Pursuing our Best Life - one word and one stitch at a time
Food Trip
We bond over food. We love checking out new restaurants, just for the fun of it.
Like many of our generation, we click before we eat. Sometimes though, we’re too hungry to bother.
We are not prolific food critiques, we’re just normal people who know good food. :)
Between the two of us, it’s the husband who cooks at home. Maybe someday I will too. But until then, I wouldn’t likely be sharing recipes on the blog. :)
Maybe that’s the key – free popcorn! Key to what? Well, employee satisfaction!
Of course free popcorn is just the symbol. Unless you have something specific against popcorn, you will generally have thoughts of fun and leisure associated with it. After all, you mostly eat it while watching a movie. Eating popcorn is almost synonymous to kicking back, relaxing, and seeing a movie. Free flowing popcorn in the office may elicit positive feelings and may actually usher in the fun!
And it’s relatively inexpensive right? A commercial popcorn machine might have to be purchased, yes, but most offices already have microwaves in their pantries so that’s a good start if there’s no budget for additional equipment.
I’ve been thinking of ways to bring the fun back at work and somehow popcorn just popped in my head. It is comfort food, like chocolate. And it can be healthy granted there’s not much salt OR sugar thrown in. Or oil.
This site gives one a good idea on how much popcorn machine supplies cost. I wonder if it’s the same locally. I’m sure that if I raise this at work I will be asked about costs and ROI. Seriously, we’ve been coming up with so many different things just to hype the floor and drive the vibe.
Maybe I’ll bring some popcorn to the next brainstorming session.
Wow. Regular Monday flew right past me. I slept the entire day, passed out on the couch without a care in the world.
Sad thing is that it’s now midnight and I have work in two hours. Because I’ve been up since 7 I’m pretty sure I’ll have low energy at work. Oh well. Such is my life.
You know what though? I normally complain about sleeping in during my days off. But now I know I shouldn’t. Sleep is a rare commodity. And I should be thankful that I have days when I can stock up on sleep.
Anyhoo.. I was looking through the photos on my phone for blogging inspiration and realized I had a few ones on DropBox that I haven’t used on the blog yet. So, here they are!
Starbucks had their Frappuccino Happy Hour promo earlier this month and I only enjoyed it once, on the last day I think. The boyfriend isn’t a coffee shop fan because he claims not to understand why people would buy expensive coffee and sit around the coffee shop. He’s not a coffee drinker and would only occasionally have some to keep himself awake at work. He’s good with the three-in-one instant variety.
We ordered non-coffee frappes: Strawberry for him, Green Tea with Soy milk for me. Colorfully yum!
Since drinks were half price, we got Venti sizes. I also ordered some food since I hadn’t had lunch.
I got a chicken wrap, and the cinnamon swirl was for the boyfriend. I also tried a cake pop. The chicken wrap was a healthy alternative to a piece of cake. Sadly it didn’t leave much of an impression on me. I don’t think I’ll be ordering it again.
The cinnamon swirl is pretty much a staple order for us so nothing new there.
The cake pop is a Bakerella sensation. It’s a lot like the oreo truffles that I also make, also courtesy of the Bakerella. I had to try the cake pops.
It’s okay. Texture was a lot like my truffles. It isn’t too sweet either, which was a bummer. My truffles tended to taste a bit salty due to the cream cheese I think, but these pops are not the least bit salty. I want more. Maybe I’ll make my own na lang.
I’m trying an iPhone app for blogging. If this works, I’d be so happy 🙂
Dad took me out for parking lessons and after an hour of going back and forth, left and right, we took a break.
Since we were already at the Quezon City Memorial Circle, we checked in at Serye.
At first things looked great. They served Dad’s tea first and the contraption used was quite interesting. But it took forever to serve my Tsokolate Frappe and the Suman sa Latik. When those arrived though, they were worth the wait.
The suman was so small though so there’s really not enough to share. After having a small portion to taste, I decided to order another serving. The waitress said it would take 5-7 minutes to prepare. 20 minutes later, it was nowhere to be seen. Dad asked for the bill so we could run soon after it is served. Guess what wasn’t included in the bill? The second suman order. So it looked like we waited for naught. Grr.
I would have recommended Serye for the little of it’s specialties that we sampled today, but their service leaves much to be desired. Sayang.
The post is successful BUT the image was way too big. Plus the image tracker of BlogBooster isn’t showing properly. Oh well. I just have to perfect posting images from mobile devices. 🙂 What follows is what I added from my PC, after resizing the image above. 🙂
Soooo… Serye was a bummer. I might give it another shot, perhaps at a different branch. The waiter was actually nice enough to tell us that they were selling the teapot that was used for Dad’s one-serving tea. He also showed us the tea leaves in a jar that they were also selling for 200 pesos. It really was interesting and would make a good gift for Mom, or for any tea drinker. Then because we waited so long for my orders, I had time to daydream about what kind of silverware, china, cups and glasses I’d like to have in my future home. Thought about furniture and Sferra linen even.
Anyhoo. We ended up spending an hour at the restaurant for just a drink and a light snack. Bummer.
I love chocolates. I’m not very choosy with them either. But since I tried Meiji chocolates, they’ve been a favorite.
A week after the big earthquake and tsunami hit Japan, I picked these sweets up from a Mercury drug store. Strawberry and Marbles.
I love their smell. As soon as I open the box, I cannot resist them.
Funny thing is, I forgot about these babies for a full week before finding them again still wrapped in plastic.
So since buying them, I’d been thinking of having them, but I managed to wait another week before ripping each pack open and devouring them. Yay, me. haha
Sometimes I buy two of each kind just for backup. I keep it in my bag, waiting there for some kind of travel emergency. You’ll never know when you might need a pick-me-up right? And these chocolates do just that for me. Okay, I probably should have something else in my bag just in case there’s a real emergency too.
The Carinderia Buffet is located in the corner of V.Luna and Mabilis Streets in Pinyahan, Quezon City. I have not been around that area so much in the last five years so I was surprised when a colleague at work told me about it. Since the boyfriend was away on Thursday, I got the chance to have lunch with a different group – King, one of my TLs, Patrick, a Trainer, and four other agents. They were going to Enchanted Kingdom after shift that day but decided to hook up with me for lunch before they set out for adventure land.
Carinderia Buffet boasts of a 99-peso Eat-all-you-can buffet of carinderia staples. A carinderia is a neighborhood/corner store or eatery that sells cooked meals at very low costs. People would eat at these places, or buy food to take home. Some people, mostly A/B crowds, try to stay away from eateries or carinderias though because these places are not subjected to government inspection for health/safety standards.
That’s what the Buffet is capitalizing on – they offer the usual carinderia fare while guaranteeing cleanliness. The price isn’t necessarily targeted for the C & D market, but for an eat-all-you-can arrangement, 99 pesos is very cheap.
Upon entering the establishment, I couldn’t help but note the roominess of the place. There were plenty of seating avaialable, and at around 1 that afternoon, there were very few empty tables. It was well-ventilated. No fancy furnishings or décor.
The second thing that caught my attention was this sign:
Well, with the number of people dining there, I wasn’t surprised that they had this rule. Besides, it was the only way they can regulate how much people could eat. Haha. Also no sharing of leftovers.
So how was the food? They had a lot of veggie dishes, but then not a lot of variety for the meat/fish section. On the set above, the left photo are all veggies, compared to all the ulam dishes to the right. One would think there should be more selections on the section to the right. I tried their por binagoongan (not special), pork sinigang (yummy, but very fatty), fried chicken (ok), adobong kangkong, ensaladang mangga/talong, and squash with string beans dish. Everything was okay, but non really WOW’ed me.
There was only one dish for dessert and we thought it was sweetened banana – it turned out to be sugared sweet potatoes.
Drinks are not part of the 99-peso fee. A refillable drink costs about 40-45 pesos.
Will I be back? If only so the boyfriend could sample the food, yes. But there’s really nothing there to pull me back.
Would I recommend it? Why not. It’s an experience. It’s affordable and you can eat-all-you-can for one hour. You can take your friends or colleagues here and treat them out to lunch without having to break the bank or taking out cash advance online. 🙂 They have clean toilets too, with tissue and running water.
Have you tried Carinderia Buffet? What’s your favorite restaurant?
Seriously, we’ve been coming up with so many different things just to hype the floor and drive the vibe.
