SOM'S : A Sumptous Thai Experience

We had lunch earlier in SOM's after hearing mass in St. Andrew's Parish. Tucked near Rockwell Makati ( I would fondly call this area Rockwell gilid), every Thai cuisine lovers should visit this spot as it never fails to draw in crowds of people even during Sundays.

Since we have our young daughter with us, we decided to stay in their aircon area (despite additional charge of 10%) as people normally dine in SOM's al fresco. We also decided to order non-spicy version meals such as Tom Ka Gai, Chicken Pandan, Chicken Fried Rice and Garlic Pepper Shrimp. I wanted to order their must try Spring Rolls but hubby said we've ordered enough food for 3 1/2 (my daughter being the half count) =) I was thinking maybe I'll order Spring Rolls next time when I'm with my officemates as we sometimes pay SOM's a visit during lunchtime.

For the drinks I ordered their Milk Tea while yaya and hubby ordered Coke Zero. It was my daughter and yaya's first time to dine in SOM's and they loved the Chicken Pandan and Fried Rice as much as we did. We ordered their must try dessert as well- Sticky Rice with sweet mangoes.

We highly recommend SOM's to everyone. A sumptous and authentic Thai cuisine is expected at reasonable prices. I see regular customers ranging from locals, foreigners, young and senior professionals. I've heard they even get orders from celebrities and politicians alike. What most of their customers do would be to call up beforehand and have their orders picked up at SOM's to be consumed at home. If you want to dine at SOM's be early as it is hard to find an empty table during peak hours.

Standard Souvenirs

My dad is about to go back to the province tomorrow after two weeks of stay here in Makati for a business seminar. We picked him up at his hotel to have dinner and buy some pasalubong(souvenirs) for his officemates and for our family. First in his list: the Double Dozen deal of Krispy Kreme.

Our standard pasalubong procedure would be to request to have these doughnuts in boxes of 6's for it to be manageable to bring back home. He was tempted to buy UAAP doughnuts as well but since Ateneo won and Season 71 is finally over, he managed to order our family's favorites instead: Hershey's Cookies and Creme, Dark Chocolate and Honey Glazed Doughnut. I used to get gaga over these doughnuts until one of my former classmate in high school thought I was pregnant when she saw me few months ago. That ended my weekend craving for Krispy Kreme and their doughnut became a once in a while tasty treat for me.

Next in my dad's list would be a box or two of French Baker brownies. He bought about 3 boxes for his officemates. French Baker brownies along with Brownies Unlimited used to be one of the top pasalubong we give to our family, relatives and officemates. It was overruled when Go Nuts Donuts came into the picture and now replaced by Krispy Kreme given the minimal price difference between the two.

My dad's officemate asked us if we know where to buy Eng Bee Tin (EBT) Hopia. EBT also ranks high before as the top pasalubong list during my aunt's era. I told his officemate that I used to see Eng Bee Tin stall in Waltermart Makati. I used to think that Landmark Makati and SM Makati are complete in terms of key pasalubong in their supermarket area. Unfortunately, EBT is in their out of stock list when we checked these supermarkets recently. I hope his officemate was able to buy a few EBT hopia as pasalubong.

Pineapple Juice Magic!

I used to be a regular milk drinker. I drink about 2 glasses of milk per day but I discovered a tastier milk alternative: Del Monte's Pineapple Juice! I love the unsweetened variant. I mix half glass full pineapple juice with water during breakfast. I always put on a teaspoon or 2 of Psyllium husk to increase my fiber requirement.

Our gym instructor learned about my latest drink discovery and advised me that it is better to take the pineapple juice at night rather than in the morning. A lot of people say that the pineapple is a great calorie (or was it fat?) burner. Taking it at night allows one to burn more calories.

I try go to the gym regularly at night. This habit allows me to burn a few extra calories while sleeping. I believe drinking pineapple juice complements my fitness efforts and even has an added bonus for me: in the morning, it makes me have a better bowel movement (even if I don't add Psyllium husk into my night drink).

I shared my latest habit with a colleague. She was quite hesitant to try it at first since she originally thought that drinking pineapple juice at night perks her up rather than calms her. Upon receiving lots of encouragement from her fitness instructor to try this habit, she noticed a no frills poop time from her end as well!

I did not entirely drop my dairy intake with this drink alternative as I am still a firm believer on the wonders dairy products can do for you. I drink Nesvita yoghurt drink or take a cup of Nesvita yoghurt as my morning snack to catch up on my daily dairy requirement.

Max's Experience

After picking up my dad at the airport, we had a quick lunch at Max's with my daughter and her yaya. Max's is one of my dad's favorite restaurant and I have grown to love the restaurant ever since I was a teenager. We used to have Max's back in our hometown and we were one of their regular Sunday lunch customers. My favorite is their fried chicken (of course! they became a household name because of it!) and when I'm in the mood for it (especially my stomach as it can become a quite heavy meal), I order their kare kare as well.

Since it has become a restaurant full of nostalgia, I never fail to visit a Max's restaurant at least every quarter for more than 10 years now. For quick lunch or snack with my family, I normally order their Platter meal as I go crazy with their pancit canton! My son who is a picky eater loves their Pancit Canton as much as I do that sometimes I let his yaya order the Platter Meal so that yaya gets the chicken while my little boy gets his serving of Pancit Canton. My husband and even my parents love their Lumpia whether taken fresh (hubby's favorite) or fried (mom and dad's favorite).

What I eagerly anticipate when I'm done with their main meal is the dessert! I love their tiny caramel bars! I can take the entire bar in an instant! I still remember the first time I tasted it about 5 years ago in their Intramuros branch. I ordered a box of it after not being satisfied with just one bite and eating the caramel bar meal allocation of my friends!

Nowadays I try to control my sweet intake thus taking one or 2 caramel bars as my dessert ( I still get somebody's share)! I'm now looking forward to my next Max's Experience!

One Bread Experience

On my way to the South parking lot, I came across a bread store in Mall of Asia. Having been into lots of anesthesia lately, I cannot seem to recall if the store was named Bread One or One Bread?! The ambience of the store is descriptive of a local feel of the famous Bread Talk chain. I was feeling a pang of hunger then thus I've decided to grab something from the store and eat it in the car on my way home while beating the city traffic.

Relatively prices of their bread are very reasonable and I cannot believe that I would still be able to buy a delicious bread with that price - more than half the amount of Bread Talk's equivalent! I was happily enjoying the piece of bread bought that I managed to eat everything while I was still in the parking lot!

Cafe Juanita: A Gastronomic Experience

Dined out with friends recently at Cafe Juanita! Food in this neighborhood resto never fails me! I love their Tofu Sisig that we try to replicate it at home. Apart from Tofu Sisig, I also frequently try their Chicharon Bulaklak, pinakbet, gambas and since I forgot the particular name of the last two, I would just describe it - the fish with crabfat sauce as well as their version of lechon kawali with bagoong. I love their bagoong sauce so much that I always ask for extra serving of it! For dessert my favorite is their sticky toffee pudding with ice cream!

Cafe Juanita never fails to fulfill my satisfaction! Apart from their food, I also love how they've set up the place. If you check out their decorations one by one, you might think that it is tacky but upon seeing it in its entire view you will appreciate such a wondrous work of art!

I urge everyone to visit the place and dine with friends, family and their loved ones as often as they can!

Public Market Experience

I rarely go to the public market and do all my shopping at our nearby Grocery. Yesterday, I wanted to clean up most of our stuff - empty bottles and newspapers.. Yaya informed me that there is a nearby junk shop at Pasong Tirad's vicinity thus we cleaned up these recyclables to exchange for a little moolah. We also decided to try out the public market especially their vegetables and fish as we were craving to have fish for dinner together with a monggo dish.

Unfortunately the junk shop was closed for the afternoon so we proceeded with buying our goodies. I noticed that goods are really way cheaper and fresher in the market than at the grocery! You can even bargain for a few stuff and some nice ladies would even add a little something for free to your vegetable goodies.

I was so happy as we finished fast with our shopping, spent only about 500 bucks for a week's worth of menu compared to spending about 800-1000 when we buy stuff from the grocery of the same kind.

I therefore wanted to make it a resolution to do weekly marketing at the public market for fresh meat, vegetables,rice and fruits whilst maintaining to do the grocery at Shopwise for personal items such as bathroom items, cleaning materials, diapers and canned goods.

All in One Cooking Magic!

I am not a good cook compared to my loving husband. What I am proud of is introducing him to an all-in-one cooking ingredient filled with magic that is true to its name - Maggi's Magic Sarap! In tradition cooking, we normally have salt, spices for seasoning, we also have soy sauce and the like as well as bouollons for soup, certain soup base for sinigang, fried mixes for crumbs and marinating and so forth! Little did I know that what i gave him as a Magic Sarap sample to improve the taste of Chop Suey could easily substitute for all of these hoopla cooking mixes!

Nowadays, we don't store many types of bouillons as well as other frying mixes. We only add to our meat and dishes a few granules of Magic Sarap and off we savor such a delectable dish! I was quite surprised to enjoy such a tastier fried rice when it was sprinkled with a few Magic Sarap!

Ice Cream Fun Facts!

I've always loved eating ice cream since I was a kid.. I used to remember every Sunday, my mom would always include in her grocery purchase a half gallon of ice cream for us. I've always loved Nestle's version of Rocky Road as well as all ice cream brands of plain chocolate, ube and double dutch.

I encountered some nice ice cream trivia worth sharing thanks to Nestle's Choose Wellness handout..

Did you know..
- Scientist have observed that ice cream makes a person happy (a similar effect takes on me during or after eating it!)
- Ice cream activates an area of the brain that enable us to feel happy and it only takes a spoonful to create this effect!
- During World War Ii, ice cream has already been a morale booster as the first "ice cream parlor" was built for sailors in the Pacific in 1945.
- Ice cream was served during America's World War II celebration victory
- Waffle cone came into the picture in 1904 when Ernest Hamwi - a Syrian concessionaire first came up with a waffle cone. An ice cream vendor ran out of dishes thus Mr Hamwi rolled his wafer like waffle into a cone! When it cooled, the ice cream vendor put ice cream on it. The customers liked it and the rest is history! (This might have been an inspiration to put ice cream on bread buns as well! )

Do you check the label?

Did you know that some milk contains added sugar? Too much sugar is a no-no to kids. The earlier your kids are exposed to excess sugar, the greater their predisposition to obesity later in life.

Added sugar comes in a lot of terms:
Added Sugar = sucrose (aka table sugar), corn syrup and maltodextrin

Check out labels in your kid's milk especially on the ingredient list. By law, it is required that ingredients should be listed in descending order. Thus those that appears first on the list are the ones with the highest content. Some milk products perceived to be good for kids have added sugar either first or second in the list! This means your kids are taking in excess sugar than expected! You can taste it in their milk too!! The sweeter the milk is, the more it is has added sugar! Some are even of the expensive types. It hurts to see some moms buying milks for their kids loaded with excess sugar even with the hopes of the milk giving improved mental development to their child. Sad to say there are some kids taking in more sugar than necessary milk nutrients.

Next time you go out for grocery to buy your kids' milk, don't forget to check the label! Check out especially those who've recently changed their label design! You might be surprised that there are even less expensive milk in the market with less sugar and still offer better nutrition for your kids than the expensive brand counterparts.

Personal Tips on Feeding your Child

A lot of first time moms will have this normal dilemma of what to feed their child once they start weaning from breastmilk or milk supplements. Some are even struggling when it comes to feeding their child. I used to dread feeding my firstborn and often pass this to his yaya (nanny). Now, I enjoy feeding my second child and wish I had taken the same route with my firstborn. 

I tried to recall what I learned from my  experience, what I've read on some books and pedia advice retained in my mind on feeding a child.. Here are those that are worth sharing. I cannot guarantee if same will be effective with your baby as what could work with my 2 kids would work otherwise for your child. Hope this helps mothers out there especially those struggling how to feed their child.

1. Breastmilk is best for babies upto 2 years and beyond. Most moms would have exclusive breastfeeding of upto 6 months then start on complementary foods thereafter. Some moms would start weaning their child to baby food as early as 4 months onwards. Check what you think is the best schedule for your baby. If your baby is having rashes or has acute dermatitis, it is best to postpone infant weaning to about 6 months onwards and start slowly on trying out different food types for your baby.

2. Baby foods that are good to start at those that are finely mashed or diced such as potatoes, apple, banana, mango, strawberry, carrots, squash, chayote, papaya and camote. Some would have rice porridge or what we locally term as "lugaw". Others would boil water used for washing rice or what we locally call as "am". For hassle free and convenient options, there are a lot of stage 1 infant cereal available with Cerelac as the trusted infant cereal brands by most moms. As infant grows older, you can adjust his cereal to the next stage. You may also opt to mix and match finely mashed or diced fruits and vegetable above to your babies delight.  My pedia's advise was to start offering ground or flaked meat to my second child as she turned 9 months old.

3. Rule of thumb when trying food for the first time is to have these offered to the baby for around 3 days straight to check if he doesn't encounter any allergy with the food offered. For infant cereal product, a teaspoon of Cerelac stage 1 coupled with few drops of water is best. Make the first baby food as watery as possible and gradually adjust consistency as soon as you feel your baby is ready for it.

4. For babies with sensitive skin or has acute dermatitis or encounters allergy rashes, it is best to postpone introducing other poultry based products and food known to alleviate allergic reactions such as nuts, chicken, fish/seafood and eggs. My pedia advised me to delay in giving these  to my son who had acute dermatitis until he turned 1 year old.  We offered these when he turned 1 and he encountered some rashes when he took these items thus we further delayed introducing these products and recently offered him these items now that he is 2 1/2 years old. Fortunately, he doesn't have any allergic reactions to these anymore. Good news: fish and chicken are now his favorite food to eat during meal times. 

5. There are times when your baby will reject some of the food being offered. Do not despair. Try and try until you succeed as they say. My second baby used to reject every new food being offered to her. We never gave up on reintroducing the food initially offered to her the following day, the week after even months after. Today, she now eats almost every food being offered to her.

6. Meal times for your kids are social times as well. If possible, take your meal together with your child. Bond with him as best as you can during meal. Do not be impatient as most mealtimes really takes longer than expected. For my first born, meal time takes an average of 30 minutes. For my second child, it is a few minutes less. We used to let our firstborn take his meal ahead of us. There are some struggling involved when we put him in his high chair and in letting him eat his food. This sometimes drains us when it is already our time to eat. Most of the time, we even let his nanny feed our child even if we are around. For our second child, we changed this and have her with us whenever we take our meals. We already kept the high chair since she would rather sit on our lap during mealtime. Sometimes she sits on her own on the regular vacant chair. We just let her be and make sure that she does not fall from the chair.

7. Start introducing other dairy products as early as your kid can tolerate it. When my kids turned one, they loved Chamyto - a lactobacilli drink as well as Yogurt. My firstborn's favorite snack drink are those of Nestle's Yoghurt drink in various flavors - strawberry, mango and even orange if im not mistaken. He loves NIDO Yoghurt and Nesvita yoghurt as well for more than a year of taking it already. We never fail to include in his baon when he goes to toddler class a bottle of Chamyto/Yoghurt drink or a cup of Nido/Nesvita Yoghurt together with his small pack of breakfast cereals. We occasionally treat them for a few spoons of ice cream when they turned 1 year.

8. Minimize (if not unavoidable) giving them junk foods such as chips which are very high in sodium since their kidneys cannot tolerate these types still. Offer them healthier alternatives instead  such as breakfast cereals or cookies.

9. There will come a time that you child would start wanting to eat on her own. Early signs would be wanting to hold his own spoon or fork. Drinking from a grown-ups glass instead of his sippy cup. Do not discourage this behavior. I used to regret scolding my firstborn on doing this stuff and until now he still eats with maximum supervision at 2 years of age. For my second child, even if it quite messy to do so, we encourage her to explore her utensils, try to feed by  herself using her own spoon and exploring various ways to try food - with her hands, with the spoon, with the straw etc. We got used to cleaning the mess afterwards and when we dine outside - we only go to child-friendly restaurants and make sure to give a generous tip to the attending food staff who tolerated our kid's mess.

10. Do not force-feed your child. If he doesn't want to partake his meal then let it be. Some disciplinarian parents would object on this tip but a child will eat when he feels hungry. If he would rather play than eat, then let him be. There will come a time that he will look for food or let you know that he is already hungry. Do not worry when he eats only one type of food for a given time. Each child is unique in his own little ways - there are some who are quite hard to feed, there are those who would just eat whatever is being served to them. You don't need an expensive milk or shift to another milk to give to a hard to feed child. You might not realize that you are just spending more or giving your child additional excess sugar depending on the type of milk you plan to shift him to. Just let him be - offer food that he wants and offer healthier alternatives such as increasing his milk intake. As long as his weight for his height is still within the norms for his age then there is no cause to worry.  I used to see in the TV ads with Pediasure and Lactum being promoted for hard to feed kids. Upon consulting with my pedia and checking out that Pediasure contains similar nutrients with my child's current milk - NIDO 1+ and its just the caloric content per serve which differs - i chose the less expensive option - to retain to NIDO 1+. The solution advised to me by my pedia was to increase my son's intake of NIDO 1+ to get the same caloric value of Pediasure's serving. With regards to Lactum, upon tasting the product during one of the samplings it offered in the supermarket, I noticed that the product is too sweet and too much sugar is a no-no for my kids. The earlier my child is predisposed to excess sugar, the greater his chances of having health related problems such as obesity. When I checked the label, true enough, sugar is the second ingredient highest in the product. From what I learned during nutrition seminar, Ingredient list in the labels are arranged in which those appearing first in the list are those of highest quantity. Sugar is listed second in lactum's pack while only listed third in  NIDO. Thus I was further convinced that I did a smart choice in giving my child NIDO. They still continue drinking NIDO until this day.

Hope this tips helped some moms in a way. These are based on personal experiences and we might find similarities or differences in feeding our child.