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.

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.

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.