My absolute favorite restaurant is Lugang. Everything is delicious, it's the right price, and the staff are the best! I usually eat lunch there with my mom. Now I already have my favorites, which is what I always order, but a couple of weeks ago I spotted something interesting on the menu - green beans and salted egg! I've never tried anything like it but it sounded yummy in my mind. I went ahead and ordered it.

Oh, it was as good as it sounded, and ridiculously simple too. It was such an unexpected combination but it somehow works! The crunch of the beans, the salty flavor of the chopped eggs - soooo yummy. Here's my version of my new Lugang favorite!

What you need:

About 25-30 pieces of green beans, locally known as baguio beans. Chop em up!

One salted/red egg, chopped also

When I was very young I was absolutely certain that I knew more than my mother. How could I not, when I've read all these wonderful books and spent hours devouring all those wise-crackin' TV shows? Surely I understand the world better than she does. I'm smarter. I will do better, she'll see.

But now that I'm older all that hubris has faded away. I try to remember all the advice and little facts (from being sick to home-making) she's given me through the years, and what do you know - she was right all along. "What would my Mama do?" is a question I constantly ask myself these days. I don't spend time with her as much as I should but I think of her always. 

Anyway, a few weeks ago I got to bond with her on a trip to Tagaytay. Remember the Project Vanity x Ford contest? We rode the All-New Ford Focus with the winners and had lunch at Marcia Adams. It was a great Saturday afternoon just chillin' and eating delicious home-cooked food. Here are the photos! 

Leaving the city in style

...to find this secret garden tucked away in the borders of Tagaytay

I'm a huge fan of those pre-mixed recipes that can be found in most supermarkets. I love cooking, but the thing is I don't usually have time to muck around perfecting a recipe from the ground up. I do it when I can but these days I rely on super quick solutions from Del Monte, Mama Sita, and McCormick.

So! Today I'm going to show you how to make idiot-proof buffalo chicken wings. All you need to do is mix and fry! And not to burn the chicken but it's not really that difficult as long as you place it over very low heat.

This isn't sponsored btw. :P I "discovered" this buffalo chicken wings mix some weeks ago and I've made many batches since then! It's delicious, although I imagine it's a bit of an acquired taste because it's not your usual chicken wings. I love it though. Has a zing to it and an undertone of flavor I can't put a name to. Anyway just try it, it's just P33 per packet.

One of my favorite places in the Fort is da.u.de (pronounced da you deh). The place is quiet, has lots of natural light, great music, and most importantly - it's all about tea! I don't know of any other restos that are truly tea-centric. And I'm not talking about milk tea ha. I'm talking about real tea brewed fresh from leaves.

da.u.de has all sorts of tea flavors that the CEO, Renee Sebastian, concocts herself. She is a tea connoiseur, and is in fact a Certified Tea Master. It's kind of cool that there's a real tea designer in our midst! You can grab fresh iced (or hot) tea from da.u.de, but you should try the tea-infused food as well. My favorite is the Roast Pork Pho (P350), a delicious noodle soup with crunchy roasted pork bits. It also has condiments on the side so you can tweak the flavor to your liking.

Some people know what they love from the beginning. Some find it sooner, but when they do it's like there was never anything before it. 

I met Patti Dizon a few weeks ago. Her parents are a lawyer and a doctor, and she was well on her way studying medicine when she quit. Why? She knew that she wouldn't be happy pursuing the profession. While she had some downtime she found out how much she loved baking for her friends and family. They loved her creations, and this encouraged to start her own business: A Spoonful of Sugar.

With only a P1,000 capital, she was able to build a cupcake business that now supplies to Moonleaf Tea Shop and various other cafes. In a month or so, she will announce another major coffee retail chain on her roster of distributors. She's only 24 and her business is just 10 months old but she's on her way to making it big!

Patti's best seller is the Red Velveteen, but my personal favorite is the Salted Caramel de Leche.

I'm not a food blogger and I won't start now, but it doesn't mean that I won't talk about food I like. :P A few weeks ago I got to visit this new Asian fusion restaurant in Marikina called Tiyo's by Chef & Brewer. The place is operated by the same people behind Ferretti shoes, so we had a meeting there to discuss business. The usual!

What wasn't usual is the food. We had this chicken sisig wrapped in warm tortilla, drizzled with mayonnaise and mustard. It was heaven! And simple too, if you want to make it at home. I loved the salty, creamy, then sour flavors of the dish. It sounds weird but wait 'till you try it! They say it's perfect with beer as pulutan.

As promised, here's my hamburger steak recipe! I like to eat it with buttered potatoes or green beans with carrots. Since I didn't have any carrots, I just blanched the green beans and called it a day. I also included my recipe for gravy. I hate to share this - don't mean to brag, people really like my gravy lol - but I decided not to be selfish. :P

Let's get crackin'.

First I make the hamburger patty. Here are the ingredients:

• 1/2 kilo ground beef (preferably lean)
• Minced garlic and about half a small onion. Make sure everything is finely chopped!
• 1 egg

I miss my dad. He went abroad again a few weeks ago - something of a surprise since we all thought he was going to retire. But we should take opportunities as they come. This time it’s a really good one so I hope he would be happy at his new job.

I love makeup and clothes but hey, that's not all there is to me. So I think I'll be posting something not beauty related every weekend from now on. A change of topic is always fun for everyone.

So! I found this website called Food Wishes some weeks back and IT IS AWESOME. I like all the recipes, although I can't cook many of them because I don't have a food processor, outdoor grill, and oven (I should definitely get an oven soon). Still, I love watching Chef John's videos because of his clear and concise way of explaining things. He's like the Lisa Eldridge of cooking, if you know what I mean!

Chef John's Bacon Ranch Chicken Skewers

I got inspired after marathoning Chef John's videos so I decided to cook some of his recipes. Take note, they're just, at best, approximations of what he made. The exact ingredients were not immediately on hand so I made do with what I found in the supermarket.