Have your fill of international food favorites at Nitz

Eating out in the company of family or friends and not agreeing on where to go to satisfy your varying cravings? Try Nitz Restaurant! Here you can have your fill of delicious Filipino, Italian, Japanese, American, even French food! For added bonus, menu prices won't burn a hole in your pocket. How's that for an interesting food trip?

The first time I ate at Nitz was about two months ago although I've been seeing this restaurant for a few years already whenever I would pass by the corners of P. Noval St. and Espana Blvd. near UST in Manila. I was amazed that this small, simple restaurant offered a wide variety of  dishes: Filipino - goto, tapsilog, different types of pancit, lomi, mami. kare-kare, dinuguan, etc.; a French classic - chicken cordon bleu; Italian - fish parmigiana, pasta (carbonara, lasagna, spaghetti); American - hamburger; and Japanese - katsudon, yakiniku,  gyudon, chicken teriyaki and tempura. It's almost like there's something for everyone here. Over the next weeks, my kids and I often ate at Nitz when we attended church service at Victory U-Belt. 

Here are the dishes that we've tried:

Yakiniku, P80.

Katsudon, P80.

Tocilog, P75. 

Tapsilog, P75.

Pancit Palabok, P50.

Lasagna, P60.

Spaghetti, P50.

Chicken Cordon Bleu, P80.

Siomai, P35.

Buko Pandan, P41.

Our usual drink - C2 iced tea

Inside Nitz Restaurant on Espana Blvd. in Manila

Lasagna is the bestseller at Nitz and rightly so, I may say, 'coz it tastes really great - a wee bit sour, a little sweet and a lot creamy! However, the serving is too small that it will leave you wanting for more especially when you're ravenous. Also unforgettable here is their spaghetti. It's Pinoy-style but not too sweet; so yummy! - the reason it was a big hit for my youngest child. I liked the Chicken Cordon Bleu as well. 

Nitz Restaurant has three branches in Sampaloc, Manila: at Espana Blvd.corner P. Noval, R. Papa St. and Dapitan corner Asturias Streets. There's one, too along Regalado corner Buick Streets in West Fairview, Quezon City (in front of FEU Hospital) and at TUP Bldg. on 

San Marcelino St., Ermita, Manila.    

Great sandwiches and more at Country Style

I'm usually headed for Quezon City on Saturdays to get our organic veggies at the QC Memorial Circle but yesterday was different as I didn't go out of my home city of Manila. It was my water baptism day at the Cathedral of Praise (Yeeeey!) on Taft Avenue and before the ceremony, my son and I met my daughter who had just gotten out of school, waiting at SM City Manila. We had to have snacks, I thought, before the church service and Country Style was my choice as I wanted to have a sandwich and a plate of spaghetti. My two kids agreed and so these we had:   

Ham Sandwich with Iced Tea, P95.

Bagel Deluxe with Iced Tea, P95.

Spaghetti with Iced Tea, P70.

Brewed Coffee, P35.

Not seen here: me - full and satisfied.

 

A dizzying array of donuts and muffins.

My little boy is all smiles over the spaghetti and ham sandwich.

As Valentine's Day was only a few days ago, Country Style's Valentine promo was still on. Lucky me was able to save on moolah. Haha! The ham sandwich, for instance was now just P95 whereas before, it cost P115. I was pleasantly surprised that I only had to shell out P355 for 2 orders of spaghetti, a ham sandwich, bagel, coffee and 3 glasses of iced tea! Not only were our food very affordable, everything was so good and filling too! I liked that the ham sandwich had lots of veggies. My little boy and I liked the spaghetti too - saucy and a little sweet. I enjoyed my coffee as well though it came a little too strong. Meanwhile, daughter said she liked her bagel too and added that it was so filling she was able to finish only half of it. Well, she had a few forkfuls of my spaghetti, that's why.

Aside from what we ordered, you can also have donuts, soup, salad, sausages, omelette and other kinds of sandwiches at Country Style. They have stores at Ali Mall, SM City Fairview, Paseo Center, Market! Market! and Robinson's Place Novaliches, among other places.

Yuletide eats

What added to your waistline during the holidays? With all the Christmas parties and New Year revelry we attended and did, I'm pretty sure everyone was stuffed and gluttonous. My family spent Christmas in our hometown in Quezon so I was fortunate to just lay back and wait for Mom to finish cooking before I get to taste what she prepared. Haha! My mother, who is now 84 years old, makes really mean morcon, I tell you. She does this special beef dish only once a year, served as "queen" of our Media Noche spread, which makes it much anticipated. For this year, however, Mom made morcon in time for Christmas because we wouldn't be welcoming the New Year with them in Quezon but in Manila. As always, it was very delicious, even better that those I've tasted in some restaurants. I have yet to learn making morcon from mother, though, and I hope to do that this year. Anyway, aside from morcon, Mom also fried some chicken marinated in soy sauce and calamansi, while my brother-in-law cooked kare-kare and pancit bijon. My two daughters, on the other hand, prepared carbonara which was perfect! I'm so proud of my kids. Their carbonara was heavenly even though it was their first time preparing this pasta dish! As for me, I did the eating. Haha!  

Mom's mouthwatering morcon.

Fried soy chicken somewhat burned on the surface. Haha! Still good, though.

Delicious kare-kare by bro-in-law.

Mom's yellow rice (rice mixed with corn).

My kids' carbonara. T'was the first time they cooked this but it was perfect!

My bro-in-law makes really mean pancit bijon.

To welcome the New Year back in Manila, I prepared spaghetti and tacos while my daughters made the desserts - refrigerator cake using broas (ladyfinger), and coffee jelly. We had barbecue too but I just bought it from Andok's. I was a little bit sad because I wanted to prepare a special Media Noche spread but failed to do so because I still had to report to work on December 31 and also January 1 and thus had little time to cook. And to top this, my househelp went on vacation to her boyfriend's place in Rizal on December 30th and returned only in the afternoon of January 1. Needless to say, she was of no use at the time I needed her most. Sigh...Oh well, better luck next New Year. Hehe!

My spaghetti.

Pork barbecue from Andok's.

Tacos.

My taco. Notice the large-cut cabbage strips. Hubby cut them. Hehe..

Garlic toast by my eldest daughter.

Refrigerator cake also by my eldest daughter.

My second child's coffee jelly.

For dinner on New Year's Day, my family plus two nephews ate at Mang Inasal. It wasn't a very good idea, though, because at a little past 8 p.m., they had no more soup, no chili (very important to me and my nephew JC) and no more dessert! Aaargh! But since I came from work and we had no more time to go the mall after hearing the 7-8 p.m. mass, we settled for Mang Inasal which is the only restaurant apart from Jollibee that is near our place. Still, it was a happy occasion for the family, especially since my two nephews, the sons of my sister who passed away on this date (January 2) 11 years ago, only get to stay with us for a few days during summer and Christmas.

At Mang Inasal, Pork Sisig.

Chicken Pecho.

Dinuguan at Puto.

Late bloomer

The beauty of having grown-up kids is that once they finish school and start earning, they can treat mom to a nice meal. The downside, of course, is that it means mom is already old. Haha! Nevertheless, I thoroughly enjoyed dinner one recent Saturday without having to pay for it myself, thanks to my eldest child. It was at Sbarro in Trinoma Mall. I know it's quite strange, even somewhat funny, but it was my first time at this Italian restaurant, even though it's been in existence in the Philippines for 20 years! I don't quite know, it just didn't appeal to me before. Truth to tell, it was Figaro that we wanted to have dinner at, but sadly, we were informed by the guard that their Trinoma store had closed last year. So second choice it was for Sbarro. However, our dinner there proved to be satisfying that I realized I was missing out on something all these years. You could say I'm a late bloomer for Sbarro but hey, better late than never. 
Anyway, my daughter and I had: 

Roasted Chicken with Spaghetti and Garlic Roll, P169.

Baked Ziti, half order, P96.

Hawaiin New York Style Pizza, P110./slice

Cheesecake, P76.

Raspberry Iced Tea, P41. and Soda, P28. 

While I didn't like the spaghetti (I'm a true-blue Filipino, I like sweet spaghetti. Haha!) and the Cheesecake very much, I loved the Baked Ziti, pizza, roasted chicken and even the garlic roll (quite oily but delish!) . My only complaint about the chicken was that it was too small a serving. One more thing I liked was that you could go for half an order of pasta here so that even if you have company, you can try different kinds of pasta and not be forced to share a full order. Sadly, however, there's no coffee here. (Why???) But I'll definitely be back to Sbarro for the yummy food that's reasonably priced. Happy weekend, everyone!