Yes, it is like my 4th time writing about this café and who can blame me. I am simply a die hard fan who believes that we should share our joyful discoveries for others to try and enjoy them as well. However, unlike before, this entry will not merely be centered around cakes but the food experience in general that this wonderful café has to offer.
Ambiance: Cozy and Homely. While I have already eaten their cakes numerous times in the past, this is actually just my second or third time dining at this café. I would really want to go back as the place reminds me of a secret garden in the middle of bustling city as I take a break from the stresses and distractions from life and take a moment to reflect.
Food: At a glance, the menu seems to offer ordinary selections that you frequently see on the usual restaurants but wait until you taste it.
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| Seafood Pasta |
I was craving for some olives so I went for this one. Yes I was expecting it to taste good for no one could go wrong with seafood pastas especially since seafood are very juicy and flavorful. What I was not expecting was to be surprised at how appetizing it would look when it was served in front of me. I knew at a glance that I would be eating a quality, healthy and flavorful lunch.
Even the pasta is juicy! It is soft and almost almost melts in your mouth. Can pasta be this juicy? Yes, Mary Grace does it! As for the seafood, the shrimp is big and juicy, the squid rings are easy to chew, and the clams are nothing but flavorful. The pesto is just an added bonus to the taste. While most seafood pastas would rely on the pesto half of the time for the flavor, I honestly believe that this one does not need pesto for it to be this tasty. It has the right ingredients and went the extra mile to really squeeze out the potential of each ingredient to make it the perfect embodiment of a seafood pasta.
I just cannot get over the experience that the next time I dine it at this café, I ordered the same. However, it took me quite some time choosing because I was torn between my principle of always try something new and the taste of my previous experience.
While I was under pressure reviewing their menu one by one, I read that a certain pasta uses Fusilli for its noodles and I suddenly had an idea. Good thing, the chef agreed to my request so here comes the seafood pasta that uses the Fusilli type instead of the classic one. Thank you Chef!
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| Seafood Fusilli Pasta |
We also ordered other flavors of their pastas, all with the same high quality flavorful ingredients accompanied by that melting ohh so juicy pasta. Ohh before I forget, the bread is of superb quality. It is not simply toasted with garlic butter on it. It is wheat bread which is crunchy on the outside and soft on the inside.
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| Dory and Saffron Pasta |
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| Classic Carbonara |
It was quite funny when for the first time, I was not able to determine what this pasta is due to the really good quality of the ingredients. While most carbonaras would just rely on the white sauce and bacon, making it look extremely creamy and unhealthy, this one has again, successfully, mind boggled me. For one, it is not white and drenched in that unhealthy sauce, second, the bacon is plenty when usually you only find one or two in the usual carbonara, three, the mushrooms are visible and four, it has TOMATOES. At first, I thought it was a mushroom truffle pasta but it looks lighter and ham and bacons do not usually enter the picture when one is making a mushroom pasta.
Thanks to Mary Grace’s, the art of making and tasting pastas have entered a whole new level.
Dessert Time: Cakes! As an avid lover of cakes, God only knows how extremely difficult it was for me to choose which cakes to try as I would have tried them all if only my body does not get fat and my wallet is bottomless. Sad to say with the limited choices, I have to make a really tough one and stick to three choices.
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| Mango Benne |
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| Sansrival |
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| Chocolate Mousse |
The mango benne was the least of my choices at first but my colleague was really into it so we ordered that one. The sansrival was recommended and the chocolate mousse was to satisfy my chocolate craving that time.
Hands down, all are good and I cannot say which among the three is my favorite. Please don’t ask me to rank it for it would be torture. The mango benne does not have a single sour mango on it and the cream is of high quality and does not have an aftertaste which probably means that Mary Grace makes her own cream. From experience, creams with an aftertaste are the instant ones that are packaged and bought from groceries.
I adore the creativeness of the sansrival. The cashews really stood out, reminding us that ohh yeah, sansrivals are partially made of nuts. Ordinary sansrivals are just topped with cream with the nuts not visibly seen or hidden somewhere in the layers.
The chocolate mousse is not too sweet and not too heavy as your spoon easily slices through the layers. As per my encounter with most chocolate mousse, while most of them are good, is that they are quite thick, heavy and really sweet. This one, you can eat it even after eating a plateful of pasta;)
Have a Mary-ful Day and a Graceful Life! Feel free to share your thoughts and comments. If you have been to Mary Grace, please do share your experience as well.
Also, feel free to visit the following links which focuses on Mary Grace's specialty cakes and pastries, making this place a heavenly treat for cake lovers like you and me.
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