Abe: Purple Soup, Bamboo Rice, and Lengua

Featuring more Filipino food restaurants as we continue with our Buwan ng Wika Special this August. We have started with Barbara's last week. This week we visit Abe. The place was full as it was lunch time. Good thing there was a table left at the corner.

Food has arrived.

Bamboo Rice

The bamboo rice was served with a little show, with the server drumming on the bamboo shell before sliding off the upper half to reveal the rice.

Flavored rice with wood ear mushroom and the bamboo taste. This is good for around 3-4 people.

Sinigang sa Ube

A thicker and purple version of the classic sour soup.

Ube is a purple yam which is commonly used for dessert, may it be cake, ice cream, jam, or others. Surprisingly, it went well in a soup dish. Purple coloring of the soup came from ube. The root crop's starchiness contributed to the thickness. This Sinigang sa Ube is less sour than other common versions.

Pastel de Lengua

Hidden under the pastry are chunks of lengua - ox tongue, stewed together with mushrooms and carrots. The ox tongue was tender enough and made more tasty with the cream.

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

Manam: Filipino Food Twists

Off to try more food with twists, we went to Manam. Their menu is already divided into two sides - the classics side and the twists side. Everything we ordered on this visit was from the twists side of the menu.


Sinigang na Beef Short Rib with Watermelon

Fruity sweet with a hint of sour - this sinigang is not the conventional strong sour soup.

The sinigang, as its name suggests, had watermelon in it which gave it a red color and fruity taste. I kind of wondered whether I was slurping sour fruit juice. It also had some tomatoes. The beef was okay, but not the melt-in-your-mouth type of tender.


Seafood Bounty Kare-kare

A bowl filled with seafood was served - crab, squid, fish, mussels, and shrimp on top. The sauce itself was nutty and had actual peanut chunks in it. I just hope there was more crab meat in the crab shell. Bagoong was also served on the side


Pancit Canton

Purple cabbage and orange sweet potato served as colorful highlights to the common noodle dish. Though the noodles were a bit salty for me, the sweet potato neutralized it. Toppings also included pork, string beans, and fried tofu.



Turon with Mango and Kesong Puti

Usually, turon has a crunchy deep fried, sugary coated wrapper that is filled with banana. This one has mango and cheese in it.

The mango was a little sweet and a little sour that is just right to balance the sweetness covering the wrapper. There was definitely some creaminess in there but I did not really taste much of the cheese. Let me describe this dessert with four words - crunch, cream, sour, and sweet. This is my favorite among what we ordered.

Overall, their viands would go well with rice. (It was a little salty, but I think I have lower tolerance for salty food than most people haha.)


Branch visited located at: Ground floor, Mall of Asia, Pasay City

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