holiday meal – Jellybeans in the City

I’ve always considered roast beef as similar to lechon.

To me, it is a show-stopping food that can serve as the central dish of a feast. In fact, when I dined at eat-all-you-can buffets, I usually make a beeline for the carving station to fill my plate with roast beef slices.

I also find it a dish of many possibilities: aside from being a main dish in itself, leftovers can be made into all sorts of dishes. These can range from roast beef sandwiches, beef salpicao, beef stroganoff, roast beef burrito and roast beef cottage pie. Imagine, from one dish, you can have several tasty iterations!

This past New Year’s Eve, I decided to have Chef Resty’s Roast Beef as the centerpiece of my family’s Media Noche Feast.

I used to get my roast beef fix at a Chef Resty’s Roast Beef Carving Station at SM Pasig but, sadly, that kiosk has since closed.

Fortunately, there’s another way to get my fam’s roast beef: instead of heading west from my home to SM Pasig, I instead looked to the east!

Chef Resty has opened a dine-in restaurant at Sitio Elena Events Venue in Cainta. I simply had to call my order in the day before, pay for the roast beef and the in-house delivery fee via GCash and await my slab of beefy goodness the next day.

It arrived way too early from Media Noche, but that’s ok. I just had to reheat it in a 250 deg C oven for ten minutes. It came out piping hot and ready for the fam’s New Year’s Eve feast. It was also accompanied by Chef Resty’s signature gravy which completed the dish.

Each slice was tender, juicy and so flavorful. Clearly, it was the highlight of our celebration!

(Unfortunately, my 1 kilo order of Chef Resty’s Roast Beef was just enough of my small family – who apparently have huge appetites – so no leftovers.)

I can’t wait for the next celebration with Chef Resty’s Roast Beef! How about you?

To order your Chef Resty’s Roast Beef, send a text or Viber message to +63 917 4329953 or +63 919 0985448 with your name, mobile number, address (including barangay), date and time of delivery and order quantity.

Chef Resty’s Roast Beef are priced at:

half kilo (Php900): sliced only, serves four people
1 kilo (Php1,600): whole or sliced, serves eight people

Allow at least one day lead time. Cut-off for orders is at 7pm.

Check out my posts on other restos that serve roast beef:

This goes out to certified bookworms like me: imagine that you’re in your happy place ( a book shop, of course!), surrounded by shelves full of tomes waiting to be read and loved, the smell of book paper all around you.

Suddenly, you start to get really hungry.

Oh, just when you were so enjoying browsing through the books and picking out those you want to bring home with you!

What to do?

If you’re at the Fully Booked branch in Powerplant Mall, you won’t need to leave the book shop to ease your hunger. You can have a meal right there at the cafe situated at the corner called Press by Fully Booked.

Here, you can enjoy classic comfort food such as:

Mushroom Soup (Php160). Creamy soup made with bits of shiitake mushroom and Italian sausage.

Classic Caesar Salad (Php250). Fresh romaine lettuce, grilled chicken slices, grated parmesan cheese and bacon bits tossed in traditional Ceasar dressing.

Aglio Olio (Php200). Al dente pasta lightly sauteed in minced garlic and olive oil.

Carbonara (Php250). Al dente pasta cooked with special bechamel sauce topped with bacon bits.

Just in time for the Christmas Season, Press by Fully Booked launched Holiday Meal Sets inspired by dishes found in a Filipino Noche Buena table. These sets are good for three to four people so a group of friends or a family can share and enjoy them.

These sets include:

Arroz Valenciana. A Filipino dish made with glutinous rice, chorizo, shrimp, bell peppers, hard-boiled egg and spices.

Homestyle Fried Chicken. Deep-fried chicken marinated in buttermilk.

Lechon Belly. Slab of pork belly rolled in seasonings then slow-roasted in the oven to achieve a tender and moist meat and a crispy and flavorful skin.

Press Iced Tea (Php100). The house blend iced tea.

Set A (Php999) includes Arroz Valenciana, Homestyle Fried Chicken and Press Iced Tea while Set B (Php1,499) includes the items in Set A plus Lechon Belly.

The Christmas Season is also about gatherings and gift-giving. With this, Press by Fully Booked also launched a series of Holiday Pastries, an assortment of festive cakes and pastried perfect for a clan “salo-salo” or as holiday gifts.

These include:

Ube Custard (Php650). Fluffy ube (purple yam) cake topped with creamy leche flan (egg custard).

Four Seasons Cheesecake (Php1,350). Baked cheesecake which comes in four flavors: Original, Caramelized Banana, Queso de Bola and Hazelnut garnished with chocolate, fresh strawberries and honeycomb.

Chocolate Cake (Php1,250). Moist chocolate sponge cake filled with layers of chocolate ganache and salted caramel, and coated with cashew crumble.

Cookie Sampler (Php440). A tub of twenty mini cookies consisting of five pieces each of Chocolate Chip, Double Chocolate Chip, Double Mint Chocolate Chip and Cranberry & Raisins,

Bar Sampler (Php550). A tub of twenty-four bars consisting of twelve pieces each of Food for The Gods and Butterscotch.

And to make the holidays even more fun and festive, the cafe is bringing 9 Weeks of Press Holidays wherein the diners can enjoy a different perk every week:

November 11-17: free Americaninfor every order of available cakes
November 18-24: 10% off on total orders
November 25-December 1: Free Double Chocolate Chip Cookie for every minimum spend of Php500 and up
December 2-8: Free Press Iced Tea for every order of any pasta dish
December 9-15: 10% off on drinks
December 16-22: Free pumpkin soup for every order from “The Classics” menu
December 23-29: 10% off on holiday sets and holiday pastries
December 30-January 5: Buy 1 Take 1 on coffee (frappe not included)
Jannuary 6-12: 10% off on all salad orders

So the next time you’re at Fully Booked in Powerplant Mall, there’s no need to leave your happy place to get a meal. Pop by Press by Fully Booked and get yourself a taste of the holidays.

Many thanks to thr managemeny and staff of Press by Fully Booked for the warm welcome and to Bella Javier for extending the invitation.

This Press by Fully Booked branch is located at Level R3, Powerplant Mall, Rockwell Drive corner Estrella Street, Rockwell Center, Makati, open daily from 11am to 9pm.

Another branch is located at Ground Floor, Santolan Town Plaza, Col. Boni Serrano Avenue, San Juan.

Disclosure: Together with other foodies, I attended a foodie meet-up held in this restaurant. The food items mentioned here were served to allow us to sample the fare to facilitate honest reviews and were not paid for by the attendees, including myself.

Check out my blog posts on breakfast/brunch joints around the metro: