Come and dine with me the Brazil Brazil way!

You already know how much I love to dine at my heart’s content—aka buffet meal. So when a friend told me that Brazil Brazil is worth a visit, it’s Php777 per head on a Sunday lunch, I totally bought it. So one Sunday, while JM was away I treated my family to a lunch at Brazil Brazil.

I’m not denying that I am a big meat eater, I’m the type of person who would not be satisfied on bread alone:D. So Brazil Brazil is the best place to be, as I was told. They offer grilled pork, beef, chicken, sausages and fruits. They even have a salad and pasta bar.

Once seated, you’ll be given a yoyo which has a red and green side. If you want grilled meat and fruits to come non stop on your table, leave the green side of the yoyo facing up. When you want to halt the delivery and enjoy your food first, let the red side visible. One thing I’ve also noticed is the alertness of the crew in attending to their guests’ needs.

It’s sad to say that I was quite disappointed with Brazil Brazil, the grilled meat does not have the magic I was looking for. It was rather ordinary, in a sense that you could easily prepare it at the comfort of your home. The saving grace for me was the avocado ice cream, which I really loved and had x number of cups. Oh well, maybe if they had lamb chops on the day that I went maybe I would sing a different note for them – or maybe not.

I scream, you scream, we all scream for...

Let's face it: It is HOT this summer. Baking hot. Sometimes, given the choice, we would rather just stay at home and laze out in bed for another hour or three instead of heading out and enjoying all that solar radiation. Besides, even if you do enjoy prolonged doses of solar radiation, you'll probably want to find something to cool down with after a while...which is why we're featuring a gustatory treat most relevant this season. I mean, just look at the title. :)

Haagen-Dazs meets Starbucks meets Blue Bunny

After our jaunt to Pancake House, my mom and I proceeded to S&R for a bit of shopping. Amid the folding tables and frame walkers we bought, we also brought home a few pints of ice cream from S&R's admittedly varied lineup.

 

For this visit, I decided to try a new flavor and an old favorite. I've heard raves about Starbucks Coffee's eponymous line of ice cream, so I grabbed a pint of Caramel Macchiato to see if it tastes anywhere near that infamous sweet blended coffee drink. I also got a tub of Blue Bunny's Double Strawberry premium ice cream. To the best of my knowledge, both of these are only available at S&R. My mom got a pint of Haagen-Dazs' Strawberry ice cream as well.

When they mean Starbucks ice cream...

...they mean it

Caramel Macchiato ice cream. Doesn't look like much, but wait till you taste it

Pleasantly surprising was how Starbucks' ice cream mimicked the nuances of flavor of its namesake blended coffee drink. I thought it was a bad imitation at first, but upon subsequent spoonfuls of the stuff it definitely felt really familiar, as I was a big Caramel Macchiato fan in years past. The coffee flavor of the ice cream melds well with the caramel drizzle taste-wise that despite appearing like separate entities it's very hard to distinguish them apart on your tongue. Deelish. Whatever trickery they've done here, it works quite well.

"It's so fluffy I'm gonna dieeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee"

On we go to the tussle of the strawberry scoops. Blue Bunny and Haagen-Dazs are both premium but they go about it in slightly different ways. Haagen-Dazs is all about the density and richness of the ice cream, evident from just the darker color of the stuff and how heavy it sits on your spoon. Blue Bunny's ice cream on the other hand is much lighter and fluffier - easier to roll into a scoop and jam into a cone. "Double strawberry" refers to the embedded pieces of strawberry (which Haagen-Dazs also has), and the strawberry sauce lacing the tub (which Haagen-Dazs doesn't).

Between these two, my palate prefers Blue Bunny, although Haagen-Dazs isn't very far behind. The latter is more easily purchased, however...

Lots of Blue Bunny ice cream tubs on sale only at S&R. They have sugar-free and frozen yogurt tubs too

Yummy :)

Finally, Mabie and I got to sample another of Merry Moo's creations from our last visit to Mercato Centrale. They name it "Aztec Chocolate" and we were curious to see how different it was from your usual chocolate ice cream.

Appropriately enough, the Aztecs invented chocolate

The interesting thing was, when we asked for "Aztec Chocolate," Arvy the friendly scoop man gave us a little explanation of what this flavor was and what we should be expecting out of it. It's a combination of chili and chocolate, basically. You may remember that Empire's macaroons also promised a similar-tasting product from a previous visit.

Arvy doing his thing

Now, for those uninitiated with matters of the pepper, milk and dairy products are a common and effective remedy for washing away the burning, stinging bite of capsaicin - the stuff that makes chili peppers so spicy. Ergo, it initially doesn't make any sense having ice cream that brings on the heat; it should be implausible right?

The proverbial calm before the storm...

When Mabie and I dug into the PhP70 scoop, we were surprised. Sure, the initial taste is of pretty good,  chocolate ice cream that's slightly on the rich side, but gulping it down releases a flame of heat that can only come from a chili pepper. That said, if you can stomach the spice, the whole experience is delectably smooth and the sensation is akin to drinking shots of a given hard drink. You'll definitely feel it burn evenly down your throat. Mabie had to give up halfway due to the strength of the chili flavor, so I experimented with taking frequent scoops if there would be any difference or "relief" - no such luck. Let's just say this ice cream flavor is a treat for chili lovers; capsaicin-intolerant folk need not apply.

All four of the ice cream flavors we tested here are variations on old trusty favorites which you might want to check out before scoping out more exotic combinations. :)

So hot, it melts on its own :p

Transcending the decades

My mom was pretty bored on Maundy Thursday, so she asked if I wanted to accompany her, driving around the Makati and Taguig areas to see what exactly was left open. Having nothing better to do, we got into my car and hit the road.

Much to our chagrin, Greenbelt and Glorietta were virtual ghost towns. Skipping Makati, we crossed EDSA and went to Bonifacio Global City. Pootling around, we noticed Bonifacio High Street was open. We parked, disembarked and spelunked for a closer look. It turned out much of High Street, Serendra and Market! Market! was also closed down, but there were a lot of people gathered round due to the massive, artistic Stations of the Cross exhibits littering the center garden of High Street. What remained open were some restaurants, hoping to capitalize on the visitors.

After walking around, my mom thought of having an afternoon snack at Pancake House. She had told me it used to be their hangout in the 1970s and 1980s, especially when the Magallanes locale of Makati was a much busier place than it is today. In those halcyon days when she worked there, there was a bowling alley, a cinema and a branch each of Magoo's Pizza, Dayrit's, the steak house Mingoy's and Pancake House.

A panorama shot of Pancake House Bonifacio High Street's interior.

The branch in Bonifacio High Street sure doesn't look like a typical Pancake House branch. They took more liberties with the decor, mixing a collection of movie posters with post-modern architecture in the franchise's trademark orange motif.

Bacon Waffles. The bacon is embedded :)

Mom had their Bacon Waffles (PhP160), while I had a three-piece order of Peach Pancakes (PhP175). Both of us had a cup of brewed coffee (PhP70; PhP78 with one refill) to go along with it.

That's some bad-ass coffee!

It has to be said, Pancake House's coffee is some of the strongest you'll ever find in a restaurant. Emptying one sachet of brown sugar into the glass, it still tastes wickedly black. It's a full-bodied brew that Starbucks mixed-drink aficionados might find overpowering. We actually ordered a refill, but as this was already 4pm in the afternoon and the brew was much more potent than expected, we requested the refill be canceled.

I didn't get to try the Bacon Waffles, so I'll talk about the Peach Pancakes, which were pretty interesting. You get a stack of three moderately thick pancakes, along with six peach slices and a small dollop of whipped cream on top. A small beaker accompanies the dish with what looks like peach-flavored syrup.

Peach Pancakes, quite obviously :) Check out the syrup beaker.

The pancakes themselves are fluffy and cake-like, and not very dense. Indeed, if your fork has a large piece of pancake skewered on it, chances are it will tear off and plop back onto your plate after some resistance. I grew up in a household that prefers dense pancakes, but I can appreciate Pancake House's recipe as it's not overly thin or floppy. The peach syrup is surprisingly not very sweet, imparting a just-right kind of taste to go along with the pancakes and peach slices.

Overall it's a good, filling, carbo-loaded breakfast or snack. And that potent coffee is just something else. I usually don't frequent Pancake House but I now might have reasons to go back more often.

Tidbits and treats at Best Food Forward

So what did we eat at Best Food Forward? As it turns out we had quite a lot to chew on.

Moroccan's promotional catering flyer-cum-menu. This is just the first page!

There was a Moroccan food stall present (yes it's simply named "Moroccan"), and curious about Mediterranean food, I ordered a plate of chicken on couscous. Eating couscous is like eating finely chopped cheese, but with a faint curry flavor getting released instead. The dish has steamed chicken on a bed of the yellow grain, along with some slightly bitter vegetables - I'm not sure but they look like squash and eggplant. Overall the combination makes for a peculiar earthy taste. It certainly tastes pretty exotic, but I liked it, although it's slightly pricey at PhP150.

Check out their other offerings below in photos.

Chicken and vegetables on steamed couscous. This was my lunch!

Batboot: Moroccan-style pita

B'stilla: a sort of Moroccan meat pie or "empanada"

Carrot sharmoula and aubergine (eggplant) zalook dip/salad.
These are made with extra virgin cold-press olive oil and paprika.

Moroccan's Chicken B'stila

Moroccan is based in Galeria de Magallanes - rather close to home. If you want something to surprise your palate, give their unique cuisine a try. They have a booth at Mercato Centrale from time to time as well.
____________________
Moroccan
Unit C-101 Galeria de Magallanes
Lapu-lapu Street, Magallanes Village, Makati City
8523658
(contact information courtesy of EYP.ph)

==================

The hilariously named Eat My GF serves up its eponymous garlic fries (the GF in the name). A serving gets you a cardboard tray full of hot fries, with large slices of mushrooms, a slathering of their in-house gravy, and lots of crispy garlic. Two short plastic forks are provided for you to stab the fries with.

This would not look out of place on Krazy Garlik's menu. The gravy makes the whole thing work. They're best eaten on their own, without condiments. Some mustard is okay, but ketchup just kills the taste they were going for, neutralizing the distinct garlicky kick.

Oh, they serve tacos too

Even the names on the menus are hilarious!

According to their Facebook page, Eat My GF will be at the Rockwell Tent on April 8-10, and will soon open in malls. You might want to watch out for the arrival of these fries with a garlicky sense of humor.

____________________

Eat My GF - Garlic Fries 

+639177941984

http://www.facebook.com/pages/EAT-MY-GF-Garlic-Fries/209255229090929

==================

Caution: The stack of roast beef on this tarpaulin sign is as big and as thick as it appears

Enzo's Shawarma sold like pancakes out there. It's hard to miss the thick slabs of skewered, thoroughly seasoned Turkish roast beef whose shavings form the innards of the shawarma. All of these are laid into a thick bed of pita bread - almost too thick, perhaps. Despite the breadth of the pita, the very flavorful beef wins out. Yogurt sauce fans may be disappointed though as there's not much of it...but I guess you could always order more.

One yawning tunnel of meaty goodness

Enzo's Shawarma has had three years of success in the University Belt area. Check 'em out!

____________________

Enzo's Shawarma
+639229905264
+639272744857
enzoshawarma@yahoo.com.ph

http://www.enzoshawarma.com/
http://facebook.com/EnzoShawarma

==================

Remember Tea.ology? This time, I made sure to try the Mojitea. I ordered it at 50% sweetness and with nata de coco.

To be honest...Mojitea isn't a very good name for the drink. The beer-colored non-alcoholic drink they served bore no semblance to the hazy semi-transparent cocktail it's supposed to be modeled after. Worse, the taste left a lot to be desired. It's very minty, but there's none of the punch or sparkle of the real thing - sensations brought to the palate perhaps by the alcoholic elements. Taste-wise, I couldn't tell if it was trying to be tea, mint, or some sort of beer, because it was trying to be all three things at once without much success.

Maybe adding some club soda would help?  

Mojitea with nata de coco, 50% sweetness

I'm pretty sure Tea.ology has great drinks, but the Mojitea just isn't one of them. The Dark Chocolate Tea I had prior was much better despite the chocolate soy milk impression.

Just in case you missed their contact details, here they are again below.

____________________

Tea.ology

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Teaology/148711248481135

http://www.mercatocentrale.ph/tea-ology/

+639339428691

==================

On to dessert. We had "yogu pops" at Picole, which is as simple as it sounds - it's yogurt frozen into a popsicle. We sampled the blueberry cheesecake yogu-pop at PhP40.

Check out all them yogu-pop flavors!

As Franz Ferdinand would sing, "Take me out!"

Ripe for a lickin'

I wasn't expecting a whole lot from this but I do have to say it's a great dessert. It really does taste like a blueberry cheesecake split in half, flavor-wise. The initial taste is genuinely blueberry; it even comes with tiny tidbits of the fruit studded into the yogurt base. As you swallow your bite, it lends a distinct cheesecake-like finish on the back of your tongue. Simple, but very impressive, and it's an example of "doing what it says on the tin," as the Brits would say.

Like Enzo's Shawarma, Picole has some presence already - this time in the malls. Check out their website for all their locations.

____________________

Picole Healthy Ice Pops

http://www.picolehealthyicepops.com/

info@picolehealthyicepops.com

Best Food Forward!

JM's officemate gave us passes to the Best Food Forward summer food fair (Thanks Ness!). Being a big fan of different dishes, we just couldn't pass this one. So earlier, we had lunch there and got to try a lot of food! 

Aside from a lot of free tastes, they also had a cooking demo inside the NBC Tent.

You already know by now how I am deeply in love with macarons. When I saw this stall selling colorful macarons, I just had to try it! I was able to try the chocolate macaron and it was heaven. The chocolate filling literally burst in your mouth. 

Stay tuned to see what else we had:)

_________________________

French Macarons by Christa

Box of 12 Php450

Box of 6 Php230

Baby Macs Php150

Lollie-Macs Php25

Macaron Towers start at P1500

Contact at: 09178905747

christaskitchen@yahoo.com