Ring my Bell, Isabel: Pino Resto Bar in Teacher's Village

Wednesday, March 20, 2013

Pino Resto Bar in Teacher's Village

Pino's Kare-kareng Bagnet

As you all know I love DIY and one crafty lady I follow online is Alessandra Lanot and her blog, Life After Breakfast. It was here that I first heard about Pino. Alessandra, who's vegetarian, manages vegan restaurant Pipino while her husband manages Pino.

I've been hearing good things though I never got a chance to visit these restaurants. But, since I've been frequenting the north of late, the family decided to give it a shot. Pino was the obvious choice as we walked in the building, a family of hungry carnivores.

The ground floor is Pino, the 2nd floor Pipino. You are allowed to cross order, but non-vegan dishes are not allowed on the 2nd floor.

Check out the wall art. I felt artsy just staring at at it.

Pino at night.

Basically, Pino is home to local dishes cooked with a different flair. Normally we do not eat in Filipino restaurants but recently these small, hole-in-the-wall restaurants in Katipunan have been capturing my eye (and taste buds).

Kare-kareng bagnet for one person. This was a beautiful meal.

Salpicao. Beautiful tender mean topped with a fried quail egg. The quail egg did it for me. This remains as my favorite dish from the restaurant.

Chicken Inasal and I can honestly say that I've never had inasal this tasty-- I was never a fan of inasal until now. Camille loves this dish.

Ensaladang hito, surprisingly very good because, again, I never liked this dish and never would I have ever imagined that I's actually order this in a restaurant and love it.

Remember the Inasal? This was on top, something called "water crest". This is the best prinitiong kang-kong like thing I've ever tasted. We had to order a whole plate of it because we couldn't get enough. Yep, I'm coming back for more of these!

The dalandan Iced tea which was pretty thick but really nice once you water it down.

And finally, the Tablea Cheescake which was all sorts of heaven in my mouth-- I AM NOT EVEN EXAGGERATING THIS TIME OMG.

Obviously, the family is coming back to Pino. The first week we tried the place, we came back twice (hence the day and night shots). It was that good. It was a pleasant surprise as we hadn't been this pleased with an impulse visit to an unknown restaurant in a while.

I once promised that I'd try Pipino and give vegan food a shot when we go back but screw it this made me hungry and I want salpicao!