First Bite: Manna & Golde

The crazy influx of new restaurants could be overwhelming for most of us. We'd often find it difficult to decide on which restaurant to try. And with most establishments heavily focusing on online marketing, those with more humble budgets are left to be discovered offline. One restaurant/café I've recently found was Manna & Golde. 

Hello, Manna & Golde.

Located along Kamuning Road, this café is rather away from the bustling streets packed with restaurants. However, one thing I loved right away here is that it has parking for guests.

Beautifully designed space greeted me as soon as I opened the door and the frustrated interior designer in me was screaming with delight. Pastel colors with black and white floor tiles for contrast; this place is very chic! I just could not picture an all male group dining here. 

Manna and Golde treated us to a coffee demo using Breville coffee machine. In case you're wondering, Manna & Golde is an official reseller of this premium coffee maker brand. 

Top barista Dave Dource showed us how to use one of the Breville coffee machines where we had the pleasure to try espresso, Cafe Latte (PHP155), Cappuccino (PHP140) and Cafe Mocha (PHP165) using Manna & Golde's special blend.

What was supposed to be a 15 minute demonstration became an hour long of sheer admiration to how easy it is to prepare one's own coffee. 

But we'll leave latte art to the experts. 

We then sampled some of Manna & Golde's newest dishes for lunch--Roast Garlic Soup with Poached Egg (PHP120), Chicken Noodle Soup (PHP135), Cheesy Chicken Parmigiana (PHP235), Classic Carbonara (PHP230) and Fully Loaded Sandwich (PHP205).

The breaded chicken on top of the red sauce based pasta was pretty tasty and added a lovely crunch to the dish. However, we all found the sauce a bit too weak in flavor. 

Same goes for Carbonara which had a chunky sauce instead of creamy. Plus points though for the generous serving of bacon bits. And the toasted bread on the side of both pasta dishes were really tasty!

The Fully Loaded Sandwich is your breakfast in a bun. Stuffed with shredded chicken, smoked bacon, scrambled egg, greens and mayo, a bite of this would definitely wake you up. It is one filling dish perfect to start your day.

But my favorites would be the two bowls of soup served to us. 

Manna & Golde's Chicken Noodle Soup is your typical hearty soup that one would love to slurp on a gloomy day. Each spoonful was flavorful and made me want more. It would have been better though if they added more noodles and cut it short so that it won't be dangling on the spoon as it makes each mouthful messy. 

I'm a bit biased with Roast Garlic Soup as I love anything garlicky. This one had the strongest flavor amongst all the dishes served to us and it was an instant hit. The bread bits was a nice touch too as to balance the bold flavor of garlic.  

We capped our meal with a slice of New York Cheesecake topped with Candied Lemon (PHP160) which was great too. It had a lovely texture, dense and had that nice tart to it. The crust was also crunchy and the candied lemon added a lovely citrus flavor perfect to end one's meal. 

As for my favorite drink during the visit, it's a tie between Cafe Latte and Mocha. 

Manna & Golde has this great coffee promo where you get to enjoy 30% off your cup of joe whenever it's raining! Now that's one enticing deal!

Manna & Golde is located at Ground Floor, Apartment 20, Kamuning Road, Kamuning, Quezon City.