Gloria Maris (Gateway)

Beloved and I had dinner a couple of times at Gloria Maris. This Chinese seafood-specialty restaurant had a newly-opened (or maybe moved?) branch at the top floor of Gateway near where the cinemas are. Beloved usually associates Gloria Maris with expensive and classy, the former being the reason why we don't consider going here. The first time we went, they were still on soft opening. Although it still looked classy and had an expensive feel, after surveying the menu, we found out it was surprisingly not-as-expensive as Beloved expected. Not fancying anything in particular that night, we decided to try it out.

As with most Chinese restaurants, most of their stuff is good for sharing. We found out that they have a soft opening promo wherein if you order more than 500Php worth, you get a free order of Yang Chow Fried Rice. We made sure to hit the threshold by ordering their Vegetables in Oyster Sauce (198 Php) and Steamed Fish Fillet and Beancurd (268 Php) as our main dishes, Steamed Seafood Roll (99 Php) and Hakao (99 Php) from their dimsum choices, a couple of orders of Seafood Spinach Soup (88 Php), and an order of Butchi (88 Php) for dessert. I asked if their juices were fresh, and received an affirmation. I ordered their Calamansi Juice (55 Php) and Beloved asked for their Watermelon Shake (78 Php).

Hap Chan (Ali Mall, Cubao)

Beloved and I ate at Hap Chan a couple of times the past few weeks. Yep, you heard that right; this one took a while in the making. Why do it like this? Well, it's sort of an experiment. Basically all of our reviews have been mostly first impressions. While important, I think the most important part is consistency, and visiting again would affirm that. Also, this gives a chance to those places I didn't enjoy the first time around because of wrong order choices or irresponsible servers or unfortunate mishaps et cetera. So, unless we spent more than reasonable, or the place is very special, expect two visits from future reviews.

Anyway, back to the current one. Hap Chan is a Chinese restaurant—one of the more popular ones, in fact. To some people I know, Hap Chan is Chinese food. I've been to this place, although a different branch, with family and friends for quite a few times before. However, I was a bit surprised that Beloved never had the chance to visit. Since I recall no bad experiences, it was a pretty safe guinea pig for this two-fold review.

I also recall that most of their menu items serves two or more, typical for any Chinese restaurant-slash-tea house. Their prices are also very competitive and quite affordable, if you consider the serving size. During our first visit, I ordered their Lobster Ball Mami (160 Php). Beloved got their Hap Chan Special Hotpot (300 Php) and rice (30 Php) to go with it. We also ordered my favorite dimsum, Hakaw (95 Php) and my favorite Chinese dessert, Buchi (50 Php). We also got special drinks—Hot Lemon Tea (60 Php) for me and Milk Tea (60 Php) for Beloved, even though they already serve house tea, which I expect from any good Chinese tea house.

Seafood Island (Shopwise, Cubao)

Beloved and I had dinner at Seafood Island, Cubao a couple of nights ago. We've been here before, but we didn't get to try the reason you should go here the first time we went—the eat-like-a-pirate "boodles". That was more than a couple of years ago, and we've been to its Trinoma branch a couple of times with friends to try out the boodle. I didn't get to take pictures both times, since everyone dug in before I had the opportunity to. This time, since it was just me and Beloved, I can finally write a proper review.

I've already said boodle twice, thrice if you count the one on the title. But what is a "boodle"? The best description I could give is a table full of food. These various platters, which is really an understatement to use as a term for this offering, have various stuff in it in addition to a mountain of rice good enough for four—and that's the smaller boodle. They come in two sizes, good for three to four or five to six. Beloved wanted lato or sea grapes, and after finding a couple of these boodles out of a dozen or so that offer this, we chose their Palawan Shores (785 Php), good for 3-4.

Seafood Island (Cubao)

Beloved and I went to Seafood Island today. Although from the name you can assume that they specialize in seafood, they also specialize in grilled and barbecued favorites. This was the first time we ever tried this, so it's basically a blind selection out of the blue. Or maybe we tried this because of the pirate crab mascot.

Anyway, there were plenty of items on the menu. Sadly, they don't provide pictures, so it's pretty hard to choose. We ended up ordering their Tuna and Crabmeat Sisig (195 Php) because we like crab and beloved wants fish, Pork Liempo (165 Php) because I was craving for pork belly, and their small serving of Crab Rice (135 Php). We also ordered a couple of glasses of red iced tea (55 Php each, non-refillable).