The Amazing World of the Undercover Chef

Yesterday after a really big comfort food happy lunch in Rufo’s in Makati and dessert in Fluke in A.Venue Mall. I found myself enroute to the south for work, then lo and behold! there was an invitation to go to a singaporean food thing with Kassy, Kwe, by her friend JR… and possibly Tamille and Chi (both of which I have not seen in ages btw)

I was really tired having only slept about 2 hours the night before, but Kassy said.. “I’ll pay for your food” Haha, as much as it pains me to say this, I cannot say no to Free Food and Singapore in the same sentence, so off we went.

So we went to Manila Ocean Park and we found ourselves in a really picturesque (think Traditional Asian interspersed with Modern elements) restaurant named Makansutra.

Makansutra is a south east asian restaurant that wants to give us foodies in Manila their unique take on hawker food ala Singapore. (You know the place in sing, where it’s like an open air thingie wherein you point at what you want and they cook it for you? Think Ihaw-ihaw but Satay instead of Adidas..har har!)

They gave us a tasting of 13 of their 14 dishes (haha, we’re due for another course next time we’re there). We were a table of 6 hungry people gorging on stuff we couldn’t pronounce, haha! that’s the long and short of it.

How did the food fare? Some were notable hits including that yummy omellete thing with the really tender fish, suprisingly loved the simple inihaw na bangus, and that egg noodle dish reminiscent of pad thai without the tamarind and much sweetness.

Drinks were on the guests, and we got different drinks each. I was lucky enough to have ordered a Lemon Barley Drink, which I loved and seriously will duplicate soon. How did my drink taste? Think rice “am” with floating bits of barley with lemon. I know it sounds weird, but the Barley was yummy I tell you! The rest had this rose drink (colored pink, tastes like something with rose water with a slight raspberry like tinge at the end, yes, think cough syrup but it was suprisingly a hit with the people who ordered it) and a michael jackson drink. (MJ = soymilk + gulaman, needed Syrup, but what the hey! healthy fiber and milk).

Dessert was a foreign version of halo-halo (to tell you the truth, I kinda like Razon’s way better) and a barley based dessert. Between the two, we liked the latter. It was barley water again with barley of course (duh!) syrup, longgans and a jelly-ish/gulaman thing with a unique texture.

Another highlight of the night besides the food was the raffle of which every member of our table won something including the grand prize worth 6,000 bucks. Har har! We were called the Lucky Table of the night for obvious reasons. har har!

Considering that I was invited last minute, I didn’t pay for anything (thanks Kas and JR!) , immensely enjoyed our table banter, and tried new eats that although I can’t pronounce do remember the taste of, last night was indeed lucky–it’s one of those–thank God I said yes nights which I am blessed to have ever so often.

Now if I only knew the names of the food and we could have taken pictures, this entry would have been better. (Note to Makansutra: when giving a tasting, give the guests a copy of  the menu. It would help us way much! )

Makansutra’s formally opens on July 4  in the Manila Ocean Park. If you want a unique experience with a wonderful view of Manila bay (date place anyone?) go do give them a visit!

And no, you don’t have to pay the Manila Ocean Park entrance fee to get in. Btw, I was suprised there’s a mall inside MOP already!