Coffee Shop Review: The Room Upstairs Cafe Manila, Philippines
The reason you haven’t been hearing from me is because I’d been fiddling around with the lead sentence of this entry for days! So I decided I’d skip the fancy words and go straight to the point. Today I’m featuring, The Room Upstairs Cafe, the place ideal for a “date yourself” thing according to the September issue of Cosmo Philippines. The point of persuasion for me was the interiors; based on the pictures, the place looks pretty. Right away I decided it’d be the next subject of my food trip.
I went there on October 7,2011 with some of my colleagues, Sir Lito, Rhoda, Raffy, Ana, and Athan. Immediately after getting off from work, we embarked on a little adventure that is finding the place… on foot! It’s located somewhere in Bel Air, Makati.After almost an hour worth of walking we finally spotted LRI Business Plaza along N. Garcia street. LRI houses over 30 stores that sell furniture, novelty items, vintage pieces, home furnishings, and artwork. FYI, The Room Upstairs is one of these furniture stores, it doubles as a cafe.
The Room Upstairs has got to be one of the prettiest places I’d ever gone to eat. Obviously I wasn’t alone in my opinion; even my companions looked impressed. It sort of gave me a moment of pride ’cause, hell yeah, I took them to a beautiful place! Some if not all of the pieces you will see at The Room Upstairs are for sale, like the lamps and other home decors, couches, chairs, and tables.
Okay, I guess I’ve made my point; ambiance wise, it’s a winner. Now let’s get down to the real business, the food. Here’s what Sir Lito ordered, Vigan Longganisa Pandesal with Calamansi Mayo (PHP120). I loved the presentation, isn’t it cute? Unfortunately, I didn’t get to taste it but I think Sir Lito liked it.
The rest of us had pasta. Ana and Rhoda ordered the same pasta dish, Vigan Longganisa in Cream Sauce (PHP 180). It tasted just like your ordinary carbonara only less creamy and it has bits of Vigan longganisa.
Raffy had Puttanesca (PHP 190). It has a strong tomato taste, sour, a little bit sweet and salty. It was good in the first few bites, but somehow the taste goes nah! As Raffy puts it, the more you eat it, the sharper the sour taste gets.
If you want a pasta that has that distinct Filipino taste (meaning sweet like that of Jollibee spaghetti), you may want to try what Athan ordered, the Spicy Asian Pasta (PHP 190). It has chunks of herb chicken and pieces of peanuts. It is my favorite among all the pasta dishes that we had. Athan was half-hearted about it though because he found the peanuts a little intrusive.
And the thing that had me singing in a sour note, my order, the Tuyo Pesto (PHP 160). I picked it because I was feeling adventurous; wrong call! The pasta has an acrid smell, it was dry, painfully salty, and had a hint of a minty flavor. For some reason, my pasta had the biggest serving. It would have been good if I liked how it tasted, but truth be told I hated it. I don’t know, maybe it was just me, because my friends thought it was okay. But yeah, I still wouldn’t recommend it.
That wasn’t the end of my disappointments. I also didn’t like what I had for a drink, the Iced Chocolate (PHP 90). It was so tart and bitter, I wasn’t able to finish the entire thing.
Thankfully the Tsokolate Batirol (PHP 60) is a different story. It was smooth and velvety, sweet but not overwhelming.
By the way, they have cakes and pastries. Since we had to leave the place at 7PM (we were told by the waitress they’d be closing the place for a party), we skipped the cake and just bought some cookies; Russian Cookies (PHP 20) (left) and Lemon Hearts (PHP 45) (right). Both were chalky, crumbly, but pleasing to the taste.
The Room Upstairs is aesthetically good but if I have to be honest the experience wasn’t everything I hoped it would be. Maybe it’s that tuyo pesto pasta or maybe I’ve set my expectations far too high, I don’t know. Let’s just say I wasn’t too impressed with the food. Still, I suggest you take this with a grain of salt. Just because it didn’t work for me, doesn’t mean it’d be the same for you.
The Room Upstairs
2nd Floor LRI Business Plaza,
210 N. Garcia St., Bel Air, Makati
Telephone no.: (02) 899-9318
it's good that there are alreaady awareness campaigns like this. back then, when i was still grade 6, i actually thought every female human being is undergoing automatic pregnancy. i thought it's part of the cycle of nature, much like the larva, puppa, moth cycle.
Ang saya ng experience natin na to, after natin kumain eh tumambay pa tayo sa place at nagtingin tingin ng mga antiques hehe…nice…sana maulit muli LOL
love the ambience of that place. nakakgutom! =)
-Macy
http://www.maccyy.blogspot.com
Why are you still skinny?!? Life is unfair! I hate you! LOL
Anyhoo, you've been tagged: http://sunsandstilettos.blogspot.com/2011/10/sunshine-award.html 🙂
You've got to admire the guy… Mr. Pure (Potential) Energy does say the darnedest things. Great food trip! Beautiful place, great food and excellent company.
given that the place looks elegant, i now have a high expectation on the taste of the foods they serve.
awww, what a shame. It all looked promising at the start. And I probably would've chosen the pesto myself, I love pesto. Sayang naman….
the spicy asian pasta & pesto looks yummy!
Barring
the food Marj, I still enjoyed our little outing. Thanks. Nice post.