French Toast with Ice Cream

By: The Moody Critic

With dimensions of 5 x 5 x 4 inches almost representing a perfect cube, no one would ever complain about its gargantuan serving size. Given its apparent thickness, one would wonder how were they able to come up with the idea and how were they able cook it evenly from the cortex up to the very interior.

Its golden brown exterior and its crunchiness added significant points to its presentation and consistency respectively.

Although this one-of-a-kind french toast has been labeled "Yummy!" or one of the "best sellers" of the cafe, the taste of the toast itself was of course not surprisingly similar to your everyday french toast.

Furthermore, even with the help of another person, it was a struggle consuming the entire dessert not only because of enormous size but also for its marked oiliness. This time, the vanilla ice cream and caramel sauce really came in handy for having neutralized the overwhelmingly oily factor in this dessert. One's liver should be prepared for the coming storm.

Presentation: 8.1
Taste: 7.0
Texture and consistency: 6.5
Complexity: 7.6 
Value for money: 9.0

Overall rating: 7.4/10
Mood: SATISFIED

Resto: Xin Wang Hong Kong Cafe Address: Ground Floor, North Wing, SM Mall of Asia, 1300 Pasay City Full food name: French Toast with Ice Cream Price: P105.00

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Chocolate Paradise Cake

By: The Moody Critic

The first thing that you would probably notice about this cake would be its posterior portion. Its milk chocolate crumbs might give you a scenario of this cake falling on a dirty, rocky terrain and was then picked up to be served on a plate. Nevertheless, it gave the cake a unique eye-catching appeal.

The cake had moderately moist consistency and quite a stable structure. With seven layers composed of chocolate cake, milk chocolate and cream fillings, who will ever doubt its title: chocolate paradise? However, I find this multiple layering scheme redundant and insignificant because the taste was very uniform regardless of layer. Moreover, layering was inconsistent because identical layers are not congruent.

I know they're trying to be different from other coffee shops out there but blue plates just don't work for me. This is a cafe; so it must express its warmth by adhering to classical plain theme of whites. Furthermore, plate abrasions are readily conspicuous in colored ones.

Presentation: 7.0
Taste: 6.0
Texture and consistency: 7.9
Serving size: 8.5
Value for money: 8.0

Overall rating: 7.0/10
Mood: AMBIVALENT

Resto: Baang Coffee
Address: 258 D Tomas Morato Ave. cor. Scout Fernandez St., Quezon City
Full food name: Chocolate Paradise Cake
Price: P90.00

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Spaghetti Bolognese

By: The Moody Critic

What a delicious-looking dish! The shape of the plate and the parsley really stirred up my appetite. As expected, the parsley gave the effective color contrast on the plate. However, the pasta was undercooked; it needed five more minutes. The bolognese sauce was lacking an effective flavor. All I could taste were the sourness and the metallic "canny" taste from the canned mushrooms.

How about the bread? In one look, you can say that it is inferior. The bread did not have an interesting personality (e.g. garlic bread). Though you can see minute amounts of an unknown herb, it was still very bland. I'm sure a little spread of butter will go a long way! This bread also seemed out of place on the plate due to its elephantine size, its paleness, and the way it was sliced. Lastly, it was moderately rubbery in consistency so a little precaution to those with brittle or loose teeth. Considering the price of this dish, is quality bread too much too ask?

Whenever I would see meat sauce in the food description, I find it exasperating to ask the fastfood chain or restaurant what their meat sauce was made of (I can't eat pork). There are two reasons behind this: (1) just the act of asking the person who cooked it takes a lot of time, and (2) some establishments don't actually know what it is made of. Consequently, I would usually shy away and would not order the dish that has "meat sauce" in it. But thank you Dolcelatte for specifying in the menu that this dish has an all-beef meat sauce.

Presentation: 8.0
Taste: 6.4
Texture and consistency: 6.2
Serving size: 8.5
Value for money: 6.5

Overall rating: 6.9/10
Mood: DISAPPOINTED

Resto: Dolcelatte
Address: 1616 Quezon Ave., South Triangle, Quezon City
Full food name: Spaghetti Bolognese
Price: P295.00

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Forest Berry Cheesecake

By: The Moody Critic

There's more to this cake than its apparent cuteness. First, you may consider this as a 2-week old forgotten birthday cake in the fridge because the base layer was mysteriously hard, coarse, and dry. Second, the middle layer had a shocking rubbery consistency similar to the nodes of Hodgkin's Lymphoma. This layer would also demand tremendous muscle effort because your fork has the tendency of sticking avidly to the cake. So when you pull your fork from that layer, you will be dragging the entire cake. Moreover, this cheesecake was ridiculously nutty thus preventing me to savor the richness of the cream cheese.

To me, it was a Sahara desert experience rather than a forest adventure. However, the oasis of that desert-like experience was the white chocolate frosting. Although it was excessively sweet, it revived the entire dessert because of its highly contrasting and potent taste. The overall structure was quite appealing also because of its unique dome shape compared to the standard cheesecake wedge.

Presentation: 7.0
Taste: 6.5
Texture and consistency: 4.2
Serving size: 6.6
Value for money: 8.2

Overall rating: 7.2/10
Mood: UNSATISFIED

Resto: Cheesecake Etc.
Address: Northeast Square Bldg., Greenhills, San Juan
Full food name: Forest Berry Cheesecake
Price: P160.00

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Oh! La La

By: The Moody Critic

It is an innovative idea to give the classic Oreo cheesecake a makeover. However, the thought of making the cheesecake matrix a marble of hazelnut and vanilla didn't work for me. By deviating from the standard layering seen in typical cheesecakes, the cake loss the balance and the potential synergistic effect of its flavors. It was like hazelnut as episode one and vanilla as episode two. Another downside of this dessert was the increased humidity of the matrix by roughly 30%. It was like eating a piece of a poor unsuspecting bread that fell into a cup of coffee. I also believe that the general idea of making a cheesecake is making it more hydrophobic than hydrophilic.

Presentation: 8.0
Taste: 7.3
Texture and consistency: 6.0
Serving size: 6.6
Value for money: 8.2

Overall rating: 7.2/10
Mood: AMBIVALENT

Resto: Fleur De Lys Patisserie & Cafe
Address: Tomas Morato ave., South triangle, Quezon city
Full food name: Oh! La La
Price: P98.00

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Hallow Mallow S'mores Pie

By: The Moody Critic

A dessert that obviously heralds the Halloween season.

To be honest, I haven't tasted the actual S'mores. I usually hear about it in American TV shows and they would really fuel my desire to taste it. But thanks to this dessert, my curiosity was somehow put to rest.

This dessert includes the traditional ingredients needed to make S'mores: graham, chocolate fudge, and toasted marshmallows except for the added roasted almonds. From top to bottom, the cake was inconsistent in terms of texture because first you have a smooth, rich graham whipped cream, then a rocky road-like texture from almonds and chocolate fudge underneath, then a gooey marshmallow layer with brittle graham crackers.

The only amazing constituent of this dessert was the deliciously sweet graham whipped cream because of its thematic cobweb-like design and the cute solitary ghoulish marshmallow on top. As I have observed, these marshmallows vary in facial expressions and personalities.

Sad to say, like its existing brothers and sisters, this dessert's Oreo crust seemed to have been enveloped with iron curtain. I wasn't able to eat it because it was practically made indestructible.

Presentation: 8.0
Taste: 7.3
Texture and consistency: 6.2
Serving size: 8.7
Value for money: 8.1

Overall rating: 7.4/10
Mood: AMBIVALENT

Resto: Banapple Pies and Cheesecakes
Address: Il Terrazo Mall, Tomas Morato Ave., Quezon City
Full food name: Hallow Mallow S'mores Pie
Price: P110.00

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