This was one of the few strawberry shots that I took when we went to visit Strawberry Farm in Benguet last March 4 to 6, 2011. Thanks to Eurotel Hotel for sponsoring our all expense paid trip. It was really a lovely treat. A couple of hands will never be enough when you go visit Strawberry Farm. Aside from the many unique baby gifts that you can grab a hold of, vegetables and fruits are oh so cheap. I honestly sometimes wish I live in Baguio. It will be a whole lot easier to eat healthier if you live in the Summer Capital, that’s one thing for sure.

Portraiture and Food Photography are two of my main hope to learn this 2011. But before anything else, I am in dire need to hone my basic photography know hows. I am giving myself this month to run through the videos I took of my Basic Digital Photography class with Sir James Nicolay. It was in 2009 that I took the class and after almost 2 years, I still have not gone through the videos.

I love taking portraiture because I love to capture the expression of people around me. Food photography for the obvious reason that my family and I love to eat. It is too obvious, in fact that we now need to know how to reduce belly fat. It will be also sweet if our love for food will manifest through great photographs.

This is one of the things we indulged in during the holidays – Vita Italiana’s Supremo Pizza. An ordinary tasting pizza. Not spectacular, for sure. Nothing beats Sandy’s Pizza for sure. It was our first time to try Vita Italiana in Robinson’s Metro East. The service was good but food can be better. We just ordered this and another pasta dish – Marinara Pescadora. Spaghetti Factory is still best when it comes to pasta.

We just love trying out offerings of different restaurants around the metro. I know that I might as well get myself ready to only fit in plus size lingerie if we keep at this pace. But we plan to lay low as soon as the holidays are over.

Today is my mom’s 65th birthday and we all decided to celebrate with a lunch date. We tried out this House of Kare-Kare located along Sumulong Highway. It was a nice, homey place. Perfect for what we are there for. It was just like a house turned into a restaurant. There is an al fresco area where there are Davidoff cigars all over the place. But of course, we had our reservation in the non-smoking area.

We ordered Crispy Pata (pictured above), Oxtail Kare-Kare, Sizzling Bangus, Bulalo and had a Red Ribbon cake that mom blew after she whispered her birthday wish.

Our newest favorite food place is Rose & Grace and here is a shot of their famous Bulalo. We used to indulge in one of those restaurants in Tagaytay for our Bulalo fix. But after having tasted Rose & Grace’s bulalo, there is no way we will be settling for anything less.

Rose & Grace’s bulalo’s meat is done perfectly. From the meat’s texture to its taste. Perfect 10. As good as it is, we cannot indulge on it as often as we would love to. Although truth is, we all should be ready but I would certainly would like to have to push away having my loved ones make a claim on the insurance of my choice from all those insurance quotes I looked into.  But we will certainly have a taste of Rose & Grace’s bulalo again soon.  Loved it to its core!

After having been served with much bigger mussels via Delish and Italianni’s, I was a wee bit disappointed with Spaghetti Factory’s baked mussels. I love baked seashells and this includes mussels. I really should be making one myself right at home! Anyhoo, as for Spaghetti Factory’s mussels Rockerfellers Style, the taste ain’t bad at all. I would have to say that they have kind of gotten my taste buds content with every single dish they serve.

Although I would have to say too that it would be so much nicer if they do servings good for more than just a midget. I’m not sure if it is my huge appetite, that resulted to my need to look into apidexin reviews, but Spaghetti Factory despite their serving tasty dishes serves small portions compared to most restaurants I know.

To break away from our usual chicken fix from Max’s and KFC, we went to Savory today. I am personally not satisfied with the way they cooked their chicken. So we ordered pancit and a beef viand to go with the chicken. Not bad.

Dining outside our home surely makes a good break for an overall domestic queen and wahm like me. But I would have to go easy on this or else I would have to make use of top rated fat burner or something. We are all gaining weight!

With other pizzas, I prefer the thick crust types. But with Sandy’s pizza, I never minded from day one I tried it that they don’t serve them in thick crust. I’m not sure if they cook it like one would a traditional pizza or even if they use furnace filters on their ovens. The only thing I care about is how good it is done. I am just glad that there are more Sandy’s Pizza branches now.

The picture above is the only order I appreciated. It is the Mixed BBQ Kabbab @P195. The rest of the stuff we ordered like that of the Regular Shawarma Sandwich. We did not get the “special” variant when we found out that the only difference between the two is the size. We were there for a taste test, anyway. Nothing special about their shawarma. Their garlic sauce even tasted more of a regular mayonnaise than that of a real persian garlic sauce. Everyone on the table agreed. Ababu it is still, hands down.

The one good thing that I liked about Shawarma Snack Center is the fact that we can stay in an enclosed area where cigars are not allowed. As opposed to Ababu which has always been an open area. But it could be just us or maybe we ordered the wrong dishes. Just in case you’d like to try Shawarma Snack Center for yourselves, here’s their address.

Shawarma Snack Center
485 Salas St.
Ermita Manila
Contact Nos. 525.4541

My craving for Sandy’s Pizza’s margherita pizza drove me to grab the next best thing -Margherita Pizza by Burgoo, P295. It’s cheaper all right. But nothing close to how good Sandy’s Pizza make theirs. Just writing about this makes me want to drive to their Blue Ridge/White Plains branch. What’s frustrating about Sandy’s Pizza places is that they cannot accommodate a lot of patrons. And because they have the best pizza in the world, there was never an instance that the place is not packed.

I’m happy to hear from the hubby that he has seen another Sandy’s Pizza crib along J.P. Rizal in Makati. If they keep at the quality of pizzas they serve, they are bound to multiply, given that the team behind the company will do good at the accounting jobs department. I hope they do and open up another pizza crib close to our place.