Frannywanny

Lately it has been extremely hot outside. Too hot that I have been avoiding all reasons to go out for lunch and instead would happily eat my homemade sandwich in the comforts of my air-conditioned office. Oh what I'd give to have a tall glass of Halo-Halo right now. This year, someone predicted that the Filipino cuisine will be the next big thing . I'm really excited for this to happen as I honestly feel there's so much for the world to taste and to appreciate about our local dishes. Set aside the famous adobo, we got our laing, pinakbet, the really comforting sinigang, our wake-me-upper silogs and of course, all our pork dishes from crispy pata down to sisig. The Filipino cuisine will surely take the gastronomic world by storm, don't you think? Having said that, I really miss Filipino food at the moment. Despite the many restaurants available, if you ask my Mom about her favorite Filipino restaurants, she will probably name 2-3 in a snap. One of these is Mesa Filip...

Growing up in San Juan, I've seen how it has slowly transformed from a quiet municipality into a fun and vibrant city. Back then, the only commercial area was Greenhills Shopping Center which continues to be our go-to place to do our grocery, to eat good food and to do some bargain shopping. There were other restaurants and commercial spaces around the area but you can basically count them with your fingers as they weren't a lot. Cafe Ysabel is one of those that has been around for as long as I remember. However, I haven't really gotten around to dining there as I always thought it looked a bit creepy especially at night. Once, Paul took me to Cafe Ysabel for dessert, as their Strawberry Shortcake is to die for, and I really couldn't get myself to go to the loo thus I just forced him to quickly finish our dessert and to take me home pronto. It must be the vintage-feel as well as the dark lighting that reminds me so much of those horror Filipino movies that my yaya ...