Banchetto

Every Friday at Midnight, the stalls set up on Emerald Avenue come to life, it's called Banchetto.

We've long wanted to try it but we're either at work or too late. Well, there was this one time before Christmas '08 when we went but were too full to try anything. I've personally envied my colleagues for having visited over and over. My husband was always ambivalent, since there was nothing else to buy but food.

But we finally got to experience it! Happy, happy us! Happy, happy tummies!

This is what I call a food trip!


When we got there it had just struck mignight and the stalls were still setting up. It was still quite dark and then in a couple of minutes everything came to life. It was a festival of lights, sounds and glorious aroma.

At first there were just a few people walking around and then all of a sudden the little strip was filled with hungry faces. :)


The first dish we tried, the Kikiam (P50 with rice). It was the real kind, not the pseudo ones sold by fishball vendors. It reminded me of childhood trips to Ongpin with my parents. It tasted really good.


Next stop was the gigantic pizzas we saw when we walked in. We just love Sbarros deep dish pizzas so we tried their own rendition of the California Deep Dish pizza (P100). We weren't too happy with it though. It tasted more like barbeque than actual pizza. We didn't finish it.


The lasagna (P60) I bought 2 stalls away from the pizza was really good though. It had just the right cheesiness to it. :)

This was a find. It's called Shawarma Sisig Rice (P70). You have the classic Filipino favorite cross with the famous white, garlic sauce of the shawarma. Yummy!


I sent Adrian to look around for something else. It was his choice this time. He came back with wonderful Takoyaki balls (Samurai balls). We love these things but only if it's made really well. These were great because they used fresh ingredients. It was also a steal at P40.


We were really full but no meal would be complete without dessert. The Very Berry Chillable cake (P60) we found was heavenly. I can't wait to go back for more actually. The Brazo de Mercedes (P35) was a really huge slice and didn't taste bad at all. I just wish the yummy, yellow center was creamier.

We had a blast. We're definitely going back. There's this Monster Burger and prawns thermidore I have my eyes and tastebuds set on.