Owndays in Estancia Mall

One of my favorite haunts currently is Estancia Mall in Capitol Commons. Kim and I absolutely love it there because there isn't that much people milling around. Most of the stores are SSI - they have Pottery Barn, Marks and Spencer, they have Old Navy, and Debenhams.

Kim and I also love eating in Jipan in Estancia. Parking is easier compared to Megamall or Glorietta, easily accessible to Jipan from the parking area, which makes walking to the restaurant easier for me.

One of the most recent shops to open is Owndays. I wasn't quite familiar with the shop - it sells sunglasses and prescription eyeglasses. Since I was due to purchase a new pair of eyeglasses already (I replace my eyeglasses annually) I checked out the place. Prices ranged from PhP 2,990.00 to upwards of PhP 10,000.00. The price, however, is inclusive of the prescription lens already. They also guarantee that the eyeglasses will be done 20 minutes after payment.

Now, usually, I don't get my prescription, it just isn't readily available, even in the most established optical shops that I've purchased from, so I wanted to see if Owndays could guarantee that I would receive my lens within the day.

Kim and went there last Saturday, I brought an old pair of eyeglasses I had so that it would be the basis for my grade - lo and behold, they do have my grade available. It took me longer to choose what frame I wanted to purchase, and I ended up grabbing a pair of Wellingtons for only PhP 3,990.00.

I was so happy with my purchase. Who would've thought that my unique grade would be readily available!

Owndays is a Japanese eyewear brand that was recently established. Their first shop was opened in 2009, and their expansion to other Asian countries in the past couple of years can only be described as aggressive. They don't sell branded eyewear, the glasses that they have are all original designs, manufactured by them, including the lenses. They also collaborate with eyewear designers for some of their pieces.

It's been a couple of days that I've been using my glasses, and I love its weight. It isn't as heavy as my older prescriptions, which may be seen as a con for others, but not having additional weight on my face is definitely a plus for me. Even if it is light, though, the build is just solid. They really have a good manufacturing arm, and the Japanese quality is prevalent in the end-product.

Don't take my word for it though, feel free to visit them in Estancia Mall, and try some eyewear for yourselves.

Owndays Optical Shop

Level 1, Shop 132 Estancia Mall, Meralco Avenue, Pasig City

tel. no. 02.9973061　

Yomenya Goemon, Italian and Japanese Fusion

Now I have eaten in this restaurant about 5 times already, and I think it is only now that I will be writing about it. Why didn't I share this sooner?

Call me selfish, maybe I didn't want to report about it, because I wanted it all to myself. My favorite cuisines are Italian and Japanese, so the fusion of both only excites me. This is my comfort food at its best.

I keep on forgetting the name of the restaurant, and honestly it is a mouthful. I just remember it as the restaurant where Big Buddha used to be. And you know what, it might be owned by the same company. What do I know? Anyway, on to the food!

One of my favorites is the Mentaiko Shrimp and Japanese Herb. What I love the most about this pasta is the cod roe! This is how I spice up my ready-made Muji pasta sauces, I usually add botarga, left-over caviar, or the vegetarian caviar of Ikea. This is really good pasta! Just add a little salt to bring out the flavor of the sauce.

I also enjoy ordering their pasta dishes which entail breaking the yolk of an egg placed in the center, and then mixing it to bind the pasta and the sauce. One of our pasta orders last night was the Sausage, Bacon, and Salmon. The sauce is soy based with butter. Did I mention you had to break the egg yolk and mix it in? :)

What's an Italian dinner without pizza, right? Ditching the Japanese fusion, we ordered the Longganiza Pizza. Really appetizing. I just wish they added more variants of the local sausage, the mixture of flavors might be pretty exciting, who knows?

Interested in eating in Yomenya Goemon?

Yomenya Goemon
2/F Greenbelt 3, Esperanza StLegazpi Village, Makati(02) 729-0586

Dinner at Ma Maison

My friends from A-List Manila (hehe) and I were looking for a place for dinner tonight. Since we were already (or always) in Greenbelt, and I luckily had my Bistro Card with me, I dragged them over to Ma Maison for dinner. Ma Maison used to be Flapjacks, which I adored so much back then, and coincidentally is a Bistro restaurant as well.

Of course, who couldn't resist taking a picture of the food we ordered. Sorry for the quality of the pictures. No, I don't think it should be grainy or whatever because I was using a Nokia N8 when I took these, and the camera is a 12MP snapper from Carl Zeiss. I apologize more if the shots are not professionally taken. Anyway, here's what we ordered.

This is one of the appetizers, Salmon Carpaccio with Alfalfa:

The other appetizer, according to one of the A-Listers was simply dee-vine! It's Camembert Cheese Fritters:

Unfortunately, I wasn't able to take a picture of the Paella, because as soon as it was placed on the table, everybody just dug in.

Here's a shot of the Seafood Gratin, which was also superb:

And our main course was the Jumbo Burger, which when the waiter was trying to sell to us was accidentally called (by the waiter) a jumbo hotdog. The Jumbo Burger was good for 4 already, and we chose the brown sauce, which according to the waiter was cooked for 28 days (to which I asked, is that 28 days continous? - he never did answer me back).

Dinner was great. A-List Manila will definitely be having dinner there again. Decor was a bit odd for me, although my companions didn't mind the vintage stuff plastered on the wall, or the tablecloth which looked like it came from the 1930s. According to how the waiters introduced the cuisine, Ma Maison is a fusion of Western and Japanese Cuisine (so why is the name of the restaurant predominantly French?).

We ended up getting an almost PhP 400.00 discount because of my Bistro Card, and the bill came to about PhP 475.00 per head (there were about 4 of us), which is the normal Friday night fare I have with friends. 

I ended up seeing Len Bayas, Head Concierge of New World Makati City Hotel, at Bizu that evening too, so all in all, it was a pretty great Friday night dinner. Miss you so much Len!

For everyone's reference:

Ma Maison
Greenbelt 2, Ayala Center, Makati
tel. no. 729.9122