Shrimp and Bacon Carbonara

Ingredients:
500g linguine
1 box Nestle All Purpose Cream
2 green bell peppers
chopped bacon
regular sized shrimps
minced garlic
rosemary
salt and pepper
garlic powder









1. Cook the linguine pasta until al dente.

2. Fry chopped bacon til desired crispness 

3. Add minced garlic and shrimps

4. Toss in chopped green bell peppers

5. Season with salt, pepper, rosemary, and garlic powder

6. Add the all purpose cream. Mix in cooked linguine

You may add parmesan cheese on top and garnish with parsley.

Four Eyes

I've been thinking of getting another pair of prescription glasses since I've fully embraced the fact that I really am in need of one. I went to my opthalmologist 2 weeks ago at St. Luke's Global City who confirmed an increase in my eye grade :( 

So I started looking at eyeglass frames again and was set on  buying a tortoise shell Michael Kors pair (which was super divine) priced at around Php6,000++. This was frowned upon by my husband who couldn't understand why I need to shell out this much for a secondary pair. As I was browsing online for prices of the same model in US sites, I stumbled upon a website called Four Eyes (www.foureyes.com.ph).

What is Four Eyes?

This website started operation in May 2013 and it sells eyeglassess and sunglasses online. The most interesting part is that they offer a service called Home Try On wherein you can select up to 3 eyeglass frames that will be delivered to your house for you to try on for up to 5 days. And what's more is that their website recently added a feature called virtual try on where you can upload your photo and try on different eyeglass frames. Gosh, how exciting!

I lingered on their website for about a week (I honestly had a hard time giving up my lust for the MK eyeglasses) until I finally decided to try the HTO service. These are the steps that I followed:

1. Create an account 
2. Select 3 eyeglass frames -- I chose choco chip, cat whisperer, and  break the rule
3. Upload your prescription or fill out the prescription fields
4. Check out and wait for your confirmation email

Choose your frames

Upload your prescription or fill out the fields

Explore their Virtual Try On! It was so fun!!

I was also pleasantly suprised that I got a Php224 discount while checking out. Because of this, I only paid Php1,271. The HTO kit arrived the following day and this is how it looked like.

I honestly had a hard time choosing, I wanted to buy them all actually. But after trying them on for millions of times and asking other people's comments, I finally decided to get the cat whisperer :)

I called their office today and informed them of my decision. They scheduled a pick up for tomorrow and I will hopefully get my glasses by the end of the week. 

I'm really glad that I discovered this website. Otherwise, I would've overpaid for my second pair of glasses when I can get it for a much much lower price for the same design and quality. 

Despedida Buffet Lunch

My nieces' visa for Germany has recently been approved and issued. My cousin (their mother) will be coming home on the 15th to pick them up and throw a small despedida party. We originally decided on getting large food orders from Conti's instead of getting a caterer due to space constraints at home. However, I woke up today and found out that Ensogo is currently running a deal with Vikings SM Marikina:

The deal features lunch buffet on weekdays good for 30 people for only P16,249. Sweet! I talked to my cousin about it and we agreed to purchase the voucher and reserve our event with Vikings SM Marikina. I spoke to Joy who immediately confirmed our reservation in September. 

We are also having dinner here on Dan's birthday in September. With all that gastronomic feasts, I guess I have to work twice as hard in working out next month =)

Devastating Duo: Maring + Habagat

Around this time last year, Metro Manila was paid a visit by the moonsoon rain which caused heavy floods in a lot of areas including ours. This year, another trip was made by the moonsoon along with typhoon Maring.

The heavy rain started in the weekend and only ceased today. I can only thank God that its effect wasn't as grave as last year's (or even Ondoy's) but it damaged a lot of properties, stranded so many commuters, and even taken several lives.

Here are some of the photos taken outside our house:

Makati's coding scheme looms over Bonifacio Global City

Rich get richer: Makati gains while Taguig loses Fort Boni in court decision

My little quiet corporate life has recently been rocked by this (unfortunate) news. While I do not have any jurisdiction nor business claims over BGC, I have been enjoying the area's coding-free life for the past 2 years. Now that the Court of Appeals has recently proclaimed it to be officially part of Makati, my Tuesdays suddenly hangs off the balance. 

Just to give a little background, MMDA implements a daily coding scheme where vehicles are prohibited from 7AM to 7PM depending on the last digit of their plate numbers. However, there is a coding window from 10AM to 3PM (9AM to 4PM in Pasig) where the affected vehicles can roam around the Metro EXCEPT for Makati and Las Pinas. These 2 cities do not observe the coding window hours, hence, if you are banned for the day, then you are banned, no questions asked. This is my main dilemma since Makati is about to impose this law soon over BGC after their claim has been staked in this little city where I currently work.

Why not take a cab on Tuesdays? The answer is simple -- it is very expensive. My daily gas consumption is Php 200 (back and forth Marcos Highway to BGC) but a cab fare will cost me around Php 250 one way which means almost Php 500 back and forth. Absurd. Plus, I think I have mentioned in one of my earlier posts that I am a threat o my own life when I take the public transpo.

Oh well, f*ck Makati. I don't really care who owns BGC. I just hope they re-think the implementation of this law over Global City. We're fine as it is, thank you very much. 

My husband's lookalike

Yes, I'm quite convinced :D

J.Cuppacakes in Eastwood

We went to Eastwood last weekend to take Zoe to Gymboree and to have a quiet family dinner as well. I was thinking of going to J.Co for dessert but the quaint shabby chic decor of J.Cuppacakes called out to me so we decided to give it a try.

The store facade. It was already dark by the time we finished dinner.

The store's candy colored facade and interiors are a welcome feast to the eyes. It's relatively small though; there were 2 customers inside the store when we came in and it was already tough getting inside the door. However, greeting you from the inside is a wide variety of cupcake flavors. 

Zoe pointing out to the red velvet cupcake with cream cheese frosting.

The choices were quite overwhelming but we settled on 4 cupcake flavors:

red velvet with cream cheese, cookie butter, cookies and cream, and triple c

All cupcakes were moist and not too sweet; exactly how I want my cupcakes. I even liked the cookie butter flavored cake even if I'm not too keen on cookie butter itself. Overall, I was quite happy with our cupcake choices. Zoe even repeatedly mentioned how much she liked her cuppie. Also, the cupcakes are reasonable priced. We only paid P335 for 4 cupcakes, 1 cup of coffee, and a bottle of water. 

The only thing I didn't like about this store was it was just a bit too tiny to even have a dining area. The 'dining area' is a bar table against their glass wall with 4 cute bar stools. Whatever they lacked in space though they made up in their decor. Overall it was a nice and relaxing experience still mainly because we were the only diners at that time :)