I did it. I went to Jollibee for lunch.
It was in an area of the city that is mostly Latin and Philippine. (I don’t know if that is correctly stated) There were several people eating there and they were all Pilipino,
This is what I had intended to eat:
Is it called Palabok? It was #12 on the menu, but #10 also came with a piece of chicken so I ordered #12.
I should have looked at the ordering counter a little better when I got there, but it took 30 minutes to drive there when it should have only taken 15 minutes. My dining time was driving time.
When I said #12, it was immediately put upon my tray. It was already boxed up waiting for me. That bothered me immediately.
This was my lunch:
You can’t see it in the picture but what saw when I opened the box was a block of something with a couple slices of egg. It was one mass. Not appetizing looking at all. Then I tasted it. ICK! I love rice noodles and they were supposed to be in there somewhere so I mixed it all up and tasted again. Double Ick!
Then I tasted the chicken. It was absolutely delicious, very hot and juicy underneath that crunchy coating. The chicken was so hot that it was difficult for me to eat as I don’t pick up fried chicken with my fingers. They did give an inferior plastic fork, but it was just a tad better than trying to eat it with a spoon. I did what I could and would have eaten another piece if I had ordered it. The chicken came with a container of brownish gravy that tasted like it came out of a can.
I mixed, I stirred, I added some of the lemon juice that was served in mass produced plastic packets and no matter what I did, I could not eat it. I threw it out!
This is what my box looked like right before hitting the trash:
Back to the counter to order what looked like an interesting dessert. Okay, I ordered 2 different desserts.
But first I took many pictures of the meal holding tank. They all came out glary.
You probably can’t see it but there are boxes of pre-made meals in there waiting for more suckers.
This is what I ordered:
This is what I got: Halo Halo
Not much different from the picture. It was very pretty, but didn’t have much taste. It reminded me of the Vietnamese dessert, Che Ba Mau on drugs.
It took them almost 10 minutes to prepare it.
The inside of the glass was smeared with a red bean paste and then in went tasty gelatinous cubes and strings. Then a layer of several types of hard beans covered with shaved ice. A scoop of ube (sweet yam) ice cream, a scoop of vanilla looking ice cream and a quarter portion of custard taken right out of a commercial individual container of custard. Then it was topped with milk.
If it would have been topped with coconut milk like in the Vietnamese dessert it would have been good. I only ate a small portion of it.
I also bought the Peach Mango Pie. What a throw back to days gone by! This reminded me just of the old fried apple pies that McD’s used to serve. Not bad! Maybe too much goo to fruit ratio but it tasted good. I just loved the fried crust.
Will I go back? Maybe for chicken and pie but nothing else.
I don’t think this will make it in mainstream America but might have a place in Philippine neighborhoods.
