Wooden Spoon

Last Sunday, I visited another restaurant with my two favorite eating buddies: my mother and my brother. This restaurant is named Wooden Spoon, a Filipino restaurant near the university. It is run by a chef who owned a similar restaurant while living in Paris. After his restaurant in the City of Lights shut down, the chef left Paris and decided to open a restaurant here.

Crab pancit (noodles)

I was eager to eat in Wooden Spoon after hearing many wonderful things about it from my friends in the university. The first thing my mother, brother, and I ordered was the Crab Pancit. In Filipino cuisine, the word pancit refers to noodles and/or noodle dishes. This dish was made up of a rich, creamy concoction of crab and egg which topped a mound of friend noodles. Despite its pale coloring, this dish was quite tasty. The only problem I had with this dish was that it was too oily. 

Wooden Spoon Fried Chicken

While perusing the menu, my mother suggested that we order the Wooden Spoon fried chicken, saying that the chef must be proud of this dish if he named after the restaurant itself. The dish, however, was disappointing. The marinade's flavor was weak and the taste did not permeate to the chicken itself. Rather, it stayed on the breading.

Stuffed pechay (Chinese cabbage)

Next, we ordered pechay (Chinese cabbage) stuffed with smoked fish and ground pork and covered with a mildly spicy sauce made of coconut milk. Flavorful and savory, this was a surprising dish, though I did find the stuffing and the sauce too salty. 

Pan grilled tuna belly with soy sauce,  bagoong (shrimp paste), and an eggplant salad

My brother, being a lover of anything that has tuna fish in it, ordered the pan grilled tuna belly. This order came with, soy sauce (for the fish), bagoong (Filipino shrimp paste), and a salad made up off chopped tomatoes, red onions, green mango, salted egg, and eggplant. The salad itself was tasty and fresh, but I ate it without the shrimp paste. The tuna belly was a bit dry and definitely needed to be eaten with the soy sauce. 

Reyna Blanca

As usual, the three of us decided to order dessert in two parts. The first was Reyna Blanca (which, when translated literally, means "White Queen"), a dish of coconut custard topped with rice puffs. The custard was refreshing, mild, and creamy while the rice puffs gave it a little crunch. This was a real treat. 

Sago cake with covered in palm sugar syrup and rice puffs

The second dessert was sago cake, which was made off sago pearls and sweetened with palm sugar syrup while being topped with rice puffs. The cake itself was nice and sticky while syrup gave it the right amount of sweetness. Like with the Reyna Blanca, the rice puffs added variety to the texture of the soft and sticky cake by giving it an added crunch.

Overall, I found Wooden Spoon to be disappointing. I had expected more out of the restaurant since many people were raving about it. With the exception of the desserts, which were my favorite parts of the meal, the food was neither terrible nor special. In other words, the food was just edible. I highly doubt a return trip to that restaurant any time soon.

Until always,

Lemonjuicesodapop