Tron Legacy

I was given two tickets to the special screening of Tron Legacy held last night at the Imax 3D cinema of SM Mall of Asia courtesy of, once again, my friend P.So (thanks so much!)

Since the event was sponsored by SM and Walt Disney Studios, you'd expect not just your plain movie showing. There was a photo booth courtesy of iFlick, complimentary eat-all-you-can pizze courtesy of Lots'A Pizza, a bucket of popcorn and a can of Coke courtesy of SM Cinema and Coca-Cola. Plus there were two Ducati bikes on display. Guys dressed as Tron characters moving around the crowd and posing for photographers.

For the first time in my movie watching experiences, we were asked to deposit our handphones, cameras, and computers at the makeshift counter for safekeeping our 'possibly' movie recording devices. I think they were taking security measures too far but, honestly, it was liberating not to have any phone calls or sms for two hours.

Tron Legacy is a follow up of the original Tron movie that came out in 1992. Tron is, of course, adapted from a video arcade game of the same name. The movie stars Jeff Bridges (both as himself in his current age and as a digitally enhanced version that is 30 years younger), Olivia Wilde , Garett Hedlund, and Bruce Boxleitner. Jeff Bridges and Bruce Boxleitner were both in the original Tron movie.

Go and catch the Imax 3D version of Tron Legacy at either SM MOA, SM North Edsa or SM Cebu. Just don't sit too close to the screen like I did, otherwise, a headache is bound to ensue with all the fast movements on the screen.

Wee Nam Kee

One of the most talked about restaurants nowadays in the vicinity of Makati is called Wee Nam Kee. Wee Nam Kee is a franchise from a hawker stall in Singapore which is very popular for serving Hainanese Chicken Rice. Personally, when I visit Singapore's hawker areas (there are several), I prefer to go and queue up for the Laksa located near Fook Hai Building in Chinatown. Laksa, for me, has more character and flavors than Hainanese Chicken Rice (but then, I digress from what this blog is all about). Anyway, its amazing how the franchisees of the Philippine Wee Nam Kee transformed it into a proper restaurant here in the Philippines compared it to being a hawker stall in Singapore.

So as I mentioned in my previous blog, I had the chance to eat at Wee Nam Kee with my good friend Eon as I happened to be in the vicinity of the restaurant last Wednesday.

First of all, allot enough time when you want to eat at Wee Nam Kee because you will definitely have to queue up to get a table. Fortunately, Eon was there ahead of me and was able to secure a table by the time I arrived at the restaurant. Ordering was easy since everybody knows that they are supposed to be the best in Hainanese Chicken Rice (steamed). I also ordered a Personal Set (includes rice and soup) of Roasted Chicken and a plate of Cereal Prawns (been hearing great reviews about the prawns so was curious to try it plus I count prawns as one of my favorite food items).

I expected the chicken dishes to arrive first since the prawns were an additional order but surprisingly, the prawns arrived first. A plate of cereal prawns includes 4 medium to large sized prawns with cereal flakes and red chili slices. I was excited to bite into my prawns as I am a big big fan of prawns (and mussels).

It's suggested that you eat the shell with the prawns but I opted to do the normal way of eating prawns by only eating the meat without the shell. Then grabbing a spoonful of the cereal/chili flake combination and eating it with the prawn was just pure goodness. The dish was as good as advertised. Up to this point, everything was going perfectly and the restaurant was living up to its popularity.

Now here comes the tricky part. If you are eating while reading this or you have a weak stomach, please stop right here!

I was ready to attack my second piece when lo and behold, what should be hiding underneath the flakes and shell...

Now to take a closer look...

There's a strand of hair on my prawn! Any normal person would lose appetite once one sees a strand of hair on one's food and I'm no exemption to that rule. I hurriedly called out the waiter and showed him the 'evidence'. He was very apologetic about it and looked quite sincere. Normally, I would have been upset but the logical part of my brain was telling me that this was no fault of his so I just let it go. He grabbed the plate with the remaining offending prawns and promised to replace them with a plate of newly cooked prawns.

While waiting for the prawns to arrive, our chicken dishes arrived. The waiter apologized to us for the late delivery of the chicken dishes and his explanation was that the cutter was not around (during a peak hour period?????)

Both chicken dishes look good enough to eat but what I really ordered was the roasted one for myself. Hainanese chicken for me is the same everywhere around.

My observation of the roasted chicken was that it was a little bit dry. And the chicken slices looked a bit smaller than the steamed one although this could just be my imagination and I'm sure the kitchen staff do weigh the chicken portion. The taste was good enough but honestly, it was not exceptional. Perhaps its because I've tried a lot of roasted chicken dishes in most parts of Asia (Hong Kong, Singapore,etc) that my taste buds have become jaded?

Next up was the infamous steamed chicken. It was juicier than the roasted one, due to perhaps being a steamed dish. The taste was good as it should be since this was their piece de resistance. But as I mentioned earlier, Hainanese chicken doesn't do anything for me.

The only saving grace for me on the steamed chicken was the trio of sauces associated with Hainanese Chicken rice. You mix together the sweet soy sauce, ginger and chili sauce to create a delicious sauce worthy of flavoring a bland chicken.

The chicken order came with a cup of rice and a bowl of chicken stock soup. I must say that I loved the rice. I'm not a big fan of eating rice but I could have finished ordered additional rice if I was a glutton. I didn't but I was so tempted.

The soup tasted like your ordinary chicken stock soup but what stopped me from finishing it was the fact that I found a small strand of hair on it (looked like a hair from one's eye lashes). I told the waiter about my double luck that day with regards to body hair getting into my food but managed to keep it cool and also managed to finished the second order of my Cereal Chicken.

So was all the hype worth it? In my humble opinion, eating there once was already enough to last me a lifetime.

Wee Nam Kee

Ayala Triangle Gardens

Makati Avenue
Makati City

Tel: (+632) 8468924

The Fruit Garden

I'm currently attending a series of basic training for Amadeus until the end of the week and the training happens to be in their office in Makati. So whenever I have the opportunity to be in Makati for the whole day (which is rare), I always try to catch up with my friend Eleanor (or Eon as she is known in these parts of my blog world for being a consistent commenter on my blog). We decided to have lunch at Wee Nam Kee (review on my next blog) and pretty much had a lot of catching up to do. Eleanor, being a great friend, gave me an advanced Christmas gift (my first, in fact, for this year) which consists of two jars of The Fruit Garden jams.

Based on the The Fruit Garden's website:

"The Fruit Garden mission is to offer consumers an 100% Natural high quality fruit products.

By understanding trends in society we are committed to develop healthy and luxury fruit products, maximizing the use of local resources.

We have developed 5 jam collections around Mango, Pineapple, Strawberry, Orange, and a seasonal collection; In addition we are also offering a 100% Pure Philippine Honey from the province of Abra."

Amazingly, these fruit jams are all home made and 100% made in the Philippines!

Above bottle is from The Fruit Garden's Noel Collection and its called Orange Whisky. The jams' consistency are a little bit runny but not runny enough that its like water. It has the perfect consistency when you scoop it up with a spoon and spreads easily on one's piping hot croissant.

The Orange Whisky is a little bit on the sweet side but not too sweet that you will get tired of it easily. Whenever there are jams around, the first flavor I always pick up first is the orange one. So it was no surprise that I enjoyed my first taste of The Fruit Garden jam with the orange variety.

The 2nd bottle is called Mango Lavender. As I mentioned earlier, I'm more of an orange jam person so I was a little apprehensive about tasting the mango flavored one. First of all, consistency is about the same as the orange flavored ones but I think there were some small chunks of mango included in the bottle (or I might be mistaken). After taking a bite out of the bread with the mango jam, I am now officially torn between the orange and mango flavors. They are both wonderful! By tasting both jams, they can be nothing else but naturally good. I might never go back to eating commercially processed jams.

Now, as far as my memory serves me right, I've never been a jam person at home. The only times that I do take jam is when I take breakfast at the different hotels that I'm check in to. But The Fruit Garden's luxury jams are definitely making me want to order a few bottles (I'd like to try the entire Noel Collection) and stocking up for the Christmas season as well as for the days beyond.

For orders and inquiries, you may visit: www.thefruitgarden.net

iSwap Faces

One of the applications from the Apple Apps store that I downloaded that I had the most fun with and which I highly recommend is called iSwap Faces.

As the name implies, it allows you to swap the faces of people on pictures that you have on hand on your iphone, ipod or ipad. And the nice thing about it, any simpleton can do it as the instructions are plain and simple.

Below are some of the photos I've 'tampered' with.

Original Photo

After iSwap Faces

Original Photo

After iSwap Faces

Believe me when I say that you will have hours and hours of fun with this apps. And so did the people who cannot get over looking at the altered pictures.

Christmas Wish List

Its almost Christmas-time and of course, one can't help having a wish-list of things one may need or want or crave but may not necessarily be of any use ...I'm not exempt from it so here they are in no particular order.

1. Delsey x Lolita Lempicka pet carrier

To allow my dog(s) to travel in style. Although I still have to see an airline here in the Philippines that would allow small dogs in the cabin. Where to buy: Travel Club in Greenbelt 3

2. Gold watch from Nooka HAVE IT! (bought a gold watch from Tokyoflash Japan though)

I already have the Nooka silver edition and I've recently been obsessed with owning a gold watch. Not wanting to look like a returning overzealous overseas worker with piles of gold on them (no offense meant), I wanted a hip looking gold watch like the one from Nooka. Where to buy: My Diamond stores like the one in Mall of Asia, Glorietta 4, Gateway Mall or Robinson's Place Ermita

3. Marc Jacobs iPad Sleeves HAVE IT!

A stylish and affordable keeper for my iPad. Also comes in purple, pink, blue and yellow. Where to buy: Marc Jacob stores like the one in Greenbelt 5

4. Blackberry Torch HAVE IT!

I'm a big blackberry fan so of course, the one that should replace my blackberry bold 9000 should be none other than the Blackberry Torch. Comes with touch screen and blackberry's signature qwerty keypad. Where to buy: Anywhere that sells handphones

5. Blackberry Playbook HAVE IT! (used my bb playbook to type this!)

Although still not yet out, it looks like a promising iPad competitor as far as Blackberry fans are concerned (myself included!). Where to buy: not yet available

6. Fino Reversible Bag

Although I'm not exactly a fan of locally made products, Fino is truly one unique Filipino company that produces world class quality products. The reversible bag is leather on one side and canvas on the other.

Obviously, below picture is not the Fino reversible bag but the Louis Vuitton Tadao. I couldn't find a picture of the Fino bag but it looks similar to the LV Tadao (Fino reversible comes in brown/brown and red/black combination). I would love for somebody to give me the LV Tadao though if the Fino reversible bag is not available hehehe. Where to buy: Fino stores like the one in Edsa Shangri-la Plaza Mall

7. iPod Touch HAVE IT!

I need the iPod Touch as a music provider when I go jogging. I usually use my BB Bold but I'd like to switch to a dedicated music player. Where to buy: Apple resellers

8. Canon PowerShot s95 HAVE IT! (although not exactly this camera but the Lumix LX5)

An excellent replacement for my old canon digicam. Great for taking pictures for my blog. Where to buy: Camera stores

9. Fred Perry Tartan Hold all

I already have two Fred Perry hold alls so another one wouldn't hurt. Tartan hold alls come in green or red and both colors are just lovely. Where to buy: Fred Perry stores at Greenbelt 5 or Mega Mall

10. Sports coat or Blazer from Zara HAVE IT!

Saw some great looking blazers from Zara which i can use on casual days that I'd like to be a bit dressier than just wearing a pair of jeans and tshirt. Great for travelling without looking neither too formal nor too casual.

I don't have a picture of the blazer but I did take a picture of the item number/barcode of the blazer that I tried this afternoon at Zara's (which unfortunately cannot upload as of the moment so I'll just have to type it out manually)

Art: 6861/326/802

Size: M

Color: Its either black or dark blue

Where to buy: Zara stores like the one in Greenbelt 5

Happy birthday...Nov 30

I'd like to give a birthday shout out to my very very good friend in Cebu, Ms May Baruc Dy Guani!





Today happens to be the birthday as well of my cousin, Calvin Ting and my friends, Mark Yuching and Chester Feliciano.

Happy Bonifacio Day!

Coriander

Coriander (coriandrum sativum) according to Wikipedia "in food preparation may refer solely to these seeds (as a spice), rather than to the plant itself. The seeds have a lemony citrus flavour when crushed, due to terpenes linalooland pinene. It is described as warm, nutty, spicy, and orange-flavored."

Coriander is also the name of a Singaporean Indian restaurant in Cebu located at Crossroad Arcade. According to the waiter, the owner of the restaurant has been residing in Cebu for seven years now and the restaurant used to be located at the house of the owner. Up until the owner decided to open a proper restaurant at Crossroad this year.

Food items in the menu are mostly spicy. So if you're not particularly fond of spicy food, I suggest dining somewhere else.

For starters we had Veggie Samosa. A puffy pastry stuffed with spicy potatoes and other spices.

We also had Naan bread with curry dip. It somehow reminded me of pita bread. Naan is a very popular type of bread from India and the curry sauce goes perfectly well with the bread.

We also had this potato dish mixed with some spices which tasted really good although I forgot what it was called exactly.

One of the two non spicy food in the menu is the Hainanese Chicken dish which came with a bowl of soup. Since I was raring for Indian food, this was the only dish that I did not try (aside from the Fish Tandoori which is solely for the reason that i don't eat fish!).

Above are two tandoori dishes, Chicken and Fish tandoori to be exact.

Saffron Rice to balance off the spicy dishes that we were partaking of. According to the waiter, a kilo of this type of rice costs Php 300 or US$ 7 per kilo (pricey indeed if you consider that you can buy a low quality rice for Php 20 or US$ 0.45 per kilo)

I love Indian food primarily because of all the spices that they use. So I thoroughly enjoyed my dinner at Coriander plus the fact that i was with excellent company.

The Coriander
Unit M-13 Crossroads
Banilad, Cebu City
Tel: (+ 63 32) 511-1675

Sunburst Chicken

One of the things I try not to miss eating at whenever I am in Cebu is a restaurant called Sunburst. I specifically go there for their Chicken Skin. I am health conscious with the stuff I eat (no fats, no high cholesterol, etc) but I always make an exception to Sunburst's chicken wings. Besides, I only get to eat it at least four times a year and you only live once!

Last decided, I decided to meet up with a friend and have a late lunch at Sunburst at SM Cebu. While waiting for him, I ordered a plate of Chicken Skin (small although I could easily have devoured the regular as well). My friend was 15 minutes late and by the time he had arrived, the chicken skin dish was all but gone!

Not to worry, I was planning on ordering a Double Ribkeel plate. So when my friend arrived, we looked over the menu and proceeded to order.

So we did a bit of catching up and talked about various stuff. Eventually his order of a Double Thigh arrived and I encouraged him to eat ahead as I've already had chicken skin earlier. To while away the time, I decided to fix me the signature sauce of Sunburst which goes perfectly well with their chicken.

Its a combination of ketchup, worcestershire sauce and hot sauce.

My friend was halfway through his chicken when I decided to follow up my order. I initially asked a waitress to follow up my order but unfortunately, she never came back to my table. The second waitress I followed up with was the one who took my order. She hurriedly went to the kitchen only to come back to tell me some bad news. I never ordered for my chicken! I almost fell off my chair and of course, i started to get upset. I reminded her that I was the first one to order ahead of my friend. She was apologizing and such but I told her to call the Manager. She said the manager was not around. So I told her to call the most senior person in the restaurant who happened to be the Supervisor. I explained to her once again why I was upset and her first suggestion was to rush my order. I said I already lost my appetite and my friend was about to be finished eating his food. Plus I was worried they would do something to my chicken in retaliation for complaining. To add insult to the injury, she wanted to comp the food. I said I do not complain just to get complimentary food as I can very well afford to pay for it. In the end, all she could offer were apologies which I didn't even feel was sincere. Lesson learned: never eat at Sunburst SM Cebu! hehe thank goodness they have several branches in Cebu.

I ♥ CEBU

I just came back yesterday from a 3-day vacation in Cebu and I must say I really love that City. As someone said...If Manila is my city, then Cebu is my home! I was there to attend my very good friend, May Baruc Guani-Dy's 30th birthday party at the Penthouse and we did party and dance (at least they did) until 3 am! which is one thing I hardly do or enjoy in Manila. I was also there to meet up with my Japanese and Korean friends (who are actually better Filipinos than me in a lot of ways). Just between you and me, I wouldn't mind moving back to Cebu if the right opportunity came...

Bought this personalized shirt from Islands Souvenir shop in SM Cebu for Php 499.75 or US$ 12. 100% cotton so its either for our tropical climate (or so the SA told me)