Okay, this is not a Barat moment. It’s been a while since we’ve been to Burgos Circle and I missed it. Okay, there are not a lot of restaurants with the ambience that we wanted. Most of the food places there are bar-type restaurants with funky multi-colored, or scarce, lighting. We like dinners where we can enjoy good food, actually see our food, and talk, and talk , and talk…
There was a restaurant recently featured on Ensogo that I wanted to check out, so we walked there, and it was several blocks away, but a good walk is still good exercise, which I actually don’t get much of, so we didn’t mind. When we reached the restaurant, I saw blue lights and what not and felt turned off by the ambience. When I read the Ensogo promo, I got the impression that the place was a bit on the fine dining side, and the bar vibe I saw scared me off (I’m not so sure about ordering expensive sous vide dishes from a disco-looking place), so off we walked back to Burgos Circle to find another place to have dinner.
It seems we got a little carried away walking around, and by the time we got to Cafe Juanita, it was closing time! Too bad. I have never eaten there before and wanted to see what the fuss was about. Maybe next time.
So, looking at our limited choices, we decided to try Just Thai. We were glad we did! We didn’t really know what to expect. As you know, there is authentic Thai, and there is fake Thai. And even for authentic Thai, there is high-end Thai (Benjarong, People’s Palace) and there is home-cooking Thai (Muang Thai). Just Thai felt a little in between. We ordered Thai Fish Cakes (290), Beef in Red Curry (P480), and Mixed Seafood in Basil (P280) and rice. We both liked the fried basil leaves on the Mixed Seafood curry, it’s something we have not seen before when eating Thai. It adds a nice something to the curry.
The Thai Fish Cakes were so so, but we really liked the Mixed Seafood Curry in Basil and the Beef in Red Curry. They both seem to have the same base as the sauce but we didn’t mind. They were still delicious. Total damage was P1,275 for 2 people. Ouch. Definitely not a barat moment. Sorry for the grainy pics, I just used my cellphone camera.
After dinner, we moved to have dessert at Sweet Bella, also on the same strip as Just Thai. I had read a few blog posts about this cafe and it looked cute, all pink and Parisienne. We ordered the Strawberry Shortcake and the Chocolata. I liked the Strawberry one. It was light and refreshing. I am a chocoholic, but I didn’t like the Chocolata that much. It was too heavy on the chocolate frosting for me, but I liked the actual chocolate cake (without the frosting). But the prices are steep! The Strawberry Shortcake was P275 and the Chocolata was P220. Sweet Bella also had a lot of macarons on display. They looked really yummy. I wanted to try some but when I asked, the price was P60 a pop! Maybe next time, then. That is really expensive macaron.
In case you are not familiar with macarons, they look like 2 big pacencia cookies with their flat sides stuck together, and they come in various colors and flavors, and can be very delicious.
