Anya is live and ready to show you everything. Watch her strip, dance, and perform exclusive shows just for you. Interact in real-time and make your fantasies come true.
✓ Live Streaming✓ Interactive Chat✓ Private Shows✓ HD Quality✓ Free Actions
Free to watch • No registration required • HD streaming
It is always a thrill to discover a new restaurant that offers a gastronomic treat to my taste buds. Lola Cafe & Bar has had an established presence in the Tomas Morato and Timog areas for the past three years, but I have never had the chance to dine at this cozy family restaurant located along Scout Lozano Street.
A few weeks ago, I was invited by Richie Zamora, aka The Pickiest Eater in the World, to try the new revamped menu at Lola Cafe. Given the number of new restaurants that have sprouted along this busy commercial area, I was not really expecting too much but just the same typical Filipino cuisine. Little did I know that Lola Cafe’s new Signature Filipino menu would leave me totally ecstatic and that I would be leaving that afternoon with a new favorite foodie destination.
Like many of the other establishments around the Scout area, Lola Cafe was once a residential ancestral home that was converted into a restaurant. You can still see the main structure of the house including the garage, the entrance and even all the way inside the dining area. One advantage of dining at Lola Cafe is that they have a huge parking garage so you won’t have to worry about parking your car on the streets.
Lola Cafe is actually named after the mother of the previous owners of the house, who is named Lola. I thought that the lola in Lola Cafe stood for grandmother, but I guess it works both ways.
Behind the cute bar is the loft where bigger groups and more private dining events can take place. This is where our long but enjoyable three-hour lazy Saturday lunch was about to take place
The ambiance inside the restaurant is very casual and homey, just like dining at your lola’s house. No need for anything fancy here, just enjoy the atmosphere and the food. Look at those cute fork and spoon cabinet holders!
In charge of Lola Cafe’s new and improved menu is Chef Jonvic Mangibin who is known for being the chef of Olive Tree Kitchen & Bar in Bonifacio Global City. He mentioned that while the previous dishes at Lola Cafe were outstanding, there wasn’t really a central unifying theme or cuisine to it. Now, he has replaced the old menu with a new lineup focusing on Signature Filipino cuisine. These are not just your traditional Filipino items but they are reinvented with Lola Cafe’s own unique twist.
Let’s start with their salads and appetizers. Although I’m not a big fan of salads, I found the Alugbati and Kesong Puti Salad (P310) to be quite interesting. It has charred alugbati, lettuce hearts, roasted carrots, beets, and a lot of kesong puti all doused with balsamic vinaigrette.
The Chipirones (P215) on the other hand has fried baby squid, cherry tomatoes and vegetable atchara with lola vinegar dressing. This is an unusual combination to put on a salad but it actually works!Â
If you like a more typical salad then try their Grilled Caesar Salad (P290) with romaine lettuce, bacon strips, bread crisp and bagoong dressing.
But enough with the salads! If it’s savory appetizers that you want, then you will not want to miss the Wagyu Salpicao (P320). My taste buds really lit up after I took a bite of this amazing starter. This Kitayama Wagyu Beef from Bukidnon is really so tender and juicy which goes so well with the roasted garlic in olive oil. All this dish needed was garlic rice and it would be good for an entire lunch. This dish gets an A+ from me!
But if it ultimate indulgence that you want, then order the Bone Marrow Sisig (P235) which combines two of the most flavorful and sinful Filipino dishes in one. This has pork jowl sisig with garlic crumble placed on top of a big bone marrow filled with all that marrow-y goodness! It is also served with flat bread and kamias jam. This may be enough cholesterol for one week, but it is really so good that you will have to control yourself from eating the entire serving. Better to share this with others.
The soups at Lola Cafe should get a special mention as well. One of them is the Bacon Belly Batchoy (P340) which has braised bacon slabs, ox tripe, and soft boiled egg swimming in a sweet garlic broth. They do not scrimp on the meat at Lola Cafe and it all gives this soup an outstanding flavor. Like most of their other dishes, an order is good for 2-3 persons so it is best to share these with the family and friends.
The Spicy Tinapa Pasta (P215)Â puts a unique Filipino twist on the traditional pasta. It combines pasta with smoked fish, fresh tomatoes and chili which gives it that familiar Filipino taste, but on a different level. This one is a little bit spicy but its something I can handle.Â
No Filipino meal will be complete without rice, so Lola Cafe features several inventive rice bowls that can actually be complete meals by themselves. The Bagoong Rice with Roasted Pork Belly (P275) has salted dried shrimp, sweet ssam roasted pork belly and chicharon with binurong mangga and sibuyas all on top of your rice. Mix them all together and you have a Filipino-style rice dish that you will not find anywhere else.Â
Another rice bowl that I preferred is the Tinola Rice with Confit of Quarter Chicken (P260) with ginger confit chicken maryland, lemongrass rice pilaf, charred green papaya and scallion-anchovy vinaigrette. Imagine having a hot bowl of chicken tinola soup and pouring it on your steamed rice. That is how this rice dish is like, a familiar Filipino taste that we all love. I will be going back to Lola Cafe for this one! The serving pictured above is a supersized order but the regular size should be good for 2-3 persons as well.
Can you believe that we have not even gotten to the main dishes yet? We were already quite full and could not believe our eyes when more signature Filipino dishes started to arrive.
The Roasted Belly Tocino (P480) is a half kilo of slow-cooked liempo with anise glaze and burong mangga. Now this is another unique creation serving roasted pork belly in tocino-style. It has a sweet taste, unlike most other pork belly items, so it might not be for everyone, but it does put a Filipino stamp on this classic pork dish.
Another dish that everyone loved is the Truffled Lengua (P495) with wild mushrooms in porcini broth and garlic cream. Lengua is a popular Spanish and Filipino dish so putting truffle flavors on this makes it even more enjoyable.
Lola Cafe also serves the Gising Express (P140) which is the classic gising-gising using coconut mix broth and homemade bagoong with sigarilyas and french beans topped with a finger chili. I was too afraid to try this, especially with that big chili staring at me, but spice-lovers would want this.
One other surprising main dish is the Garlic Calamansi Buttermilk Fried Chicken (P390) which is fried chicken drowned in calamansi buttermilk and ginger-scallion butter sauce with a sprinkle of chili garlic oil. We all love fried chicken and this is Filipino comfort food at its finest. The garlic and buttermilk gives it a different flavor but it works well together to give even Jollibee’s Chickenjoy a good fight.
To finish our delightful meal, Lola Cafe also presented a few of their new desserts like the Banoffee Pie (P150), a Graham crust cake with banana custard cream and chocolate shavings. A lot of my friends were raving about the Baguio Strawberries & Cream Pavlova, a crisp and chewy meringue topped with cream and a generous amount of strawberries. Both were great endings to a gratifying and amazing lunch at Lola Cafe. Now, I have a new go-to place whenever I want to invite friends and family for a cozy and satisfying get-together with good food and desserts.Â
