Frannywanny

Early this year, I opened my travel journal again. Not known to many, I keep a notebook/scrapbook that documents all trips since Paul and I got married three years ago. It had photos, quotes, theme park tickets, boarding passes and a lot more. However, we got extremely busy and I now have a heavy box that goes with my journal filled with photos, receipts, tickets that have yet to be placed in this journal. What more now that I've relocated to another country?!  I think I need a whole new scrapbook as everything might not fit in my old journal anymore. Anyway, at the last page of my journal, I have a list. This list is something that I love referring back to once in a while. My goal is to visit at least one country per continent in my lifetime. So far I've covered two thus I have 5 more to go. Knowing that I won't be able to travel far this year, I went through the list to see which are the "doable" destinations. Vietnam . The land of pho and banh mi! L...

To celebrate our 2nd wedding anniversary , Paul and I had a dinner date at the Marriott Cafe . I guess it must have been fate and perfect timing that the Marriott Cafe is currently having their Flavors of Asia promotions wherein a couple of Asian favorites will be featured every dinner for the entire month of July . As such, it was a perfect chance for us to relive our fun two-weeks honeymoon spent in Singapore and Malaysia , two years ago. We did nothing but to eat, eat and eat. Luckily, our honeymoon coincided with Singapore's annual Food Festival allowing us to sample and enjoy never-tried-before local fares at affordable prices. Marriott Cafe has prepared a really good spread! I began with some Vietnamese rice rolls that were carefully handmade by the happy looking Chef Phan Tien Hoa of Renaissance Riverside Saigon. Normally, I would have my rice rolls with hoisin sauce or peanut sauce but I was pleasantly surprised by this pesto-tasting green peanut sauce that was...

After enjoying a couple of Thai specialties at Nav with my colleagues last Friday, Paul and I joined our dear friends Richard, Irene and adorable Lauren for lunch one rainy Sunday. This time we headed to Makati excited for our Vietnamese feast. Shameless plugging alert: I've been craving for Asian dishes lately, I guess this is after going through the August issue of Yummy Magazine that features a LOT of yummy Asian recipes *drool* . So..grab your copy NOW! A couple of months ago, Richard and I purchased a coupon each from Metro Deal Philippines . This coupon will allow us to have a four-course Vietnamese meal for two for only Php. 445 at Ba Noi's . What a steal! Since it will be our first time to try Ba Noi's we figured out that given how reasonable the price of the coupon is, it won't be too painful on the pocket should our meal fails to meet our expectations. Let me share with you the dishes that were served to us by Ba Noi's : From the moment we sa...

I love to travel and when I travel, the one thing that I look forward to is to eat the local dishes found in the country where I'm visiting. Nothing beats enjoying something authentic. While I've never been to Vietnam, this has been part of my list since last year after seeing photos taken by my friend L. She spent three fun days in Vietnam and enjoyed authentic Vietnamese coffee and fresh spring rolls with plump shrimps inside. Oh my mouth waters as I view her photos. An invitation to Aquaknox brought The Foodie Club together one Sunday lunch. Since we were a big group, we didn't arrive at the restaurant at the same time. Therefore, to while away time for the early birds, we were given a basket of Prawn Crackers to munch on. Delicious prawn crackers very similar to those that you can buy from the grocery and fry at home. I love dipping this in vinegar. When more than half of The Foodie Club have arrived, the kitchen began to serve our meal. First came the Goi Cuon...

It has been two weeks since I've officially started my No-Rice diet. Don't ask me if it's working, I guess it is but I'm not sure. All I know is that it truly feels great to to be able to keep this (diet) going for as long as I can. Ha! Talk about being hard on myself ;) Tonight was date night. As always, it takes us a while to finally decide on where to eat. Our normal conversation would go like this: P: Where do you want to eat? F: Anywhere, how about you? P: Anywhere also, go choose na F: You nalang P: (getting hungry and impatient) dear, please choose na F: ok fine, Pho Hoa (teehee) So it was Vietnamese for us tonight. Luckily, we have a branch located nearby making it pretty accessible for us to visit anytime. Pho Hoa Noodle Soup originated in the US of A and was brought here more than 10 years ago. Currently it has 15 branches located all around Metro Manila. Although, Pho Hoa is pretty much classified as a fast food-ish noodle house, I really enjoy dining here b...