Bananas from Calawis, Antipolo

Yesterday, I made sure to stop by the weekend market at the Sumulong Park, which is the area between the Antipolo Shrine and City Hall. I already saw the fruits and vegetables being sold there on my way to City Hall and I knew these were cheap and sold by the farmers themselves.

Saba and latundan bananas from the weekend market 

 

Banana chips likely from the same saba variety that's abundant in the mountains of Antipolo.

I learned from the vendors from whom I bought bananas that they were from Calawis. I frequented that barangay because of Mt. Purro, which is managed by the family of close friends. Whenever we were there, we made sure we got some fruits and vegetables from the area if not from Mt. Purro where they have the farmers over to sell their products to guests. My only regret from yesterday was not buying ginger. Perhaps I will get some from them next weekend.

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Mazesoba at Menya Kokoro

I found this unfinished article about the lunch we had at Menya Kokoro at the Podium in Ortigas Center. Their main dish is mazesoba, which is a brothless (soupless) noodle dish. The noodles are soba and not ramen. I haven't eaten this since the 1990s when I think I last had it at our university canteen (shokudo) in Yokohama.

Unagi mazesoba

Closeup of the noodles of this very satisfying dish

It's always nice to get reacquainted with the food I tried many, many years ago when I was a student in Japan. In this case, the mazesoba was a welcome departure from the ramen we usually enjoy. The unagi (eel) was a bonus that I readily opted for when I saw it on the menu. I wouldn't mind eating there again soon. But the serving is generous so I have to be a bit hungry to finish the food.

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Lunch at Tablo, Maginhawa Street, UP Village

We initially planned to eat lunch at Gyud Fud Hub last Tuesday. However, when we got there, we discovered that two of our go-to stalls have closed. These were the Bacolod Chicken Inasal and the Siam Thai where we usually got our lunch when we are at Gyud Fud. The others are ok but we only occasionally order food to try other stalls. The only one remaining among our go-to was the Japanese themed stall serving salmon sushi and sashimi. But that sort of limited our choices. Hindi naman kami mabubusog sa ice cream ng Colonial Creamery. And so we ended up going to Maginhawa Street where we haven't lunched at for a long while. My buddy guided us to Tablo, which he said was a popular restaurant. 

Their version of beef salpicao

Fried breaded pork chops

We had a really good lunch at Tablo. The servings were generous as we only, correctly, ordered two dishes that we shared among three. There was real good value for money, too, considering the quality of the food and service at the restaurant. We were lucky that we had lunch there during this mid year break so it was not crowded. I heard it could be full during evenings and weekends. We are already looking forward to the next opportunity for a lunch out.

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