Great Asian food at every price range
12-16-09 · Food trips & events Tags: Chinese, Japanese, Korean, restaurants
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Two weeks ago, my husband and I went to the Dapitan Street flea market for a little shopping. If you haven’t heard, Dapitan is a haven for bargain shoppers. Everything from furniture to Christmas wreaths can be found there. But that’s another story. What I want to share with you is where we had lunch before we went to Dapitan. It was a weekday, traffic was bad and I was already bracing myself for a humid and dusty shopping experience. My husband, Speedy, suggested lunch at Shuin along Araneta Avenue, a place frequented by the residents of the nearby Chinese community.
My first Shuin experience over a year two years ago was not related to dining. Shuin sells food products from ready-to-eat roast duck (a practical idea for the Noche Buena or New Year’s Eve dinner) to peanut oil to loose leaf tea. I’ve shopped there a couple of times but never had a meal there despite repeated pronouncements from my husband that the turo-turo style fare was really good.
That day we went to Dapitan, I figured it was time to try a meal at Shuin. I ordered a bento box with roast duck and, to my surprise, I was asked to choose a vegetable dish to go with it. When my bento box was served, not only did I have roast duck, the eggplant dish I chose and rice, there was a dark hard boiled egg as well that looked like it had been simmered in sauce after it was shelled. The price? P140.00 (it’s the most expensive bento box meal in Shuin). And everything was delicious. If you plan to try a Shuin meal, however, let me warn you that it is a small no-frills place and the rest room is a nightmare. If you can live with that and just focus on the food and the great price, you’re in for a treat.
The weekend after the Shuin lunch, we were back in the Quezon City area. This time, to bring our girls to Subic Apex, a warehouse along Quezon Avenue that sells everything from Chinaware to blue jeans. We dropped by on the day we went to Dapitan and branded blue jeans were on sale “ buy one, take one. We figured the girls would have a ball so we took them there. And have a ball they did. I almost ran out of cash.
It was almost dinner time by the time the girls called it quits. Speedy suggested a place which specialized in fusion cooking. The restaurant is called Asian Twist and it is located at the corner of Amoranto and Speaker Perez streets in Quezon City. The restaurant interior is slick and modern with a mint green and white motif. The menu?
Try the bibimbop (Korean bibimbap, literally, “mixed rice”) with bagnet, the Ilocano lechon kawali, served in a stone pot (which really makes Asian Twist’s bibimbop a variation called dolsot bibimbap) with kimchi, mung bean sprouts, kangkong, gosari (brackern fern stems) and raw egg. How much? P175.00 “ the average price of Asian Twist’s bibimbop meals.
Fast forward to December 12. It was our 18th wedding anniversary and we had already agreed that we would have dinner at Miyabi Restaurant at the Pan Pacific Hotel in Malate, Manila, a place suggested by a reader (thank you, Nats Lee!) after reading my review of Sumo Sam Restaurant.
What makes Miyabi different from the gamut of Japanese restaurants in the metropolis is the wide, wide, wiiiiiddddeee array of dishes. The menu was several pages long and there were about twenty items on each page. We were so overwhelmed that we couldn’t decide. My older daughter, Sam, wanted to take the easy way out by proclaiming, “I want everything!” That would have been impossible, of course, unless we were prepared to be hospitalized afterward for sheer gluttony.
So, we chose. Carefully. Forgive me if I don’t remember the Japanese names of the dishes. So much food and it got totally confusing. But I can describe each dish we had “ all seven of them. Asparagus with a spicy mayo dressing garnished with chopped hard boiled egg. Gyoza. Nylon clams with a buttery sauce. Rice rolls topped with generous heaps of roe. Rice rolls wrapped in tuna and salmon and stuffed with mangoes, cucumber and cabbage strips. More rice rolls with prawn, egg roll and crisp crumbs. And a last platter of rice rolls wrapped in bean curd skins. The seven-course dinner for four, with drinks, cost a little over P1700.00. What a feast!
Click the thumbnails below to view the food photos from all three restaurants.
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- Shuin: Bento!
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- Shuin: braised pork ears
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- Asian Twist: interiors
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- Asian Twist: drinking glasses
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- Asian Twist: iced coffee
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- Asian Twist: pot of green tea
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- Asian Twist: salad!
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- Asian Twist: Korean chapchee
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- Asian Twist: Miso soup
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- Asian Twist: panini!
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- Asian Twist: California roll
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- Asian Twist: seafood bibimbop?
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- Asian Twist: bibimbop with bagnet
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- Miyabi Japanese Restaurant: fish roe!
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- Miyabi Japanese Restaurant: salmon and tuna rolls
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- Miyabi Japanese Restaurant: a very large prawn
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- Miyabi Japanese Restaurant: wrapped in bean burd skins
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- Miyabi Japanese Restaurant: gyoza
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- Miyabi Japanese Restaurant: asparagus
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- Miyabi Japanese Restaurant: green tea
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- Miyabi Japanese Restaurant: nylon clams
nice pics ms. connie
we were just at the amoranto area last weekend (tending to repairs on our ondoy-stricken car), sayang had i known earlier about asian twist, we would have tried it (we ended up eating at mcdo, how adventurous!!) will definitely try it next time. ps. maybe you can also post pics of your subic apex buys 
Re Subic Apex buys: I was intending to kaya lang people will ask how much the items cost, eh, I’m giving them away as Christmas gifts. The intended recipients might read and… LOL
Am trying to figure out what to eat for lunch and anything that I come up with PALES in comparison to the food pictures that I just saw. Thanks. LOL!
Thanks for sharing with us your food trip, been longing to try the Asian twist which is very near to our house. now i do have a good reason why to try it. may I check the Subic Apex you mentioned where is it located?been living here for almost ten years ngayon ko lang narinig. thanks.
Coming from EDSA, it’s after Roosevelt Ave.
This post is really helpful. You have gien us a lot of ideas where to dine when we go for vacation in the Philippines soon. Thanks Missy.
Hi Tita Connie,
Thank you for sharing your food experience, plus the photos…kakainggit! My sister will be arriving from canada and I want to bring her sa Miyabi, coz she loves Japanese food
Question lang po, did you get to eat a dish where you had rice? Like the typical ulam at kanin? Or just rolls, asparagus and clams? Sorry to ask, pero kse am thinking of something like ulam and kanin, kase baka di ako mabusog sa rolls lang po (in short, matakaw…hehehe). And I was looking for tips on what to order when we go there 
Thanks po 
Subic Apex is on Quezon Ave, across from Pegasus. Their Christmas sale is on this weekend! I got some great buys – toys were buy 1 take one only a few weeks back…they have lots of little promos for everything from servingware to Christmas decor.
Hmmm, since I learn so much from you.. I wondered about this the last time I was in Manila. Why do most of the sushi in the philippines have mango as a main ingredient? The only answer I got from a waiter as “Because it’s supposed to be there..” Do you know where this stems from?
mango is readily available in the Philippines. Some would say that the maki (sushi roll) got “filipinized” to suit the Filipino palate. The original California Maki is “stuffed” with avocado and cucumber and / or kani meat. Here the default California Maki is rolled with ripe mango and kani.
kakatuwa itong post, since i live within the area, literally between araneta and dapitan arcade haha.
i’ve shopped once palang sa dapitan arcade, though i frequent the adjacent Suki market. items are really nice, i wouldn’t wanna tempt myself. =)
the warehouse sale is good too! i’ve been there, and the corelle items are pretty cheap. there’s also a DVD sale at quezon avenue, near national bookstore, but i don’t know kung open pa, it’s supposed to be only for end of november until december 2nd week but i heard they extended the sale.