Food

[JDDavao II]

On 9/19/2019 at 6:43 AM, Tommy T. said:

A bit contrary to what JD wrote, L and I have found a number of decent ethnic restaurants in Davao:

American, Japanese, Chinese, Vietnamese,  Korean, French, Indian. But they don't jump out at you - you have to find them. And the good ones can be expensive - close to USA decent restaurant prices. They are mostly in or near malls, but there are some in tiny strip-malls - the poor look-alike restaurants are most common however.

I've been to most malls here, I think, and not been impressed enough to want to pay the taxi man for the ride from, say, Toril to Abreeza for anything. I would love to hear about restaurants, though. We just tried "Davao Famous Restaurant" across from S&R which I thought would be awful given it's name, but it was pretty good Chinese-style food.

 

On 9/19/2019 at 12:16 PM, Tommy T. said:

I am okay with a lot of Filipino foods - adobo, pancit, lechon (roast pork), kinilaw

I enjoy most Filipino foods, as well. Many of them have been staples in Hawaii for generations so my connection there has prepared me for quite a lot. I would never have moved here had I not enjoyed most of the "regular" foods. 

We were just at Azon's Boneless Lechon today in Bangkal and everything was quite good.

[JDDavao II]

On 9/19/2019 at 2:28 PM, Tukaram (Tim) said:

The best food I have found here, by far, was in Boracay.  There are a lot of foreigners cooking, so the food is pretty good. Still... Boracay also had some of the blandest "Indian" food I ever tasted ha ha. 

I was surprised, not at the food, but the cocktails in the Boracay beachfront restos. No one could make a martini - the first thing I ask for to judge a cocktail bar.

[JDDavao II]

17 hours ago, intrepid said:

Adding to that is the fact most either will not or can not buy the better ingredients to prepare a good dish. 

As someone who attempted to raise quality backyard chickens to sell/share with the locals, I can attest that our chickens were larger, fatter, and healthier than many. What the weren't is cheaper. And cheaper is all that matters here. 

[JDDavao II]

1 hour ago, Guy F. said:

One of the episodes of Anthony Bourdain's "Parts Unknown" TV show took place in the Philippines. He gave a good review to Jollibee. I wonder how much they paid him.

I think a lot of what Bourdain did was in the spirit of "For what it is". I have found it's best to look at food here in the same vein.

As a New Jersey native, I've had much better pizza than I can get at Greenwich. But, for what it is, sauce and stuff on dough, Greenwich is good. Master Siomai in the grocery store food area isn't the best Chinese dim sum I've had, but for grocery store food court siomai? It's good. And so on.

[Mike J]

21 hours ago, Tommy T. said:

Yesterday, I was shopping at a nearby SM and was disgusted when I saw a large rat scamper from the meat department to the freezer section right in front of me.

Maybe mystery meat was on sale that day and the rat escaped the meat department before being put through the grinder.  

[Tommy T.]

8 hours ago, JDDavao said:

I would love to hear about restaurants, though.

I will start a new thread for food and restaurants just here in Davao so we don't take over this one...

[Tommy T.]

9 hours ago, Mike J said:

Maybe mystery meat was on sale that day and the rat escaped the meat department before being put through the grinder.  

And I saw that rat AFTER I bought some ground "beef" and ground "pork"...

Edited September 21, 2019 by Tommy T.

[Tommy T.]

16 hours ago, JDDavao said:

As a New Jersey native, I've had much better pizza than I can get at Greenwich. But, for what it is, sauce and stuff on dough, Greenwich is good.

Agreed about better in USA. Best pizza I had was at Aurelio's in Chicago. But Northlake Tavern in Seattle was outstanding too... But pizza is personal and each of us has our preferences... so I respect yours totally.

L and I prefer S & R pizza most of the time. But the quality varies - sometimes there are few toppings at all or they are clumped in one part of the pizza. I love their sauce. Surprisingly, we had a Shakey's pizza brought by a relative that was outstanding. But she couldn't remember which one she ordered. I went back a few weeks later and ordered what I thought she might have done and it was terrible! Just cheese on a cracker with a few dribs of sauce, bits of toppings... And that was from the same outlet. So I must have guessed wrong. But I will try again. Greenwich is okay, by our standards - better than Yellow Cab or Pizza Hut.

[GeoffH]

I enjoy a lot of the local dishes, this is Ginagmay (Bisayan) cooked by SWMBO mama that we had tonight with rice.  A mix of various vegetables with slow cooked pork.

 

 

[Marvin Boggs]

11 minutes ago, GeoffH said:

I enjoy a lot of the local dishes, this is Ginagmay (Bisayan) cooked by SWMBO mama that we had tonight with rice.  A mix of various vegetables with slow cooked pork.

 

Rice?  You don't say....