When we arrived at Cafe d'Asie for their lunch buffet, this huge elegant chandelier greeted us, overlooking the floor below. To the left are the dining tables, cozy and casual in feel, while to the right is the buffet spread.
Both the lunch and dinner buffet are priced at P1,390 nett. Children 6 to 12 years old are charged half the price which is P695 nett, and kids 5 years old and below eat free of charge. For the breakfast buffet, you can enjoy their profferings at only P770 nett. Pretty affordable compared to other hotels', considering their selection is pretty abundant.
We started with some salad, theirs has different types of greens, as well as veggies and eggs. There are four dressings you could choose from, and there are also some ready-made cold salads you can try. Aside from this, there's a section of cold cuts with smoked milkfish to boot.
I, for one, don't usually pass up the cheese station. Give me about three to four choices, and you won't hear me complaining. Along with the cheese are crackers, dried fruits, nuts and a bowl of honey. Oh, and they have a bread station, too, filled with various dinner rolls.
One of my favorite cuisines is Japanese, and luckily this is usually included in any international buffet. I took a bit of sushi here and there, trying out those whose names I don't know, but are pretty enough to eat. I helped myself to a large serving of sashimi---both the salmon and tuna---as I could devour these pretty easily especially when they're fresh.
A hodgepodge of cuisines litter the buffet: Indian, Mongolian, Korean, Chinese. There's a grill station where you can opt to have your seafood and meat charred with that smokey mouth feel. There's rice if you're up for it, and a couple of soup choices to warm the stomach.
For the hot dishes, that day they served Chicken with Mushrooms, Sweet and Sour Pork, Potato with Herbs, Pan Fried Fish with Florentine Sauce, Buttered Vegetables, and Beef Stroganoff.
More often than not, I skip the hot dishes unless I see something that's intriguing enough for me to try. There's only so much food I can take so I'd rather save the space for the usual suspects like cheese, salads, sushi and sashimi, made-to-order seafood, desserts, and the US Roasted Rib Eye.
What can I say? It deserves your prime gustatory real estate. My hubby and I are always lucky to experience an outstanding prime rib whenever we're at Circles, and so far among the hotel buffets we've tried (Spiral, Market Cafe, Marriott Cafe, and Paseo Uno to name a few), our vote still goes to them when it came to this steak. Until now. I can't believe that an equally good rib eye resides just a few minutes away from us. Moist, tender, oozing with flavor; every bite of my medium rib eye slice was heaven. I simply had to return for another round.
Another thing that sealed the deal? Café d'Asie's dessert roundup.
There were fresh fruits, and ice cream complete with a plethora of sprinkles and marshmallows for toppings. There was this Bread and Butter Pudding I regret not having since it earned quite a number of thumbs up from fellow bloggers.
At the center of it all was a pyramid of petits fours comprising Pandan Cream Cake, Ube Mango Cake, Cherry Cheesecake, Lemon Curd, Mango Mousse, Florida Cake, Blueberry Crumble, and assorted Fruit Tartlets.
Few, yes -- again when compared to other hotels' dessert lineup. Simple, maybe, but that's debatable. The difference lies in that their cakes are better than other hotels' -- moist, not too sweet, and I've mentioned this before, these beautiful little treats are not put there just for the sake of filling the dessert station. Every bite is enjoyable; a wonderful ending to a scrumptious and delightful meal.
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