A cool place to satisfy your cravings for food and bevs exploration is Boudica Café Bar at Mega Tower SM Megamall in Mandaluyong City. Coming after the well-known Boudica at City Golf Plaza nearby, Boudica at Mega Tower is an expansion to offer its more discriminating patrons the gastronomic delights of the favored bistro.
As I entered, the first things I noticed were the sleek interiors that manage to maintain a cozy atmosphere even with seating for up to 150 people. The space that features a mix of contemporary and retro furniture with lounge chairs and sofas designed for comfortable cushioning for long period of sitting. Its eclectic but soothing color tones that are easy on the eyes highlights a decorative bar with spiral staircase as surligner to bottles enhancing the appeal. Instagrammable backdrops and wall frames, vintage decor pieces incorporated with nostalgic elements and decorative collection pieces complete the visual experience.
Primarily, the advantages you get are the excellent and diverse menu of well-loved dishes all over the world, each with a unique twist, tweaked just a bit for the distinction, but never losing the authentic taste and flavors. Complementing that is a complete bar for varied personal choices, and friendly prices to make your chill-out memorable.
Each of us ordered our own dishes as we dug into a variety of options, from salads to pizza, to fish n’ chips to unagi and then braised short ribs in red wine as our mains. Every dish was prepared with care, featuring stylish plating and attention to detail
We had chances to taste other dishes shared by others too and like the Croquettes de Parma (parma ham, gruyere cheese with spicy tomato relish) that did its share of an appetizer as well as the Blue Cheese and Walnut Salad (crumbled blue cheese and caramelized walnut on the bed of greens, cherry tomatoes, red onions, bacon and chicken) that did its responsibility of making me eat my prescribed daily intake of vegetables as the greens were a good variety.
The Fish & Chips I ordered spoke volumes about the quality of Boudica’s cuisine. It has a choice of salmon, halibut, cod or pollock prepared as authentic as it can be with hand-sliced potato or sweet potato fries, and accompanied by three types of dips: tartar sauce, mushy peas, chip shop curry. Truly a classic meal.
The Unagi Kabayaki was grilled and glazed to perfection with unselfish side servings of delicious Nori seaweed strips, furikake rice, katsuobushi flakes, red pickled ginger, teriyaki sauce and a soft boiled egg.
What we enjoyed most was the Slow-braised Beef Short Rib in Red Wine that did not call for a knife and was fall-off-the-bone tender. This you must order.
To have some inkling of its bar offerings, I ordered a signature cocktail called Hug Me, a unique blend concoction of Tanqueray gin, Midori, lavender, lemon and strawberry, that is given a dose of smoke (nitro effect) in a glass enclosure before it is served. Somehow I find it hard to relate to most of the cocktail names. But the Tanqueray was there.
In a nutshell, I would invite my friends to visit Boudica, which opens at 10 AM when the mall opens and closes at 2 AM. It offers fine cuisine in a casual bistronomy atmosphere, without the high prices that we are wary of but still providing the quality food that foodophiles like us deserve.
/Some images are courtesy of Boudica Café Bar/
