Mama Lou's: Italian Day Out (Lunch)

Recognized as a place to get good Italian food, Mama Lou's is the first destination of our UP Town Center Italian themed food trip.

I have been wanting to visit Mama Lou's in BF Homes ever since I heard about it from my cousin. For this visit, I went to its UP Town Center branch with my friend. It was lunch time and we did not make any reservations so we were put on the waiting list for a while.

After a few minutes, we were given a table outside and some complementary bread. This came with salsa and pesto.

Poutine with additional bacon

The poutine with additional bacon arrived soon after.

Fries glistening in its gravy-cheese glory. Maybe it was just me but the gravy had some kind of pizza taste in it. Perhaps from meat, tomato, and spices?


Risotto Tartufo Funghi

It was a longer wait for the risotto. Finally, this truffle dish arrived.

Slices of cheese and mushrooms on top of rice in a round plate, this photo does not capture how flavorful this dish really is. Truffle cream provided a different taste. The creaminess and cheesiness reminded me of carbonara.

Watch out for part 2 of featuring an Italian dessert! Any guesses?


Branch visited located at: UP Town Center, Quezon City


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Italianni's: Bistro Dinner

Here’s part two of the Bistro day series. After lunch at T.G.I. Friday’s, we had dinner at Italianni’s. Just like in T.G.I. Friday’s, we used our free appetizer coupon and ordered a main dish.

Complementary bread while waiting for our orders.

Italianni’s Fritti

For the appetizer, we had Italianni’s Fritti which was described as mozzarella sticks on the menu. Mozzarella blocks is more appropriate, I think. Not just nuggets, blocks, because of its size. We have been having cheese as an appetizer today. This time, it was pure cheese coated with breading. I would have loved it more if it was melted enough to be soft and stretchy. But maybe I just arrived a little late and it got cold already. My fellow gastronomer ordered this and was already on our table when I arrived.


Indeed we were served cheese with coating and not coating with a little cheese inside. Just look at the thickness of that slice. The stretchiness of the cheese was not very evident but the chewy factor was there.

We took some pieces home and heated it in the oven. Then there came the stretchy chewy cheesy snack.

Fettuccine Beef Ragu

Back to the dinner, we ordered Beef Ragu pasta as main course. It had a tomato based sauce on thick fettuccine noodles. Plus points for the tender beef ragu on this dish.

And with that, we exhaust our free appetizer coupons that came with the Bistro Card we bought last year. This discount card introduced us to the casual dining restaurants of the Bistro group.

Branch visited located at: 2nd floor, Entertainment Mall, Mall of Asia, Pasay City