I’ve mentioned Ha Yuan and its Maki Mi before. However, that post did not do justice to one my favorite eateries.

I grew up eating Ha Yuan at the Food Court of SM Cubao at its Basement. Due to our home’s proximity to SM Cubao, we were there almost every week, and almost every time I would get either taho (soy curd and tapioca with syrup), the Beef Noodle Soup, or the Maki Mi.

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For our third wedding anniversary, I bought for my husband a small charcoal grill from Ace Hardware. And because my husband went on a vegetable shopping spree from his recent out-of-town trip, we had a bunch of vegetables in our fridge just pleading to be grilled.

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Patchi Chocolates from Beirut found its way to the shores of the Philippines, onto my desk and eventually, to my ever excited taste buds.

Once you enter the Patchi store, it is easy to be intimidated. Their display of gift baskets of chocolates are worth at least 4 thousand pesos. On their display shelf of individually wrapped chocolates, you will find an overwhelming number of variants. Even with the menu and description, an indecisive person may experience something short of a seizure from all of the choices… 40 variants!

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The menu is one part of the restaurant operation that every customer sees and it may define the restaurant or food service outlets in many ways… read more about menus.

I know very few people who don’t like chocolate. In fact I am fortunate to be surrounded by friends and family who mostly love chocolate. You will actually notice a lot of what I have in this blog talk about some form of chocolate candy, drink or dessert. And my ultimate dream is to be able to perfect my own version of a moist chocolate cake.

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At least twice, we crashed at a friend’s place and crashed her kitchen too. We all don’t have the luxury of time so we all take advantage of using any spare time to cook anything that comes to mind. In this case, we cooked… [read more...]

Why does your ice cream melt so fast? There must be animal or vegetable fat in it. Not anyone knows that but it’s true. Most ice cream use substitutes for milk fat. If you want to make sure you’re eating ice cream that contains only milk fat, try FIC’s Gourmet, Premium and Lite flavors. Who’s FIC or what’s FIC? [Read More]

Lately, my taste buds have turned to craving for Asian flavors. I seemed to be always looking for spicy yakisoba, shrimp dumplings, sushi, sashimi, veggies in oyster sauce and orange chicken. Even my snacks have that hint of Asian as I stuff myself with siu bao (Steamed Pork Buns) or some siu mai (Shrimp dumplings) that are abundantly sold in kiosks around the place where I work.

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Meat sauce. Bechamel. Cheese. Think rich, yummy lasagna. I love it! The many times I have made it though really became too rich even for me. Imagine all that butter you need to make your bechamel sauce.

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You all know how much I love cheesecake. I made a simple cheesecake, a chocolate cheesecake and now I have successfully whipped up a mocha cheesecake. This was inspired by the most perfect coffee cheesecake that my friends and I had while enjoying coffee and great conversation at Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf. Surprisingly, my cheesecake proved to be the most perfect among all those that I have baked. No cracks, intense taste. So I am sharing with you my tried and tested recipe. Enjoy!

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It was my first time to go to Boracay, so I was looking forward to 2 things: the beach and the food. I was really looking forward to lots and lots of seafood on my short stay on the island.

[Read more at stoicpassion.com]

These days I always get chided for not sharing my recipes for dishes that I serve to friends and family. I tell them its not that I don’t want to share, I just have limited time to sit down and actually come up with witty words to go with the recipes that I publish. I don’t want my posts to be just a recipe. I try to add some story or two to accompany my recipes because in reality my recipes are parts of my life.

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Kubiertos.com in partnership with Discovery Travel and Living is giving away 10 cookbooks by DTL’s famous chefs, Willie Harcourt-Cooze, Kylie Kwong, and David Rocco to 10 lucky readers of this blog. All you have to do is post a comment here about what you plan to do this year to make Christmas extra special. You can post as many ideas as you want as long as they’re unique. It would be understandable if the basic idea will become similar to others but the details should be uniquely your own. (Ex. Special Christmas dinner can be an idea of many people but you can make it unique by how you plan to do it or what dishes you plan to cook to make it special). The contest will run from December 13 to December 27.

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Being the busy bees that my hubby and I are, there isn’t always time to pack up and drive to someplace nice so we could just unwind and relax. However, about an hour away from the city, (at least without heavy traffic and all that) there lies Tagaytay, a small town frequently visited by those longing for some cool air and warm meals.

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I am so in love with Pepper Lunch’s Beef Pepper Rice. But its not possible (or practical) to dine out there everyday so I did my best to try and create my own version of a dish that is made out of Beef slices, rice, and a lot of pepper. It was a challenge to exactly replicate the appearance even the taste of the dish that came over from the Japanese but it was something that satisfied my craving. I used thick strips of beef as that was what we had available so for next time, I will make sure to buy super thin slices (like bacon) for my next beef pepper rice.

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Greetings from AQ Services International!

We would like to invite you to apply for a mystery shopping program. It would require you to mystery visit several petrol stations.

1. For these mystery shops you need a PERSONAL CAR (motorcycles are not allowed). You are required to observe the service and facilities standards of petrol stations.

2. Reimbursement: The shop fee is 450 Pesos per shop. You are required to make petrol and store item purchase. The minimum amount to spend on fuel is 200 Pesos.

3. Deadline: These mystery shops have to be completed within the one week and the surveys must be completed and submitted within 24 hours of mystery shopping, latest by the 14th of November 2009

Please note that these mystery shops are to be executed between 9 am to 3 pm, 7 days a week (Including weekend).

We will inform you from the 19th October onwards if you are selected for one or more mystery shops. Do check your mailbox for updates!

Summary:

Project: Mystery Shopping for an oil & gas company
Task: Evaluating and Research
Time: 9 am to 3 pm, 7 days a week (Including weekend)
Deadline: 14th of November 2009
Fee: 450 Pesos
Location: Philippines

If you are interested in getting some extra money over the weekend please contact my colleague or myself at feisal@aq-services.com or me at alessandro@aq-services.com.

TELL A FRIEND

We are always looking for new mystery shoppers. If you have friends or family who might be interested, please refer them to us. You can redirect them to our website or use the following link (copy paste the link in your browser if it is not active):

http://www.aq-services.com/mystery-shoppers/tell-a-friend-about-mystery-shopping

With the initial hype that comes with a new place gone, I was secretly hoping that Charlie’s would not be too crowded for lunch. It was almost 1pm after all so I fully expected that only the regular clients remained. But we arrived to find no table available and there was quite a wait for us to do before we were able to enjoy the food that many foodies have talked and written about.
Being so close to where I worked, many were surprised that I hadn’t even tried Charlie’s famous Philly Cheesesteak or their Buffalo Chicken Wings. I have long since resigned to the fact that there are certain expectations when people know you write about food. So my friends were supportive when I suggested we eat at Charlie’s and off we went and waited for a few minutes for a table.
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Feeding a household that is composed of a family of 4 (3 boys) and 2 nannies can be a strain to one’s creativity in the kitchen. Too many times, I hear the frustrated sighs of “Again?!”, when the kids find out what is being served for dinner. Often, when I try to reengineer the previous day’s leftovers, it would be my hubby that I would hear complaining that my skills were not enough to hide the fact that I was still serving leftovers. It is a chore simply to come up with unique and delicious dishes to serve your hungry family. After all, how many times can you serve Adobo, Sinigang or Kare Kare?

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I have been reading up on several bloggers’ DiscOVIries contest and only now found a theme that I can participate in. Surprisingly though, I found the theme through tech blogger Javyee instead of another foodie like me. His week 3 contest encouraged bloggers to show their passions in terms of the gadgets you have or use related to it. This theme is named: Display Your Gadgets. Javyee is a tech blogger so his photo included his collection of computer, camera and podcasting equipment. Nice.

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I must confess I have disliked drinking milk ever since I crossed the line and left preschool. I also do not like milky tasting or even milky looking dishes or treats like a milkshake or white chocolate or ha ha what do you know, polvoron. I do however love to mix milk in cooking and baking where the milk complements a dish instead of the main ingredient.

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