All the sushi you can eat

(originally written January 22, 2011)

One thing you must know about me is that I love to eat. I wanted to eat somewhere I haven't been before so one Saturday in January, I ended up at Sakae Sushi at SM Mall of Asia. Now, I've been to this mall a lot of times before and I've passed by this place a number of times too but have never really gone inside. I like Japanese food and their sushi buffet for Php399 caught my attention so I decided to get dinner there. Basically, you can get all the sushi you want as they pass by in a "conveyer belt" and eat until you can't stuff yourself any longer. For the price mentioned, you also get miso soup and hot/iced green tea.

Sushi passing me by.

Each colored plate represents the amount of the food in it, in case you are not availing of the buffet. Blue = Php39, Yellow = Php59, Green = Php79, and Red = Php99. To get the most value for my money, I got mostly red plates. These are also the ones which looked more appetizing.

One thing I didn't like very much is that their sushi are very thick. Most of those that passed by me are made with a thick layer of rice and maybe it's their strategy of getting you full easily since this is a buffet. Another thing is that I hoped they had smaller sushi, like bite-sized pieces which can easily fit my mouth.

By the times I got full, I finished seven plates. I really wanted to eat more but my stomach couldn't handle it. All in all, I can say that the buffet was good. Sure, there was nothing really special with their sushi but I went home with a full stomach and that's good enough for me.

My seven empty plates.

Big Binondo Food Wok Chinese New Year Special

It was a lucky coincidence that I had the day off on Feb. 3, which was Chinese New Year, so I decided to finally go on the Old Manila Walks' Big Binondo Food Wok. Binondo is known for being Manila's "Chinatown" and being Chinese New Year, the tour was special compared to the usual tour. The instructions e-mailed to me stated that the meeting place would be at the Binondo church at 2 pm. I arrived a little earlier than 2 pm and immediately looked for people who looked like they will be joining the tour. There was already big group of foreign ladies, which I guessed was there for the Food Wok. Since it was my first time inside this church even though I've seen it quite a few times, I looked around and took a few photos.

Binondo church's ceiling

At some minutes after 2pm, our tour guide, Ivan Man Dy, arrived and took our group to the side of the church to officially start the tour. There were 43 people in our group that day, with more than half being foreigners. I was alone but there was also another person who went solo for the tour, so we became buddies for that day. The tour started with a history of Binondo narrated by Ivan from memory and with the use of simple visual aids. I'm sure all Filipinos studied history in school but hearing it that way makes it easier to absorb.

Our tour guide, Ivan Man Dy

There were festivities all around Binondo and it was getting noisier around the church so we went to our first food stop for some peace and quiet. This is where Ivan continued retelling history and where we got our first taste of Binondo's food for that day.

New Po-Heng Lumpia House

The first food served to us was Lumpia. It was fresh lumpia, filled with lettuce and veggies. Before we ate, we all learned a little lesson about lumpia or spring rolls, and a demonstration of how to eat it. You're supposed to put the a drop of the sauce, a drop of chili sauce, spread it, take a bite and then do it for every bite. You can also put garlic mixed with vinegar, and believe me, it is better if you put that garlic mix.

Preparing the lumpia

My lumpia. This is half of the regular serving.

We also has tsa misua, which was like fried misua. I had only a little of this because I don't want to get easily full. Like the lumpia, you can also put chili sauce on the misua. I liked it better with the chili sauce just because I like spicy food. The nuts in the misua also added to the flavor of the dish.

Tsa Misua

After the lumpia house, we then walked towards our next food stop which was almost literally a "hole-in the-wall."

Dong Bei Dumpling

Watching the dumplings being made from the glass door/window.

The dumplings are made fresh right there for everyone to see. The place can seat 20 people but everyone in our group can fit inside, though some will need to stand. The dumplings were great. I actually bought some frozen dumplings to take home.

Fried dumplings

Steamed dumplings. Bought some of this to take home.

For our next stop, we had to walk a little further to a siopao place. Ivan says you can't buy siopao like that outside Binondo and it is neither asado or bola-bola. I don't really eat siopao but I liked the taste of this one even though I don't know what's in it.

While eating our siopao along the sidewalk, lion dancers came and we got to see them perform. You have to give them treats and play with them to make them dance which was really fun to watch.

The lions...

doing their dance

After watching the lion dance, we headed on to our next stop which was Cafe Mezzanine. It was a big and airconditioned place which fit all of us comfortably. It was also very evident in the interiors that this place is also called the Volunteer Fireman's Coffee Shop.

Cafe Mezzanine

Helmets and photos line up the walls.

Here we were served iced coffee, salty rice (I forgot what it's called) and fish ball soup. I was also able to catch a glimpse of the dragon dance while we were here.

Coffee, rice and soup

Dragon dance

For our last stop, we went back to the lumpia house for dessert. And Chinese new year won't be complete without tikoy of course! We were all given different flavored tikoy and other free stuff to take home.

Stuff I took home :)

Attending the Binondo Food Wok, especially during the Chinese New Year was so much fun. I'm looking forward to joining their other tours as well and get to know more about Manila.

Yakimix birthday

It was my birthday last Feb. 1 and to celebrate, I decided to have a family dinner at Yakimix. This place has been around for a while but we've never gone there. I know it's a buffet place which is what really attracted me to it, but I also liked the idea of grilling the food on our table.

I've read that the place can be packed but we came on a weekend and easily got tables, though the place got full as time passed. We immediately went to the buffet station and divided the stuff we were gonna get. There were soups (we tried one, and didn't really like it so we passed on soups), kimchis, different raw meats - beef, fish, squid, shrimp; a station for cooked veggies, meat and rice; sushi and maki and of course dessert.

Different meats to grill (there's a crabstick in there too).

Another plate waiting to be grilled.

These meats went on to the grill and while waiting we ate the other selection of food that we got. My family is not much of a Japanese food lover, so I got the sushi all to myself though I did force them to try the salmon skin maki which is my favorite.

The asparagus wrapped in meat was delicious.

Waiting for them to get cooked.

Got only a few since I'll be the only one eating.

Mixed rice, tempura, fish with broccoli, chicken among others.

The dinner wouldn't be complete without dessert. They had a bunch of small square pastries, choco cups, a sans rival cake which later on got replaced by a chocolate cake, candies, marshmallows and ice cream. One thing I wished is that they could have had more ice cream flavors instead of Selecta's 3-in-1 + 1. Nonetheless, I love sweets so I was a happy girl.

We had a lot more than 2 fruit pops :p

More desserts :)

Oh, and since it was my birthday I got a decorated slice of cake and a song c/o these girls from Yakimix. 

New Year Post

(originally written January 18, 2011)


I’m not much of a writer; I’m not very creative either, which may be why I’ve never kept a blog before. But this time I want to try something new.

I know this is overdue, but here it is anyway.

2010 was not a very good year for me, so this time I want to have an awesome year. There are a lot of things I want to do, places I want to go and experiences I want to try. Add the fact that I’ll be turning 25 in less than a couple of weeks makes me realize that I must do something to turn them to reality. I’ve always kept them stuck inside my head but never really did anything. This year, it’s going to be different.

I’ll go on an adventure.