Sarsa Kitchen + Bar in Bonifacio Global City

Guess what? Frannywanny.com has been around for 8 years already! I'd say time flies when you're busy blogging. It's always fun to reminisce as I would go through my old posts and read all about the food and travel adventures that I've had with Paul and the friends we're so lucky to meet along the way. After all, eating is a communal activity and it's always a good thing to meet like-minded individuals who share the same passion such in my case, that would be eating and writing.

During our visit back home over the holidays, Paul and I met up with a couple of our favorite Filipino food bloggers whom I have to say are one of the best in the country. These guys do take food seriously and they have been my gurus when it comes to keeping myself updated with the yummiest food find in the metro.

Meet Jeng, Richie & Rina, Jane & Jeff, Jaz & Eric, Spanky, Joan & Abet, Ray & Lynne. These are the guys and gals behind some of the food blogs and Instagram accounts that I follow on a daily basis.

Jeng and Jane took care of organizing our dinner and it was after Jeng's recent trip to the Lion City where he told me all about this really good Filipino restaurant called Sarsa Kitchen + Bar that we agreed to have our dinner there. A quick research also told me that the restaurant is owned by Chef JP Anglo (one of my chef crush! heehee ♥).



Sarsa specializes in mostly Negrense-inspired dishes such as the famous chicken inasal, sizzling kansi and more. What makes it special is each dish showcases Chef JP's personal interpretation and how it is given a more modern take. I'm no expert in Filipino cuisine as you know I grew up in a very Chinese-cooking household but I do have my favorites and I'm glad that they're all available at Sarsa. Nonetheless, I left the ordering to the very able hands of Jeng who made sure that our table was filled with all the yummy dishes.

Dinner began with these beautiful skewered Isaw (Php. 165), which I know isn't for the faint of heart. It's chicken intestines and trust me, it's really delicious and addicting. The best way to enjoy this is to dip it into a bowl of sinamak for that added zing!

I also requested for an order of Isol (Php. 170) which is my secret guilty pleasure. It's grilled chicken tail (also known as chicken pwet in tagalog). It's fatty, oily and really yummy! It really takes a lot of determination and self-control to stop after the first stick.

Next came the Sarsa Batchoy Special (Php. 275) which is a protein-rich soup cooked with egg, noodles, bacon-cut liempo (pork belly) and bone marrow. It smelled really good and the soup was so rich and flavorful. Note that the serving was quite generous too where 4 people can share one bowl.

As if we can't have enough of that sinful bone marrow, we also had the Sizzling Kansi or Sizzling Bulalo (Php. 380) which came piping hot on a black skillet plate and a huge marrow sitting right in the middle of it on top of a pool of creamy gravy. I'm personally not a fan of bone marrow so I just had a small piece of bulalo and immediately moved on to the next dish.

To balance out all the sinful yet truly yummy dishes that we have, I requested for the Monggo-nisa (Php. 190) which I LOVEEE! Oh my, I adored how deliciously creamy and rich the monggo (green beans) were and the crispy longganisa (pork sausage) just made it even more satisfying. I think I ate half of this as it was conveniently placed in front of me.

Another delicious veggie dish is the Roasted Kalabasa with Green Beans (Php. 210). Creamy and roasted squash with green beans served with crispy dilis (anchovies) and chili garlic. Normally, people would shy away from squash as it can be really mushy and it has an acquired taste but Chef JP has made it so good that it won't be a problem to convince non-veggie eaters to give it a try. This goes so well with rice.

Now back to more meat, we also had the Lechon Kawali (Php. 270) with Batwan Tsokolate and Pinakurat (vinegar). We've had a lot of crispy pork belly versions growing up but it was my first time to have lechon kawali with... chocolate! What do you know?! It tasted surprisingly good as the chocolate dip had a mild spicy kick thus taking this dish to a whole new level of satisfaction. Trust me, I was happily licking my lips after having one two three countless slices of the lechon kawali.

Aside from the menu, our eyes wandered towards the blackboard conveniently placed near our table where it lists all the newest dishes available. We were all game to try the Sinigang Fried Chicken (Php. 420) which sounds really promising. Must be my very picky tastebuds but I can't seem to detect any sourness or anything different as a matter of fact from any other fried chicken in town. This was the only dish that I wasn't so crazy about that evening.

Of course, what's a Filipino meal without rice? We tried the Ginamos Fried Rice (Php. 60) which is the Negrense version of the famous bagoong (shrimp paste) fried rice. Jeng actually gave Paul and I a bottle of Ginamos when he came to visit and I had to Google it first as we weren't sure what "Ginamos" meant. Thankfully, the first site that popped up immediately taught us that ginamos is another word for bagoong and with that we immediately thought of different dishes to use it for. The Ginamos Fried Rice was a winner and the best thing is it complemented all our dishes that evening.

Oh we were so full but we all still wanted to stay as a lot of catching up had to be done. Jeng, our ever gracious host, continued to order the Piaya Ice Cream Sandwich with Salted Muscovado Caramel (Php. 145). We got two different ice cream flavors to test which one would be better and naturally the ube flavored one won by a landslide. How interesting to make use of a very traditional baked pastry like the piaya and served it as a bite-sized ice cream sandwich. Definitely props to the chef!

We had an amazing time at Sarsa Kitchen + Bar that we were actually one of the last groups to leave that evening! Thankfully, the staff didn't have to push us out yet. Paul and I are so thankful that our favorite food bloggers took time out to meet up with us. Imagine, this was during the crazy holiday rush and they were all game to set time for dinner. We're missing a few more foodie friends that evening so till our next visit back!

P.s. Btw, one of the highlights of the evening was meeting Chef JP Anglo and having a photo op with him too! Talk about being chef-strucked again! *giggle*

Check out Sarsa Kitchen + Bar is located at Forum South Global, 7th avenue cor 25th street, Bonifacio Global City, Taguig City. It's near Fort Strip after where the NBC Tent is located. Call them at 866-0912 / 0927-7060773. They also have a new branch in SM Mall of Asia.