WD-50 tasting menu

So it turns out I didn't find the time to write the review I wanted. I'll post the pictures and names of all the dishes from the tasting menu first. For now, they will have to speak for themselves!



Cobia, chinese sausage consomme, endive, sherry vinegar



Everything bagel, smoked salmon threads, crispy cream cheese
This was our unanimous choice for favorite dish of the night! That bagel is actually ice cream shaped like a bagel! The sweetness mixed with the smoked salmon threads (it's like our ma-hoo or pork floss! except I guess it should be hee-hoo because it's fish! haha) There was a bit of a boo-boo that happened to Anne's dish though. She found a strand of hair inside the ice cream bagel, so we promptly had it returned. The server was very apologetic and to make up for it, the sous chef gifted us with a bonus dish brought out later on!



Foie gras, passionfruit, chinese celery
The taste of the passionfruit filling delicately and seamlessly gives way to the richness of the foie gras. I never knew the combination could work so amazingly!





The bonus dish!
Shrimp noodles, zucchini, mousseron mushroom, chamomile yogurt



Scrambled egg ravioli, charred avocado, hamachi
This tasted like a very sophisticated breakfast dish. A bit of Japan meets America. We loved the freeze-dried bits of potato. They're so tiny but they packed a lot of potato punch. They tasted like hashbrowns or fries!



Cold fried chicken, buttermilk-ricotta, tabasco, caviar



Snails, red lentils, juniper, orange
Our least favorite dish. I ended up taking only a bite of it because it was a combination of two things I never quite liked in food, snails and oranges. Don't get me wrong, I eat oranges, I love orange juice, but I just don't like them in savory dishes. So, I couldn't bring myself to take another bite.

The server noticed my bowl was still almost full and asked "It's not your favorite?" I said no with a sheepish smile. Then she asked, "Would you like to replace it with something else?" And I said, "Okay!" So they gave me another dish in its place! This might be standard procedure for restaurants of this caliber, or it might not be, but I was so impressed by the level of customer service they've been displaying so far!



My replacement dish! So much yummier!
Smoked eel, spice bread, black radish, campari
I was so happy to be having this that I almost forgot to take a picture of it! We had almost finished picking at this new dish when we remembered. So, I ended up with a shot of the half-eaten plate instead. Shoti and Anne joked that they should have left their snails untouched too so we could all have this instead!



Duck leg, popcorn pudding, kalamansi, lovage
Who knew kalamansi jelly could taste so good with duck? We were so happy to see the Philippine lemon, our Philippine lemon, on the menu that we couldn't wait to see how he'd infuse the flavor into the dish. The jelly was a pleasant surprise!



Lamb loin, black garlic romesco, pickled ramp, dried soybean
I'm not a big fan of lamb, but this was probably one of the best (if not the best) I've ever tried. Shoti loved it, and why not? The combination of the perfectly cooked, still pinkish lamb with the black garlic romesco and the freeze-dried edamame was delightful.



Vanilla ice cream, balsamic, raspberry
I never knew the Italians drizzled balsamic vinegar on top of strawberries on top of their ice cream! This was WD-50's interpretation of the dish. Winner!



Hazelnut tart, coconut, chocolate, chicory
This was our favorite of the three desserts! Good ol' chocolatey happiness.



Caramelized brioche, apricot, buttercream, lemon thyme



Cocoa packets. Chocolate shortbread, milk ice cream.
Would you believe those packets are made out of chocolate too? Named "chocolate leather", the packets housed what tasted to me like crushed Ovalteenies! Yum! We're still wondering how they were able to make the chocolate leather... so cool!

waiting for adobe illustrator to move

The thing I hate most in the world right now is waiting for Adobe Illustrator to finish saving documents. I know it must be torture for my computer to be working with such big files here at work, but it's equally torturous for me to just sit here and wait, not being able to do anything else. Such a waste of time. I could be done in half the time (maybe even less) if the saving and the moving objects, and the printing didn't take so long!

Anyway, I have a bunch of tasks that I should finish this week:
1. Design some marketing promos for Red Mango (Philippines),
2. Buy myself some Pantone guides,
3. Pick a paint color for the walls of the den bathroom,
4. Decide on the layout of our room back home,
5. Create a mood/inspiration board for our room and
6. Reply to a ton of emails!

But tonight, I am planning on doing something that's not remotely related to any of the items on my to-do list! I am going to write (or at least attempt to write) a review on WD-50 which a friend visiting from San Francisco, my brother and I tried out last night. The tasting menu set us back $170 each! (Eeeep!) So our pockets all have holes in them now (and there's no shopping for me for the next 3 weeks!), but it was a completely one-of-a-kind culinary experience so I like to think it was worth it! After all, when (and where) else will I be able to taste an ice cream bagel?

So, just watch out for my next entry which will be complete with a blow-by-blow photographic account of the 11 or so dishes we had last night! :) You'll be salivating by the end of it all. As Liz would say, "Nom nom nom!"

stripping it back.

So, I decided to completely strip my blog back. I chose a template (with just a few minor tweaks in the colors) to bring it back to the simpler days. It was a bit hard to use my blog. It functioned like a bad website with links that led to dead ends so I like it much better now that it's back to the bare bones. Now if only I can bring myself to update this regularly. Not that I have anything interesting to talk about. Pfft. Ah, whatever. I just needed something to get my mind off work. It's so hard to design stuff when you don't have any good ideas. Inspiration, come and find me please!