Baguio Dining & Entertainment

DINING

Dining is fun in Baguio. There are a lot of restaurants to choose from which serve Filipino, American, Mongolian, Chinese, Italian, Korean, and Japanese cuisine. Here one can discover the best in Northern Philippine cooking from bakeries and pastry shops offering home-baked breads, cakes, sweets and native delicacies or the more family orientated fast-food chains abound in the city. Most establishments are located in Session Road, the main commercial artery of Baguio, and are open from 10 a.m. to 10 p.m.


Picnics and food to-go
Dining in Baguio need not always be about spending a lot of money. With its numerous parks and open spaces, having a picnic is a good alternative to those dining havens along Session Road. Whip up a Caesars salad with Baguio's fresh finds, have a little gourmet cheese and a bottle of red wine, and voila! - you're ready to savour good food and the city's cool breeze.


Cooking at home
If you happen to have a kitchen where you're staying in Baguio, home cooking can also be a fun activity. If you find cooking too much of a workload, go for some take-out food or dine in one of the many hotel restaurants that offer excellent cuisine.


Local Fare “Kulangot ng Intsik”
are coconut shell packaged treats that can only be found in Baguio. They are a common sight in the markets and souvenir shops. "Kulangot ng Intsik" literally translated means "Chinese boogers".  Don’t be put off by the name though. Open the shells by peeling the red paper holding it together. The brown stuff you see coating the inside is a sweetened coconut milk product. You scrape it off with a spoon or pick it with your fingers and eat it as is. Yum!



How to Really Cut Your Baguio Food Bill

Your Baguio food bill can add up to a big part of your vacation spending, especially if you are staying for a week in Baguio, or if you are travelling in a large group.

This is another reason to stay in a lodging establishment that allows cooking.

In deciding what's better for you, consider these then:

1. Preparing your own meals may be cheaper but can take up a lot of valuable vacation time
-- and there's so much to see and do in Baguio that your typical 3day/2night sojourn may not be enough.

2. There are a lot of interesting inexpensive restaurants to try in Baguio that you will not find anywhere else in the world and it would be a pity if you did not at least try some of them.


Here are tips on how to save:

1. Load up on grocery items.

Baguio groceries cost the same as elsewhere in the Philippines. Due to the many residents Baguio has, one cannot say that it is a tourist trap. In fact, tourist dollars go a long, long way in Baguio.

A popular grocery is the one at the SM City mall. So if you did empty your pantry back home and bring everything with you on your trip, know that many of the same items are available here.

If you are staying on the northwestern side of town (near Naguilian and Bokawkan Roads), the grocery stores near you are CSI grocey at the CooYeeSan mall that is oh so cheap, and Holiday Supermart.

Small stores like Shop and Munch and Supreme Deli on Leonard Wood road also very conveniently located and have good sausages and cold cuts.


2. Go to the Baguio City Market.

It is in fact the 3rd thing you should do upon arrival (the 1st would be refuel/buy a map, the 2nd, check-in). Most folks go to the market on their last day to shop for cheap vegetables and souvenir items to bring home. Go on your first and last day.

Have I mentioned that our market is propbably the cleanest in the country? Have I told you that you can find everything that's fresh and ready to cook there?


3. Check out our bakeries.

There didn't used to be too many good bakeries in Baguio in the 1990s (something about the high altitude and lack of equipment and ingredients did not make it easy then). Now we have some really interesting ones that I can recommend:

Swiss Made on on Session Road. I recommend their crusty rolls and "pandesal." Holiday Supermart has its own bakery with good banana bread.

Baguio Country Club has a bakery kiosk accross the main gate that is open to the public. Their raisin bread is popular.

Of course there's Cafe by the Ruin's take-out counter accross Baguio City Hall that sells kamote (sweet potato) bread.



Outdoor Cooking and Dining

1. Have a Barbecue!

If you're staying at a transient home or if your inn has facilities for it, have a barbecue with the whole family. Or a bonfire dinner with roasted marshmallows, strawberries and cream, a large green salad, grilled , corn on the cob, and the list goes on... I leave it up to you!

By the way, the above menu is provided by Atenara House to its guests, upon special request. Otherwise, they only offer that splendid Roast Beef Salad Bar and Pasta Buffet


2. Have a Picnic!

Keep it simple: a large blanket, disposable plates, cups and utensils, a lot of fresh fruits, cheeses, breads, cold or smoked deli meats, some strawberry wine and you're off to a good start.

Now, where?

All the Baguio parks, of course. We have so many!

Or try going up towards Beckel (take Leonard Wood Road until you hit Wright Park Circle, turn to Pacdal, start climbing Ambuklao Road. Between Tiptop (that's an area on Ambuklao Road) and Beckel (that's a barangay) you will see many wide open spaces overlooking the city. Just park your car, put on some cool music and have a party!

Did we mention that you could do the same at Mount Santo Tomas, Baguio's highest peak?

Dining and nightlife is found mainly along Session Road, the bustling hub of commercial activity in Baguio. Though more bars are scattered throughout the city, most are seedy and even dangerous. Street muggers and pickpockets have been known to do the rounds even in the middle of the day.

The whole stretch of Session Road features a motley array of dining options. Surprisingly there is a good set of Chinese restaurants perhaps taking advantage of the fresh and good varieties of vegetables Baguio has to offer. Hop on to Star Café for hefty portions of fried rice and corn soup or their breads and pies; the adjacent Dainty Restaurant offers good coffee and noodles too. Then sample the Beef Brisket at Yan Chow (which also offers a live band at night) tucked in Assumption Road, one of the side alleys connected to Session.

For light eaters, the Swiss Made Euro Deli has gourmet sandwiches, great coffee and hot chocolate served in big mugs. This cafe has eye-catching blue and red interiors and is most frequented by the university crowd. Whilst folksy music, cheap beer and cocktails make Le Fondue at La Azotea Building the timeless watering hole in the city. Local artists even peddle their wares like shirts and silver crafts at the ground floor when nighttime comes.

Don Henrico's pizza and pasta dishes are still the most sought-after among locals and visitors from Manila. Lunch and dinner times draw in long queues at the door. Again, hearty portions are served at prices that won't hurt the pocket. Another locally famous spot is Café by the Ruins over at Chuntug St. near the City Hall. It is known for excellent albeit pricey organic fare and its rustic ambience.

More nightly choices can be discovered in the small bars and restaurants that make up Nevada Square in Loakan Road and inside Camp John Hay.

Around Burnham Park, all sorts of roasted delicacies are sold from barbecue stalls and streetside eateries - one can smell the smoke-filled air away from the park especially when chilly night breezes in.


Café by the Ruins

Café by the Ruins, Baguio. In front of the city hall. This rustic café offers a menu that changes with the seasons. Both delicious and healthy, it always features the bounty of Baguio. Their food list includes hearty soups, vegetables and salads, unusual pastas, café specialties such as fish roe steaks or their gigantic vegetable lumpia smothered in fragrant garlic. Freshly baked breads. No soft drinks, please. Juices and teas, both herbal and fruit. Strawberries or lemon. Benguet coffee, freshly brewed, plain, with cardamom or cinnamon. Hot chocolate.


Sampalukan (Ang Babaing Bastos), New Pamilihang Bayan, Balanga, Bataan

This popular restaurant sits diagonally in front of the new Pamilihang Bayan at Balanga, Bataan. Mely Tuazon started it out many years ago as a simple backyard turo-turo specializing in home-cooked fare: sinigang na ulo ng isda, fresh fish, crab and shrimp, as well as inihaw na baboy. The menu changes with the seasons. But her key ingredients have remained the same. Aling Mely continues to use the fruit and leaves of her tall sampalok tree to concoct her fabled broth. And her vinegar is from nipa, drawn from palms that line the Bataan coast. Although the specialty of the place is that savory fish head sinigang sitting in a thick sourness, it is the proprietor's ribald humor that gives Sampalukan its special charm.


83 Gallery Café Pagsanjan, Laguna

Ernest Santiago's little corner of heaven. You can't miss it. A tall, folk art statue of a woman in a bright green baro with a pink saya (called Gemma) stands in front of an eclectic storefront beckoning visitors to stop and indulge.

Our lunch with Ernest started with a signature dish of Cafe 83, a refreshingly crunchy salad made from fiddlehead fern (pako) fresh from Liliw, layered over with Chinese singkamas and Lumban white cheese. Enlivened with a thick garlic and olive oil dressing, it is (to me) one of the best things about Pagsanjan. The salads were followed by pink sinigang made from bangus bellies from Siniloan, soured by thick slices of native guava. Like a sorbet, to clear the palate. Main courses for the day consisted of home-smoked tulingan lying on a bed of grilled eggplant and tiny cooking bananas (saba), a rich chicken platter soaking in freshly squeezed coconut cream (gata) and yellow ginger with nicely folded mustasa leaves on the side, and one of Ernest's signature pastas, smothered in fresh tomato sauce and flaked tulingan.

Cafe 83's regular menu also offers pandesal with a variety of fillings like grilled eggplant, kesong puti or longanisang Lucban. A total dining experience that should not be missed.


Lab-as, Dumaguete

The best Filipino food in Dumaguete. Arguably the best in the Visayas. Memories are made with the house kinilaw enlivened with tuba vinegar, dayap, chillis and kakang gata (undiluted first pressings of coconut milk). Must-try's include lumpiang isda, Vic Fuentes' version of Bicol Express (shrimp, squid, onions, chillis and young coconut floating in a savory bath of coconut milk), sinugbang tarugho (chargrilled swordfish) and Chicken Halang-halang, a Dumaguete dish in which the flavors of sweet peppers and siling haba dance ever-so-lightly on the tongue.

Every Wednesday, the tabu (day market) at Malatapay comes to life. Meals served by the seashore, less than 30 minutes south of Dumaguete, from 8 a.m. to 3 p.m. We had fish in season prepared in the classic Visayan su-to-kil. Grilled mamsa belly, malasado -- browned on the outside, but juicy and slightly pink on the inside, served with a dipping sauce of coconut vinegar, tomatoes and chili. Its head cooked as a refreshing tinola, made interesting with the large white gonads, soft like Japanese tofu, tasting like a very light cheese. Its flank chopped into tiny raw cubes for a zesty kinilaw. The three dishes using up close to four kilos of fish flesh. On another occasion, we had tanguigue (Spanish mackerel) done three ways. Just as good. On the side, savory lechon Bisaya, no sauce, stuffed with lemon grass, garlic and salty black soybeans. Bright, sweet mangoes, peeled and ravaged, one then two, to clean the palate, to delight, to complete the experience. On long bamboo tables, under a thatched roof with a bamboo frame. The sea breeze and the view of Apo Island keeping everything picnic perfect. Only on Wednesdays.