A Visit to Chef's Table

Mark took me out for a dinner date last Saturday at Chef's Table in the Fort Bonifacio, Global City. We used the Valentine's day as an excuse to have a 5-course dinner in this quite popular restaurant. Chef's Table is owned by a quite famous chef in the city, Chef Bruce Lim, who I knew from a food show on the Asian Food Channel. Anyways, here's a short summary of our dining experience.

I was welcomed with a single pink rose, super nice :).

Checked the set menu for Valentine's Day.

Chili on this yummy cocktail, very interesting. That's my date btw, distracting me.

Shellfish and seafood explosion in coconut-lemon grass soup. Super yummy!

It's actually a set of four food samplers but I didn't take photo of the balut dish because it's not that photogenic and I don't eat it. This was also where the picture taking stopped. I was starving.

The food were great and was very pleased with the taste. I have a ridiculous obsession with salt, but I never needed one in this meal. The taste is just perfect. What I was trying to figure out during our dinner was that the set menu didn't seem fit for a dinner date. The menu have shellfish and crab as main course, something that I will never order if I'm out on a date with a prospect lover/boyfriend. If you can remove an oyster, a clam, or a mussel from its shell with a fork and a knife without touching the shell and not making a big mess, then it's not a problem. Thing is, girls will be girls. On a date (a potential bf that I like big time), I'd normally order something that's easy to eat. Not necessarily to eat like a bird, but just something that's not messy. Girls can get tensed specially when they are out with someone they like, and of course, we want to impress and make the evening perfect. What more if you'll eat crab? lots of squeezing and digging in and finger licking action. I squirted crab sauce (whatever it is called) on my face twice trying to crush it to get to the meat. Luckily, I was with my husband-to-be and we were already over that impress/get impressed, turn offs and ons stage hah.

After the delicious meal, I realized that the menu does actually fit, may not exactly for teeny dates, but for Valentine's day. Everything was an aphrodisiac, from the soup down to dessert. Plus, touching food (with clean hands please) is quite intimate and seductive. How could I miss that (well, I was hungry and couldn't think right)?

Anyways,I wasn't quite wowed by the dark chocolate panna cotta. I'm not really big on desserts, but it's quite chewy for a panna cotta. Also, it was quite weird that they served my main course when I wasn't done with my appetizer yet. Not really a biggie, but the table was quite small to accommodate 2 big plates on one side at a time. The dessert was also served a few minutes after serving the main course. It's not also a big deal, but I would want to have my panna cotta to be nice and chilled :). We also ordered a cocktail that never came, then found out after 20 minutes that something broke in their system that caused our cocktail order to not reach the bartender. Doh!

Well, maybe it was just a busy evening.