Mel and the New Normal

Choco-late de Batirol has been long on my must-try list of places to try when I returned to Baguio. I didn't know what to expect, I just knew I had to try it! That's Josh's snake from his horse ride. It's not part of the menu, haha. This is the Cacao fruit. I really don't know what was running through our minds when we impulsively purchased this. It's like, I expected the whole fruit to taste like chocolate or cacao! (Of course it didn't!) They advised on to suck on the seeds. Erm. Honestly it was not good at all. The ladies in the next table were peering at the fruit curiously, so we gave them some. They though we were being generous, but honestly we couldn't eat any more. Hahahaha! This is the famous chocolate de batirol (hot chocolate) of the place. It was good. However, I was expecting it to taste like Mary Grace's hot chocolate -- thick and goey. It wasn't, it was milky but still chocolatey. It was a good drink for the cool weath...

Hill Station is a very popular area in Baguio now. Just a stone's throne away from SM Baguio, I never noticed it until I read about it in Anton's blog Ourawesomeplanet.com. As we passed by it going around Session, I promised we'd come back and check it out. The library in the adjacent Mt. Cloud Bookshop has starred several times on the IG feed of my friends. Entrance Signages Look upon entering. It was quite dark, as it was also dark outside.  With my cousin Trish, and her BF Martin At this point (a month later) for the life of me, I cannot recall the names of these dishes. Peruvian chicken? It was good, though nothing blockbuster for me.  Personally, this was the dish that I enjoyed. It was their house salad, and it included native Baguio ingredients (what else?) like strawberries, candied walnuts. It was so fresh, like it was picked off their backyars. (It probably was!) Another memorable dish, their ice cream incorporating Baguio flavors ...

I really wish I had taken more room shots of Hotel Elizabeth. It was a really pretty place, and worth it's price. Back story here is, we were supposed to stay at our house in Baguio. My cousin, who was an hour ahead of us on the road, saw that the road leading to the house was being renovated. Since it was a narrow and winding road, we decided not to stay in the house instead, especially since it was late at night already. We didn't want to have to deal with figuring out if the electricity and running water had any kinks. I had read about Hotel Elizabeth in a magazine, where they featured the owner. I saw online that they had a 50% percent sale on the prices! It came out about P2,500/night. Ordinarily J and I would stay at a lower priced place, but when we're the kids we're concerned about safety and cleanliness. We were relieved that they had available rooms. At 11PM, we were tired and ready to just pass out on a clean place. Luckily, Hotel Elizabeth was beaut...

It's been years since we visited Camp John Hay. We were surprised to see a part of it was developed into an Ayala Land mini-hub kind of thing, with a call center and all. And around the call center? Restaurants galore! There was Fruits In Cream, Yellow Cab, Starbucks, etc! We had eaten dinner already though, so we decided to try a place that had desserts, called "Everything Nice." Well-lit entrance Menu of Beverages J and Josh lining up, checking out desserts. Clean interiors. Waiting for our hot chocolate and cakes Chocolate Mousse Their version of Hot Chocolate J said he was pleasantly surprised by how good the desserts were! Pasalubong shelf All in all, I think we were happy with the desserts! We had their chocolate cake, chocolate mousse, and hot choco, and all were good. Reasonably priced (think Starbucks rates) and a lot of people were going in and out. It's definitely worth checking out, instead of going to the o...

I don't remember ever picking strawberries in Baguio. Perhaps when I was a kid. Or maybe I just forgot. Anyways, we promised the kids that we would take them strawberry picking. So even if it was raining a bit, and it was traffic getting there, we still persevered. Since it was our first time to travel to the fields by ourselves, we had to use Google Maps on my S4. We were able to find the correct spot, though we mistakenly took the longer, off-road route (my bad.)