it that day, but I found my drink to be reallyyy sweet. I was thinking of buying a can of either the African Sunrise tea or the Chai tea leaves but you get a free drink if you buy a can so mom and I decided to just go back next time to buy the can and enjoy the free drink. We also ordered a Triple Decker Cheesecake to go along with our drinks. We read Good Housekeeping while drinking and eating our desserts.

After maybe more than an hour, it was time to go. We had dinner plans with our family friends from Coron. We went to Legend HK restaurant, and dad was the one who picked the dishes to order. I really liked the food because they were all delicious. I just didn’t like the lady who took our orders because she was rude. Tsk, tsk. We pretty much just caught up with each other’s lives but we didn’t talk that much either because P and J are more on the shy type. That and also because we didn’t know what to talk about. Once we had finished talking about our lives, we talked about other people’s lives. Hahahaha, typical. After dinner, we went home and just watched TV for the rest of the night.

Philippines 2015: Day 1 (Yabu, Burger Connection, H2O Spa, My Kitchen by Chef Chris)

On the last week of December 2015, I went back home to the Philippines for the holidays. I was supposed to go back for Christmas but due to some office-related stuff, I wasn’t able to. It’s all right though, at least I was able to spend my birthday and New Year in the Philippines.

Every time I go home, I feel like time is never enough and that I’ve missed out on a lot of things and happenings with the lives of my family and friends. However, as my friend clearly puts it, “You’ve made that decision.” Yes I did. I don’t regret coming here and trying out how it is to work and live abroad, and I do know that all of our decisions have their trade-offs so I’m not going to dwell on that anymore.

This post is to remember the things I did and the places (mostly restaurants) I went to on this specific trip:

Day 1: Dec 26 (Saturday)

I got out of the airport at around 4AM. My parents picked me up, and since we were hungry, and because it was our tradition, we headed to Aristocrat in Roxas Boulevard for breakfast/post airport pick-up meal. We ordered sinigang na tiyan ng bangus (tamarind soup with milkfish belly), chicken barbeque, and stuffed squid. Yum! The servings are much smaller now though, I feel like. After eating, we headed home and went to sleep!

Woke up and got ready for lunch. Austin picked me up and we went to Robinson’s Magnolia. We didn’t really know where to eat so we ended up in Yabu because he wanted unlimited rice and salad. Hahaha I ordered the salmon because I was craving for salmon. Admittedly, I don’t eat a lot of fish in Taiwan. Mostly, I just eat meat and vegetables.

After lunch, Austin dropped me off at Burger Connection. My friends and I were supposed to go to Ludo for food and board games, but we found out that they open at 4PM and I had to leave by around 5PM for another appointment. Burger Connection is this small board game burger restaurant located at Sct. Rallos, Tomas Morato. I was the only customer when I got there, but as the day went along, the place became packed. Wow, I didn’t expect that. They have a minimum fee of PhP150 per person (consumable), and so we ordered nachos, fries, and iced tea. Bry also ordered a burger because he was hungry. They had a variety of games to choose from, and we ended up playing the following: Love Letters, Walk the Plank, Geistes Blitz 2.0, Exploding Kittens, etc.

Since I had to meet mom at H2O Spa for our body massage appointment, we left at around 5:30PM. I hitched a ride with Kimbies and in the car, we talked about her future plans (she wants to study abroad!) and current ongoings in her life.

I had a full body massage at H2O spa because mom had gift certificates. Massages are more expensive in Taiwan and so I make it a priority to get a body massage each time I go back home. We laid on the hot bed after the massage and it was really relaxing. After that, we went to Makan restaurant to claim our free drinks. I had the carrot pineapple juice while mom had the carrot orange juice.

Then, we met up with dad for dinner. We were supposed to go to Greeka Kouzina because I was craving for their fig walnut salad, but they were already closed at that time so we ended up going to My Kitchen by Chef Chris. We ordered his signature dish – panizza. It’s this pizza divided into thin strips that you roll together with arugula and olive oil. Yummy! We also ordered a shrimp pasta dish that was also delicious. Dad liked the food so that’s good.

I’ll write about Day 2 in a separate post!

Come and go, July

We’re already in the last few days of July. Can you believe that? The second half of July has been pretty eventful as well.

One of my (very few) Taiwanese friends came back from her 4-month internship in Germany, so we met up with our other American friend for lunch at Yiamas Greek Taverna. I’d been craving Greeka Kouzina’s (a Greek restaurant in the Philippines) fig arugula salad and thought that maybe Yiamas’ roka salata would satisfy my craving but I was completely wrong. So disappointing. T ordered the moussaka, and it was good but it was overpriced. The roka salata was expensive as well. Oh well, at least I’ve crossed that restaurant off my list and I know not to go back there anymore. I also received a hand cream from Germany. Aww, thank you!

 

T and I tried out this Indonesian restaurant that his Indonesian colleagues frequent, and according to them, it’s the closest authentic restaurant they’ve tried so far. We ordered the chicken curry and the chicken satay. The food’s good and it’s cheap/prices are pretty average. The food reminded me of Singapore though, because it was during my first trip to Singapore that I tried such food.

 

The microwave in our pantry broke down for a couple of days, and so we weren’t able to use it. In those few days, T made me sushi so that I won’t have to heat my food anymore. Aww, so sweet! I’m really super lucky to have such a good and caring boyfriend.

 

We celebrated Goku’s birthday at Ponderosa Steakhouse. Yummy!

This is a character that the company Animax (?) set up at the bus stop where I take the bus home from work. So cute! Originally, it was in the center of the bus stop, but a lot of people were probably taking pictures with it that eventually, it was moved to the side. A sign that warned/told people to pay attention to incoming cars was also placed on the character. Hahaha.

Free cake from my manager!

One of my friends from high school who’s currently working in Singapore came to Taipei for a short vacation, and so we met up with another one of our high school friends who is also based in Taipei for lunch. We ate at this pretty expensive Italian restaurant Solo Pasta whose chef apparently goes to Italy every so often to learn new techniques and dishes and whatnot. The pasta was really delicious, I might say, it’s flavorful and the pasta was cooked really well. However, the size wasn’t that big and so I felt like I wasn’t really satisfied/full. There’s also a minimum consumption fee per person of TWD350. Yikes.

Oh well, at least we were able to try it?

Duck breast pasta

Lemon pie

After lunch, we went to Net because Paul wanted to check out the sales. T and I had to leave after a while though, because I was supposed to go and dye my hair. In the end, I didn’t. It was pretty late and it would take so long to have my hair dyed, so we just went to their company gym and worked out.

There’s this restaurant that we always pass by on our way home from work (whenever T picks me up from work, that is) that I’ve been wanting to try. It’s called Bear Hits Toast, pretty similar in name to one of my favorite restaurants Shark Bites Toast, which was why I thought it was good too. I was wrong. Their food wasn’t anything special.

On the last day of the month, J asked me if I wanted to have KFC for dinner and since I hadn’t had their food in a while, I agreed. I went for their Mexican salsa chicken pita wrap something because I was craving for pita wrap. Heehee. Yuuuuum!

Anyway, I’m going to try this thing wherein I blog every day for the whole month of August. The posts do not have to be meaningful, or long, but I just need to write down something every day. Let’s see how that goes.

[Taipei] Therese Eats: Yiamas Greeka Taverna 亞馬仕希臘餐廳

The first time I went to Yiamas was after the Philippine Independence Day celebration when my friends and I were still hungry and were looking for a place to eat, drink, and sit down since our feet were killing us. Yiamas had already stopped serving food when we got there, so we were left with ordering drinks.

The second time I went to Yiamas was because I had been craving Greeka Kouzina’s (Greek restaurant in the Philippines) fig walnut salad and felt that Yiamas’ roka salata is similar.

I was totally and completely wrong. They are NOT similar. Greeka Kouzina’s salad is soooo much better than Yiamas’. I was really disappointed with Yiamas’ roka salata, to be honest. The serving wasn’t that big (for its price, around 300-320NTD, if I’m not mistaken) and it just wasn’t as delicious.

T ordered the moussaka (which was also around 300+NTD) and it was good. However, I feel that the serving isn’t big so it wasn’t very filling.

They have gyros that are cheaper at around 200NTD an order, but it’s not really big either. My friend ordered that and he seemed all right with it but I wasn’t able to ask him how it was. Oops.

On the bright side, at least I’ve crossed Yiamas off my list of restaurants that I want to try. I’m probably not going back there any time soon because I just feel like it’s overpriced but you can try it out at least once and see for yourself how it is.

Address: 106台北市大安區安和路二段181巷3號 (No. 3, Lane 181, Section 2, Anhe Rd, Da’an District, Taipei City, 106)

Telephone Number: 02 2737 0037

Facebook: Yiamas Greeka Taverna 亞馬仕希臘餐廳

[Taiwan] Therese Eats: Road Runner Burger, Beer, Cafe

This is another restaurant that my cousins and I wanted to try, and this one is located around the Shida area. We met up one Saturday afternoon to go shopping but before that, we decided to have early dinner. Since we didn’t want to eat at Bambi Bambi (our go-to restaurant around the area) because we wanted to try something new, we finally had the opportunity to eat at Road Runner.

When we got there, there were a few occupied tables but there was only one employee. He apologized to us saying that for some reason, all the other employees said that they were going to be late that day. #bestemployeeaward goes to him then! He was also the chef. Wow.

We weren’t in any rush so we sat down at an empty table and looked at the menu. We even told him to take his time and that we were fine waiting.

I ordered the beef avocado burger meal. You can either choose to have fries or a salad and unlimited drink. They have Swiss Miss in their drinks list! I chose the salad because I’m not a big fan of fries.

They give you plastic gloves so that you won’t get your hands dirty. The burger was reallyyyy good, which was made even better by the reasonable (read: not expensive) price.

We also decided to order fried calamari as a side dish. We were choosing between the mozzarella sticks and the fried calamari, and it was a good thing we went for the latter because we eventually got free mozzarella sticks as the restaurant’s way of “making up” for letting us wait. We were really surprised because we didn’t even complain or anything, and we totally understood that the guy was all by himself and he had to take people’s orders, cook their food, and serve their foods until another employee showed up to help him.

After we paid the bill, they gave us a free fortune cookie. It was funny how my fortune was the only one with English. My cousins’ were in Chinese. Hahahaha talk about coincidence. Timely “fortune” too!

Really yummy food and reasonable prices = satisfied customers!

Address: 106台北市大安區羅斯福路三段171號2樓之1 (2nd Floor, No. 171-1 Roosevelt Road Sec. 3, Daan District Taipei City) – near MRT Taipower Building Station exit 3

Telephone Number: 02-23686801

Operating Hours: Weekdays (4PM-12MN), Weekends (11:30AM-12MN)

Facebook page: Road Runner Burger, Beer, Cafe

[Taipei] Therese Eats: Le Tao 來自北海道的新鮮

My cousins and I went to Songshan Cultural and Creative Park to check out the exhibits as well as the stores inside Eslite Spectrum. After walking around for a couple of hours (I think), we decided to have afternoon tea at this nearby cafe. My cousins had been here before, but since they liked it, they wanted to eat here for a second time.

In order to diner here, everyone has to order a minimum of 1 drink. There is also a time limit of 2 hours per table that you can stay inside the cafe. For starters, they give you this mini chocolate platter.

Roxane and I ordered the matcha lattes while Richelle went for the cocoa latte, if I’m not mistaken. I can’t remember what these drinks are called.

For food, we ordered the 芒果之戀，厚燒鬆餅 (NTD360) that are these 3 fluffy pancakes topped with mangoes and other fruits, with a side of vanilla ice cream.

We also ordered the 綜合水果雙味乳酪蛋糕 (NTD250) that contains their bestselling cakes (cheesecake and tiramisu) and also comes with a side of vanilla ice cream and fruits.

To be honest, the food and drinks were good but they were expensive, in my opinion. The service is really good though, and the ambiance is pretty nice as well. According to my cousins, this is a restaurant/brand from Japan that is maybe one of the reasons why they’re expensive?

Address: 信義區忠孝東路四段553巷30號 (No. 30, Lane 553, Zhongxiao East Road Sec. 4, Xinyi District, Taipei)

Operating Hours: 11:00AM-8:00PM

Telephone Number: 02 2760 2100

Website: Le Tao 來自北海道的新鮮

[Taiwan] Therese Eats: Galette

I found out about this restaurant from my cousin who had previously been there and posted a picture online. I felt like it was such a cool place to go to, so one Saturday afternoon, I told my boyfriend that we should go.

It’s a cafe wherein you can hang out, eat, and assemble jigsaw puzzles. They also have free wifi and they don’t have a time limit (which is both good and bad – good for those who already have seats and bad for those wanting to get a seat) so you can stay there for as long as you like. They also have this promo where they give you free cookies if you finish assembling a 300-pc puzzle.

When we got there, there were no vacant tables, and so we had to wait for around half an hour (maybe?) before we were finally seated. Ended up with this 300-pc Starry Night puzzle because it was the only 300-pc puzzle left. It was sooo hard to assemble because most of the pieces look alike and because the color scheme mostly revolved around different shades of blue and yellow.

We also ordered the quiche and matcha latte, which were yummy. I also like the cup because it’s really pretty. One of the downsides is that our table was a bit small so it was kinda cramped. Had we ordered two drinks/food, then it wouldn’t fit on our table anymore.

After around 5 hours (WHAAAT!), we were finally almost done with the puzzle!!!

Below are the cookies that we got for free. If you have nothing to do and want to spend the entire day out of your house, then you can try going to Galette just to try it out.

Address: 台北市大安區辛亥路一段136號 (No. 136, Sec. 1, Xinhai Road, Daan District, Taipei)

Operating Hours: 11:30AM-10:00PM

Telephone Number: 02 2362 2585

Website: 葛樂蒂咖啡館 Galette Cafe

 

[Taiwan] Therese Eats: Agnes B. Le Pain Grille Cafe

Agnes B. Le Pain Grille Cafe is another place that my cousins and I have always wanted to try but was never able to. One night, after watching Furious 7 with Richelle, we had dinner at a Japanese restaurant. We were supposed to go to Shida night market after that because I wanted to buy some beauty products. However, since it was raining, we decided to stay inside the mall and have coffee/dessert instead. We ended up at Agnes B. L.P.G. Cafe because it was near the restaurant where we had dinner.

We were only supposed to get drinks, but they had a promo where if you ordered anything worth 200NTD or over, you’d get a slice of cake for free. We only had to add 40NTD and we’d get the cake. What the hey, right? I don’t really remember what we had because we were choosing between different drinks that I already forgot what we ended up ordering. It might have been the creme brulee latte and tiramisu latte, but I might be wrong. I also don’t know what the cakes are because there were no labels (or I wasn’t paying enough attention) so we just pointed at what looked yummy. As I’m currently browsing through their website, these could be the Tiramisu 提拉米蘇 and Danielle 奶油甜酒巧克力蛋糕.

For some reason, I always had this notion that their coffee and dessert were expensive, and that was one of the main reasons we always don’t end up going inside. I found out that day that I was wrong and that they were no different (in price) from Starbucks drinks, or other cafes around Taipei. I liked my drink, and we really enjoyed Danielle. We didn’t like the tiramisu as much. It was a really fun day bonding and chatting with my cousin.

[Taiwan] Therese Eats: Caffe Bene

Since Caffe Bene opened last year (?) in Taipei, I’ve wanted to try it out with my cousins. However, we always end up going to other places, or I was always unavailable whenever they’d go there (happened twice, maybe) so I was never able to go with them. When I went with T to Kaohsiung over the Tomb Sweeping Holiday, we decided to go because there was a branch near the public library where we were at the time.

Since we’d already eaten dinner at home, we decided to get dessert. Got the matcha latte 冰抹茶拿鐵 and the cinnamon caramel honey bread 焦糖肉桂吐司 (because they were out of the garlic and cheese one 香蒜起司). T got regular latte 冰拿鐵 and his brother got the chocolate chip latte 冰巧克力拿鐵.

According to their website, the honey toast alone contains 1022 calories!!! WHAAAT. Good thing we shared it among the three of us (although admittedly, I ate a lot more compared to the two of them HUHUHU). Everything was delicious though, so I regret nothing!

Labor Day Weekend 2015: Banqiao (Top Gun Bowling and Mega City)

Since we had a long weekend (Labor Day weekend), we were supposed to go outside the city. I wanted to go someplace we hadn’t been to before. However, since we were both busy and lazy to plan anything, we ended up just spending time around the city.

On Friday, we went to Banqiao early in the morning to play bowling with T’s friends. The bowling alley has an ongoing promo wherein games/rates are cheaper from midnight until around 8 in the morning, at around 15NTD for a game (10 frames). You can see from the picture below how rates are 50NTD from 8am until 1PM, and increases to 60 and 70NTD as the day passes. They opted for the cheapest ones so we were there before 8am. Zzzzz. It’s been super long since I last played bowling, so I officially suck.

After bowling, T’s friends had to go somewhere else, which I found weird because I thought we’d be spending the day with them, or at the very least that we would all have lunch together. T and I went to Mega City Banqiao mainly to watch Avengers 2. Since the movie wasn’t for a couple of hours (phrase check?), we had lunch at the food court (Food Republic). We bought Indian food from Indian Fans, and I also bought milk tea from Toast Box. I wanted to order the Kaya Toast Set but I was already full by then, so I decided against it. While waiting for the movie, we walked around the mall and hung out at Kingstone (bookstore). After some time, we went to the cinemas and then watched Avengers 2. Pretty good, overall. I wasn’t planning on watching Avengers 2 since I hadn’t watched Avengers 1 (it doesn’t make a difference, I think), and because I wasn’t a big fan but T wanted to watch it so…

We were thinking of either going home for dinner or just eating out when T asked me if I’d eaten at 博多拉麵. He had previously eaten there with his colleagues and he felt that the food was good so he wanted to take me there. I went for the milk/cream (?) soup base because it’s the restaurant’s specialty. The ramen was reallyyy good, and I really liked it! We also ordered some side dishes to go along with the ramen because I wanted to eat more meaaaat.

All in all a good day!