It's calamares in the Philippines

Fried squid or calamari is better known as calamares in the Philippines. This is due to the close affinity of Filipino to the Spanish language.

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Red-Dyed Egg White

Red Egg from Lola's Kitchen at The Enterprise Center Food Park

For the record, this seems to be the worst red egg I've seen and served to me ever. The red dye obviously seeped through the egg shell resulting in pink spots in the egg white. The yolks, however, look good.

Red eggs among Filipinos are preserved with the use of salt for the purpose of longer storage period. This may be one of the many Chinese influences to Pinoy cuisine. However, unlike the Chinese red eggs, which are believed to symbolize prosperity and happiness are used as gifts for kids birthdays, we just eat them as ulam with rice matched with sliced tomatoes or whatever you find something good to match them with.

I have experienced preparing red eggs in the past back home in Isabela where in we used itik eggs. Itik are a kind of ducks with brown and black feathers. The white ones or what we call pato are very few and I have never seen an egg of pato. Seriously.

Not that they don't lay eggs. They do. I was just not exposed enough.

The basics of making red eggs, according to my mother, is that it should not be too salty and that the dye should only stay on the surface of the eggshell. If it passes through the shell and on to the egg white, it means  something went wrong with the preparation. And that should not be served and eaten because you wouldn't want to eat food coloring.

No matter how much others say that it is safe, pinkish egg white is something I do not find desirable. I am not a heath freak, but I am not going to eat this.
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Pan de Sal de Manila

Pan de Manila’s pan de sal is one of the best tasting pandesals I have tried so far in my entire life. If you like your bread hot, this is the right place to go to because they bake every hour. I think it's also a good thing and gives you a good feeling particularly when you chanced upon them coming right out of the oven, which is very often.

I like it that there is a branch in the building where I work. And aside from it, there is also another one across the street, an alternative during holidays when the one in the building is closed.

Different kinds of palaman (fillings) to choose from are also available - dairies and creams and cheese and jams and butter.  Pandesal is salted bread, so having any of these fillings with it makes a good combination.

If you do not want any palaman, they also offer a variety of cheese breads, ensaimadas (glazed spiral pastry), and some herb flavored such as pesto and the likes.

I'm now hungry!

Halloween Crinkle

Got a crinkle cookie treat from Pancake House! Although it was not decorated enough to make it look like it's for Halloween, it's cute. The waiter gave me a complimentary piece because we ate a lot.