10 Dove Street

Secrets are made to be broken. This is mostly true, but if you are a Marcos crony, you can argue that it is not. In Cebu, there are a lot of restaurants which are only known by a selected few. It does not mean that they serve distasteful dishes though. This is because they are located where no one ever imagined that there is a restaurant in the area.

The place over at 10 Dove Street, Sto. Nino Village in Talamban is a great example of a secret restaurant. Although some people heard of it, few have actually found and tasted it. Like the story of Ibong Adarna, it seems like people who finds it never come back and tell the story.



The restaurant at 10 Dove Street does not have its own name. It does not have any signage and if you ask their staff or a waiter, they will tell you that the name is 10 Dove Street. This is a restaurant which offers fine dining and an ambiance better than most restaurants. The restaurant have 6-8 tables which makes the atmosphere comforting and not too crowded. It is not advised to go alone as the place is designed for group dates and couples.

Dove street has a fixed menu which means, you need to pick a soup, a salad, a main dish and a dessert. This set is only at an approximate of P180 per set.

Broccoli and Cheese

Mushroom Monterey

First off, their Broccoli and Cheese soup is a winner. The thickness of the soup is perfect while the broccoli still the life of the party. Dove Street's Mushroom Monterey soup has the same qualities any regular mushroom soup. But its edge is definitely the way it was thickened. I love the heavy feel of the soup and its natural mushroom flavor.

Caesar's Potato Salad

Chicken Mango Salad

The Dove Street salads are legit enough to take you away. If you love Caesar's Salad but hate the leaves and vegetables, the Caesar's Potato Salad is for you. With a mixture of cubed potatoes, hard boiled eggs, chopped bacon and Caesar's salad dressing; this is the meat lover's counter to the usual Caesar's Salad. If you are into pasta salads, their Chicken Mango Salad is for you. This salad is composed of elbow macaroni, diced chicken, diced mangoes and water chestnuts in a light-mayo dressing. The character of this dish resembles to a wild ride in Disneyland as the sweetness of the mango and the sour taste of the mayo collides with the chicken. The salad is simply exciting.

Chicken Waldorf Salad

If vegetable salads make you tick, Dove Street's Chicken Waldorf salad will surely brighten your meal. A bowl of this salad is made of fresh lettuce, diced chicken, apples, celery, parsley, toasted walnuts, red onions, golden raisins mixed with cream and mayonnaise. If you do not call it a salad, then you need to transfer to Mars and take your fail with you.

Roast Beef Dylan

Tipsy Shrimps

For the main course, they serve sandwiches. But these are not just your ordinary sandwiches as each is a mouthful. Their Roast Beef Dylan sandwich is packed with tender roast beef with sautéed onions and mushrooms topped with melted cheese. The flavor of the beef flourishes with the onions and melted cheese that it is makes you think your mom made it for you. Their Tipsy Shrimps sandwich on the other hand is an opposite. This is a light sandwich made out of shrimps, tomato, cucumber and cream cheese. This sandwich is an acquired taste as the strong flavor of the shrimp is being mellowed down with the cucumber and tomato's natural taste. It's like a hot coffee in a 3-day rainstorm.

Porky's Nightmare

Another Dove Street pride, Porky's Nightmare is heaven to pork lovers. It is filled with roast pork, sliced tomato, cheese and tangy apricot dressing That makes this sandwich pass for outstanding. The sweetness and of the apricot sauce and the flavor of the roasted beef is one of the best combination of flavors I have ever tasted. This sandwich leaves a lasting impression that even Taylor Swift will write a song about it.

Mango Cake

The secret of a happy marriage may still remain a secret. But no matter how hard you try to keep a secret, it is a universal law that sooner or later, it will be discovered. Hayden Kho knows that best and learned it the hard way. So I share to you, 10 Dove Street. It is too good for a secret that it should not be kept.


10 Dove Street is located at 10 Dove Street, Sto. Nino Village, Banilad, Cebu City. Meal set for soup, salad, sandwich and cake is at P180 only. For reservations, contact 346-0618.

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All pictures are taken by Roland Faelnar. For more of his works, you may go to http://roui.multiply.com

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Laguna Garden Cafe

Picture from CafeLaguna.com

Clothes make the man. Naked people have little or no influence on society.

Fashion and food may be like oil and water, they will never mix. But if you are a foodie, fashion and food have a connection. With fashion, you try to check if the style of a certain person is an eye candy. When it comes to food, you check the presentation because you eat with your eyes.

The way to a man's heart is through his stomach, right? Does fashion or style works that way? Maybe. Let's ask Noynoy Aquino and Liz Uy for that matter, yes?



The way you fashion a restaurant and style the dishes is not that easy. You need to have a great chef and a great ambiance to achieve the excellence that most restaurants are aiming for. One of the restaurants that have achieved fame for their food, ambiance and great service is Laguna Garden Cafe.

The Laguna Garden Cafe serves the finest Filipino cuisine cooked in home-style tradition that made the Laguna name famous. As classy as a Chanel hand bag, the Laguna Garden Cafe is a household name amongst Cebuanos and is known for their expertise in Filipino dishes.

Fresh Lumpia

Chicharon Bulaklak

The fresh lumpia in Laguna Garden Cafe is a favorite. This fresh lumpia has a generous amount of filling and the sauce on top just made the dish the next top model. The sweet and tangy feeling of the sauce makes it one sexy dish. Now, if you are into hardcore Filipino food, it's their chicharon bulaklak you should get. This chicharon bulaklak is properly cleaned unlike the usual ones (READ: no signs of bitterness), that it can pass any obsessive compulsive mom's criteria for clean. And what makes it more special is that it's not too salty but only too crunchy. Just the way we love it.

Fried Shrimp with Sweet Sauce

Kinilaw Na Tanguigue

If you are into seafood, you better check their Fried Shrimp with Sweet Sauce. Guaranteed fresh, the natural flavors of the shrimp just come out and the sweet sauce that has been poured gracefully will cause a tsunami on your taste buds. For the lazy foodies who just wants to shove the food in to their mouth, I suggest you get their Kinilaw Na Tanguigue. Their kinilaw's presentation is very questionable. Like a nudist, you do not see anything with it. Most kinilaws are crowded with spices and herbs but this this one is an exception. It just consists of 2-3 spices, leaving the diced tanguigue naked. But don't let it fool you. The flavor of the fish is just so overwhelming, that you can eat it for a whole week. Also, the fresh coconut milk balances all the sourness on this dish. Their kinilaw is as authentic as your Lhuillier wedding gown.

Lechon Kawali with Liver Sauce

Do you remember John Travolta in the movie Grease, where he played a the boy who wears a black leather jacket that your mom warned you about? You know he's a brat but you love him nonetheless. That's exactly the feeling you will get when you taste their Lechon Kawali with Liver Sauce. It is what a lechon kawali must be about. Some meat, crispy pork skin and a right amount of fat because pork fat rules! I like how they serve this dish wherein the meat is not soaked in oil. Because of that, it gives us a very good excuse to eat it.

Pochero

It does not end there. Laguna Garden Cafe's Pochero is very legit. Even the soup of the pochero is very tasty, all you need is rice and you're good to go. I adore the sweetness of the corn and banana mix well to the flavor of the beef. The beef is also soft but not so fluffy because you might die. Some restaurants focus more on the tenderness of the meat and it turns out fluffy after. Laguna Garden Cafe makes sure that the texture will remain on the meat and that's what separates them from mediocrity.

Kare-kare

Laguna Garden Cafe's Kare-kare is one of the best Kare-kare I have ever tasted in a Filipino restaurant. The vegetables are not as dead as 70's disco fashion and the peanut butter soup is not taking the spotlight from the taste. The Kare-kare is surprisingly good, it is like Gucci on a plate. The meat of course is well cooked and the shrimp paste has a mild flavor to make sure that the main dish is the Kare-kare and not the paste. This is a must-have.

The food in Laguna Garden Cafe is an eye candy. Every dish has its own presentation and it is as good as it looks. The devil has to wear Prada to make sure that it does not look like it's the devil. But with good food, the taste is the soul. No matter how beautiful the presentation is and after all the debate with how it looks, it always comes down to the taste.

So even if you wear Prada, you are still Gretchen Baretto.

Laguna Garden Cafe is located at the Ground Floor of the Ayala Terraces. Rates are at P150.00 - P290.00 and good for 2-3 persons.

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All pictures are taken by Mr. Dan Eustaquio unless stated otherwise.

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Cookery: Double Cheese Baked Macaroni

Cheese is one of man's greatest achievement. It may not cure cancer though but it makes life seems a little better. I personally think that cheese is one intense component in a dish that beads of sweat comes down every time I see a food with cheese on it.

The Double Cheese Baked Macaroni is one of the sexiest baked macaroni that ever exist. It gives pleasure to cheese addicts and meat lovers alike. If the looks of the food could kill, the flavors will send your soul to thy kingdom come.



Double Cheese Baked Macaroni shows why cheese is better than margarine. I trust cows more than chemists.


Ingredients:

Pasta
• 1 400-gram pack macaroni

Meat filling:
• 1/4 cup oil
• 4 cloves garlic, minced
• 1 small onion, chopped
• 1 green bell pepper, diced
• ¼ kilo ground pork,
• ¼ kilo ground beef
• 1/4 kilo ham, cubed
• 2 cups tomato sauce
• 2 tablespoons catsup
• ¼ tsp dried oregano/ dried basil
• salt and pepper to taste

Sauce:
• 1/2 cup butter
• 4 tablespoons all-purpose flour
• 1 big can avaporated milk
• 1 1/2 cups chicken broth
• 1 cup quickmelt cheese
• 225 grams cream cheese


Instructions:

1. Boil macaroni as directed in the package.
2. Drain then set aside.

Prepare Meat Filling:
3. In a skillet, heat oil.
4. Saute garlic and onions.
5. Add pepper and cook until tender.
6. Add ground beef, ground pork and ham and cook until browned.
7. Add tomato sauce, catsup, bay leaves and seasoning.
8. Bring to a boil, lower heat then allow to simmer for a few minutes.
9. If sauce get too thick, add a little water.
10. Add this mixture to the cooked macaroni.
11. Mix very well then transfer to an ovenproof glass dish. Set aside.

Prepare Sauce:
12. Melt butter then add flour.
13. Stir to remove lumps.
14. Add milk and chicken broth while stirring continuously.
15. Add the cheeses until smooth and thick.
16. Pour evenly over the macaroni in the dish.
17. Bake in a preheated 350 degrees F oven for 20 to 30 minutes or until top is lightly browned.


Chef Ryla is a graduate of Basic Culinary Arts and gained her Certificate on Commercial Cooking (National Certificate No. 10070202006587) in MOST Institute Cebu Campus.

For orders: 09325322100 or 09059132547

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The Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf

So you are single, have a great job, a good set of friends and a perfect life. Material things are not a problem either. You have a car, a nice flat and the newest iPad.

Then you realize that women are not interested in you.

That is the sad fact my friends. We cannot understand women. We do not know what they really like and what they really don't like. My best hint would be because of your looks. But that's okay, there is always the blind side of love. This is probably because to have a beautiful or a successful woman makes us the alpha male. Well, not if you married Kris Aquino.



One way to understand a woman is take her to a coffee shop. Engage in a relaxing atmosphere and talk while enjoying great coffee. Taking her to The Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf would be the greatest idea since deciding to finally throw your journal in the urinal and finally talk to a girl. Coffee Bean offers excellent coffee and great eats. The coffee shop that invented the ice blended coffee, Coffee Bean continues to treat us with quality products.

Ice Blended Double Chocolate

Their Ice Blended Double Chocolate makes the coffee nervous. Topped with cream, the richness of the chocolate blasts all over your mouth. If you are into cappuccinos, The Coffee Bean's cappuccino is as interesting as Sam Milby's gender. When you order their cappuccino, stirring is prohibited. This is because the cappuccino is made and handcrafted by putting the flavors layer by layer. Because of this, you need not to stir to fully enjoy the coffee.


If you are into the classic fresh brew, they serve the best coffee beans there is and will handcraft it personally for you. Their fresh brewed coffee can always soothe your day. It is black as the devil, hot as hell, pure as an angel and sweet as love.

Chipotle Roast Chicken

Smoked Turkey & Melted Cheddar Cheese

No matter how beautiful your girl is, she still gets hungry. The Coffee Bean does not just serve the finest coffee but they also serve great meals. Their gourmet sandwich is a winner. Their Sandwiches are composed of fresh vegetables with a good amount of meat in it. Not just that, all sandwiches are served with a small side salad. Their Smoked Turkey & Melted Cheddar Cheese Sandwich is simply made of awesome. The meat of the turkey does not taste like rubber at all. The turkey is not heavily flavored to give way to the natural flavors of the meat. To seal the deal, the melted cheddar cheese is successful in giving character on the sandwich.

Chilled Spicy Chicken Salad

Coffee Bean's Classic Caesar Salad

What surprises me is that The Coffee Bean also serves salads. Give their salads the chance like how women give chances to their lovers. The difference is that their salads will never fail you. Just like how you found your wife, you never thought that on of the best caesar salad can be found at a coffee shop. The best thing about the Coffee Bean's Classic Caesar Salad is how the sauce is tossed to stick to the romaine leaves and garlic croutons. This is the salad that you need to take on seriously.

Roasted Chicken & Mushroom Fusilli

Men knows how they like their women. Good girls go to heaven, bad girls go everywhere. Coffee Bean also offers pasta for people who choose heavy meals. Their Spicy Tuna Linguine is not a dish to keep away from. This dish is playful. The spicy flavor of the dish does not set everything on fire and there is a distinctive hint of sourness on the sauce. They also serve Roast Chicken & Mushroom Fusilli. This dish is very tasty and creamy. I love how the light flavors leave the taste on your lips. The flavor stays long enough, it will make you busy while your girl is in the wash room.

Low Sugar Chocolate Mousse

Carrot Cake

If you are into sweets, Coffee Bean offers low sugar desserts without taking the sweetness away. From their Chocolate Mousse to their Toblerone Cheesecake, it is prepared with consistency on the art of confections. The little pinch of sourness from the cheesecake is there and the texture of the dessert is perfect. Coffee Bean's Carrot Cake is a surprise treat. You need to focus on this cake as the mixture and the balance of the sweetness is greatly accomplished. Perfect after a meal or partner it with coffee and share it with your love one.

Blueberry Cheesecake

Just like any other guy, I don't understand women. All I know is we need to pamper her because if she cries in court, the judge will wipe her tears with your checkbook. The guys who finally understand women are already married and is working to go to Honolulu - it's got everything. Sand for the children, sun for the wife and sharks for the wife's mother.

The Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf not just offers great coffee and food. It proves that the richness of each ingredient will determine the quality of the product and that is what makes this coffee shop tick.

Chocolate, women, coffee - some things are better rich.

You can check out The Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf in Robinson's Cybergate Mall, SM City Cebu, Ayala Center Cebu and I2 AsiaTown IT Park, Lahug. Their pastas are at P169 - P229; Sandwiches at P199 - P289

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All pictures are taken by Roland Faelnar. For more of his works, you may go to http://roui.multiply.com

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Don Henrico's

Great food is like great sex. The difference is, you are not burning calories but building large foundations called legs. Foreplay happens when the chef is preparing the food and the sex happens when we eat it. Like sex, we look forward to eating. We always find time to prepare or plan what food to enjoy for the day. If you are a guy and the last time that you were inside of a woman was when you visited the Statue of Liberty, you need to pause for a bit from work and go to a fine restaurant.



Sex without food after is an empty experience. After all, you need to share something not just the bed. A good restaurant that knows great lovemaking of food is Don Henrico's. This Italian restaurant is one of the best places if you are craving for Italian food. They put so much love into every dish that you feel very special in every bite.

Quesadilla Mexicana and Home Style Onion Rings

Don Henrico's Home Style Onion Rings are such a turn on. You will really taste the sweetness of the fresh onion and the crispness is like a loud couple over the next room. It was the best onion ring I have ever had. Their Quesadilla Mexicana is a good substitute if you are not in the mood for pizza. The cheese and the meat is just right and the sweet sauce drizzled on top of the quesadilla makes everything perfect.

Classic Carbonara

Don Henrico's Spaghetti

The Don Henrico's Spaghetti is one of their forte. The sourness of the sauce is already a Visa for Italy. The aroma coming from the herbs and spices on the sauce comes out and the meat is not too much to handle. It is so good, it almost hurts. If you are into white sauces, I really suggest their Classic Carbonara. It is composed of fettuccini pasta with button mushrooms and smoked bacon with light parmesan cheese. The creaminess of the sauce holds on to the pasta like how Mariel Rodriguez tries to hold on to her career and reputation.

Supreme Pizza

If you love pizza, then get ready for the restaurant's own creation, the Don Henrico's Supreme Pizza! It is a pizza with the orgy of pepperoni, beef, ham, mushroom, pineapple tidbits, black olives and bell pepper. I like how each slice has all the ingredients and the taste of the dough is superb. Just the kind of pizza that we all love, less oil with a generous amount of cheese.

Buffalo Wings

Don Henrico's also owns a very interesting dish. This is the Don Henrico's Buffalo Wings/Chicken. As we all know, buffalo chicken originates in New York. What Don Henrico's did is to fuse it with italian flavors and because of that, the buffalo chicken's flavor is as interesting as an interracial love affair. This is composed of fleshy chicken cuts which is deep fried and tossed with a very special sauce and served with a creamy ranch dipping sauce. The strong flavors of the dish plays with your tongue and you will experience a pinch of sourness on it which makes everything perfect. Having this buffalo chicken is like having great sex. So good that even the neighbors had a cigarette.


There are a lot of dishes to be tasted in Don Henrico's. I would have read the menu more often but their menu is like a Playboy Magazine, it keeps my glasses steaming over. Great food and making love explains half the emotions of human life.

That is why some people are looking for meaningful one night stands.

Don Henrico's is located at the 2nd Level, The Terraces, Ayala Center Cebu. Price range is at P200 - P400 (depends on size of serving).

Special thanks to Roland Faelnar for the pictures. You may visit http://roui.multiply.com/ for more of his works.

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Classic Savory

A diet is a penalty we pay for exceeding the feed limit. Some go on a diet to maintain their heavenly bodies and stay healthy. If you are under a diet program, your discipline and will power will be tested all the time. If you're underweight, the first thing you lose on a diet is brain mass.

As for me, I was on a diet for two weeks and all I've lost is fourteen days.



If you are on a diet, you will not be looking forward to Christmas. You will be looking forward to your cheat day. This is a day in a week where all hell breaks loose. You see, dieting needs a lot of work and the cheat day makes sure that you will not outsource the work in China.

If you are in Classic Savory, I suggest you move the cheat day. If you can't move your cheat day, then starve for the day. This is because it is all worth it.

Chopsuey con Lechon

Classic Savory's Chopsuey con Lechon is a twist of the famous dish. Imagine crispy pork liempo on a bed of sauteed vegetables. The flavors of the vegetables are well orchestrated and the sauce is made of awesome. I love the extra crunch on the vegetables. It is well prepared and the arsenal of the vegetables reminds me of the FHM Philippines' 100 sexiest women. The mild flavor of their chopsuey makes it a really good side dish.

Kikiam

Their pancit is also a highlight in the menu. What I love about their pancit in general is that, it is not too oily and not too salty. It is a must-have on the table. Classic Savory also have bragging rights for their Kikiam. They claim that their kikiam is a legend-to-be but I say it is already a legend. The kikiam is well fried and the tangy flavor does not give you a punch right on the tongue. The kikiam's flavor stays in your mouth with comfort and compliments the sauce. Again, it is not too oily like most kikiams and the ground meat contracts the flavors well.

With all the remarkable dishes on their menu, what people should go after is their chicken. The Savory Chicken is a 1950 recipe by the Ting brothers and was passed on to 4 generations. In Manila, the old restaurants which serve the Savory Chicken still stand. However, the Classic Savory restaurant emerges to the mainstream and a lot of people have been arguing with who serves the original taste of the Savory Chicken. Remember that this has been passed to 4 generations. For me, you will only know the original taste of the dish if this has been made by the originators themselves. Since I do not have a time machine, I based my review on how the chicken is made.

The Savory Chicken stands as one of the best chickens ever made in history. The juiciness of the chicken and the tenderness of the meat is extraordinary. This restaurant has raised the standards by a mile on how to fry a chicken. With the juice and the texture of the meat, it is clearly not re-heated. The uniqueness of the chicken also include its skin. The chicken skin is very crunchy and usually, if a chicken skin is crunchy, it has lost its flavors. Not with the Savory Chicken. The flavor stays like first impression.

The chicken at Classic Savory is arguably one of the best. Don't even attempt to remove and not eat the skin because of your diet. You see, everything in Classic Savory's chicken is so good that if only we can eat bones, I would have eaten them too. With the way the chicken is meticulously cooked with herbs and spices before frying, the flavor became so pure, Moses couldn't even part the skin from the meat.

Classic Savory is located at Robinson's Cybergate and SM City Cebu. Price range is at P150.00 - P225.00

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Boosog Lasang Pinoy

One of the best cuisines in the world is Filipino cuisine. Aside from the fact that some are based on a dare, Filipino cuisine is an explosion of flavors from different herbs and spices. There are a lot of reasons why it is considered as one of the premier cuisines in the world. One of which is the way the food is cooked and how the natural flavors of the dish comes out.

Filipino cooking is critical. Original Filipino dishes do not have measurement on their ingredients. Cooks from the provinces use their touch in cooking when it comes to adding the ingredients base only on their own tongue's estimate. If done perfectly, the food will be excellent. A little mistake would mean a disaster.



There are lots of Filipino restaurants in Cebu but few are worth visiting. One of these few is Boosog Lasang Pinoy Restaurant. Boosog may not be a household name just yet but the name itself is what we all aim for every meal. Boosog comes from the word busog, a term for being full in the gastronomic world.

Pinakbet

One of the amazing things about Boosog is they serve the best pinakbet in town. I am not a big fan of the dish as I didn't fight my way to the top of the food chain to eat vegetables but the pinakbet in Boosog took my tastebuds by storm. The flavor of the shrimp and the squid blended so well that it somehow wraps the vegetables in a strong yet calm flavor. The flavor is so good, you can eat a copy of YES Magazine in it.

Tinolang Manok Bisaya

The crispy pork ribs on the other hand is above average. I like how they fried the ribs to the amount of tenderness that it is usually made. The meat is not too salty and contains just the right amount of fat. Don't get too busy with the ribs though, their tinolang manok bisaya (native chicken) is as legit as it looks. Cooked with the traditional malunggay (moringa) and sayote (chayote), the flavor of the manok bisaya really comes out and mixed very well with the soup. Even the aroma of the dish mesmerizes me like the Pied Piper of Hamelin.

Sinuglaw

A Filipino restaurant that does not offer kinilaw is not a Filipino restaurant. Another dish that Boosog serves is sinuglaw. Sinuglaw comes from sinugba (grill) and kinilaw. This is a fusion of grilled pork and marinated fish that is served with fresh coconut milk. The sinuglaw's tuna is well marinated with vinegar and the collaboration of the grilled pork gives a little bit of bitterness on it. With the sweetness of the fresh coconut milk all over, it sums up to an awesomely delicious dish.

Grilled Tuna Panga

From their array of specialties, nothing compares with Boosog's grilled tuna panga (jaw). The properly grilled tuna panga is stunningly delicious, it's like a beautiful woman on your table. The softness of the tuna is equivalent to excellent and the natural flavors of the meat just comes out in an instant. This dish takes the cake. Their grilled tuna panga is so delicious, it made me think about what I did in my life to deserve it.


Boosog knows that we cannot solve our major problems with potatoes. That is why they offer unlimited rice and bottomless iced tea to all their guests. With prices from P80.00 to P250 (varies from size and type of dish), Boosog is a must-go Filipino restaurant.

We do not need to go to classy restaurants to enjoy food. Most Filipinos don't like gourmet cooking or "this" cooking or "that" cooking.

We like good cooking.

Boosog Lasang Pinoy Restaurant is located at The Gallery, Juan Luna St., Mabolo Cebu City (in front of Carmelite Monastry)

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