rice cake confessional

I meant to write about this immediately following the major wrath I was feeling after my experience on Philippine Airlines during my last trip to Manila. Sigh. Where to begin…

1. Philippine Airlines takes off from the Centennial Terminal at Ninoy Aquino International Airport in Manila. The terminal was built just a few years ago and, from the outside, is much prettier looking than the regular terminals. Too bad it is terribly engineered. First of all, you get in line to check in. Get in another line to pay the ‘airport fee.’ Get in another line to go through immigration/customs. Get in another line to go through security. Now, this sounds like every airport on earth. EXCEPT at most airports finishing up at one line leads you past that counter into another section in the airport.

Oh no, not at Centennial. Every time you finish in one line, you have to fight the crowd and swim upstream (with all your luggage) to another corner of the airport. Lather. Rinse. Repeat. Pull your hair out.

2. PAL charged us overage fees. They allowed only 20kilos per person on an international flight. This was shocking to me because usually they give you 70lbs per bag with a 2 bag limit. (When we fly from SFO to Manila this is usually the case no matter the airline.) They charged us. Exorbitantly. It cost more than one of our tickets. We were 15 kilos over total between the two of us. Fees are ok. Enough for 1 ticket? I might as well buy a ticket and use up the extra seat on the plane.

3. The flight was late. We chilled at the airport for 2.5 hours or so. We were also unlucky enough to be seated next to the smoking room. GREAT. Now I can have an asthma attack AND smell like smoke for the duration of my flight.

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I’ve mentioned Yuet Lee before because it’s my SF equivalent to Big Tomy’s in LA. The cuisine is not the same but evenings (or should I say early mornings?) I’ve spent at these two establishments are nightcaps to fun evenings spent with good friends.  My Bay Area homies love this place. To be honest, my first few trips were okay at best. I dunno if we’re ordering better food or if I’m getting accustomed to the taste but our most recent meal was way past okay into really, really good.

We started with beef tomato soup. Yay for eggs in soup. Boo for it tasting like ketchup soup. Next, please.

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JenLui wants to eat at Santa Ramen (and so do I) but we never quite make it all the way up to San Mateo to check it out. This weekend was no different. I hijacked her lunch invitation and asked for Korean bbq instead. Partly because I was craving Korean food but mostly because I was dreading another trek up the peninsula (it would have been my third trip this weekend). We considered Palace BBQ Buffet but decided on the restaurant that Jane’s family frequents – Korean BBQ House (I know, real creative guys) in Milpitas.

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I can’t believe this is my 100th post! According to WordPress it is so I guess I have to believe it. I’m pretty surprised with myself as I kinda thought that I would start this and then abandon it in a month or two. I think it helps that I’ve been doing a lot of traveling, I love eating, and I have friends that also love eating. I don’t have any fancy visitor tracking, but WordPress does tell me how people get to my blog. It looks like I get the most traffic from search results. It’s fun to see the random searches that made their way over. Stuff like ‘bean noodles witch yoo hee’ (which I have a perfect post about!), ‘plaza premium lounge airport’ (which I stayed at a few months ago), and ‘recipe for belly buttons dessert’ (wth is this?).

To celebrate this big milestone, a cupcake for me and a cupcake for you.

I made this awhile back but have yet to post about it. It’s your regular, run of the mill chocolate cake mix with homemade peanut butter frosting/glaze. Decorated of course with chocolate sprinkles. I used this recipe from Baking Bites. The only change I made was that I only used 1 1/2 cups of confectioner’s sugar and I ended up using 1% milk since that’s what I have in my fridge. I also don’t have an electric mixer so I couldn’t get the frosting fluffy. It turned out more of a glaze than a frosting which is a-ok for me. You have to put the sprinkles on right after you put the frosting on. Otherwise they won’t stick.

Happy Eating!

The Yelp reviews on HC Dumpling are all over the place. Some folks rave about the awesomeness of their xiao long baos. Other reviewers say that the place has cockroaches. I opted to not eat here for awhile due to recent roach sightings, but have now tried to the place twice with no signs of the reported cucarachas.

Back to the xlbs aka soup dumplings aka juicy dumplings. These kinds of dumplings are special-er than regular dumplings because the soup is actually inside the darn thing. Each dumpling is a spoonful of soup all wrapped up in a convenient carrying case. I’ve tried the scallop, pork, and shrimp and loofah varieties. Of the three, the shrimp and loofah one is the tastiest at HC Dumpling. The loofah is a nice addition to the mix that gives the soup inside a fresh, light taste. I thought the filling on the pork dumplings was a little mushy and the scallops ones I can barely remember.

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Hands down the best meal I had in India was served by the swanky Novotel Hyderabad. Beautfully spiced and baked tandoori chicken served with smooth and creamy dal. Topped with a small side salad and steamy, crusty naan. The chicken portions were HUGE on this one. Two really big chicken legs with that tasty blackened skin from being in the tandoor. You could really taste the yogurt seasonings. I had dal a bunch of times while I was in India and this was the best. Creamy with a kick, the texture was really above par and the sour cream swirl gave it a nice touch. This meal left me happy and full!

Everyone has one of these. That place they go to after a night out on the town. Generally, you don’t visit these places unless you (or your friends) have been drinking a bit and it’s sometime in the middle of the night already. For the Bay Area homies, it’s Yuet Lee. For my LA homies, it’s good ol’ Big Tomy’s.

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So if you’re a snobby sushi eater than Sushi Mac is not the place for you. However, if you’re a broke ass college student then haul ass over here. Where else can you get a no frills sushi meal for only $2.75 a plate?

When I was in college (do I sound ancient yet?) we went to Sushi Mac about once a week during my junior year. Back then we had to make the trek from UCLA to Sherman Oaks for our sushi fix. Back then the plates were $2.50 each! They got wise to their demographic and opened one not far from campus on Sawtelle near Olympic in the Ross shopping center about a year or so after I graduated. Nice timing, Sushi Mac. During a recent romp in LA I was stumped as to where to eat and decided on Sushi Mac – partly for the convenience, partly for the memories, mostly for the spicy mayo.

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