The store's windows were painted with holiday greetings...
They also had Feliz Navidad but it was by an orange bin which were 4 lbs for a dollar and was
We needed to get to National City to get some new flooring at a local carpet place...
Since the carpet place wasn't open yet, we killed some time driving around before decided to stop at this strip mall, the same one with Villa Manila, which used to be the old Max's Fried Chicken.
We haven't been here in awhile and I saw the red, yellow and blue Pinoy Fiesta sign. We hadn't heard of this place before and thought we would try it out.
Perhaps I could see if they had some snack for us...
Their bakery section is pretty small. They didn't really have any baked goods that looked appealing and the selection was really slim ("puto" or rice cakes mostly). They did have some sweets I'd never seen before (I'll get to that later) and a take out food section.
We bumped into some folks we knew from TC's dance group. They had just finished having their fried fish lunch.
Fried items (ukoy, lumpia and fish) behind the case and various rice cakes in front (puto and kutsinta):
We planned to eat at home after choosing our new flooring so we just opted for a snack to share.
Lit up capiz parols (star shaped lanterns) were suspended from the ceiling since it was Christmas season.
We got one ukoy, a sweet potato and shrimp fritter ($1.75) served with a vinegar and garlic dipping sauce.
It was a bit on the greasy side but okay just for a little snack. My parents used to make this when we were younger. Come to think of it, they made a LOT of fried food, haha.
Back to the dessert...I saw boxes and boxes of this dessert filling about three racks. The label only listed the ingredients but not the name of the sweet.
The bright cellophane wrappers and the pyramid shape were very attractive.
A box of ten cost $4.50. Later on, I found out from my friend D, that these confections were called "yema", a sweetened egg and condensed milk dessert, usually with nuts.
When unwrapped, the consistency was soft but had texture because of the finely chopped almonds, which I liked.
Here is a really great link which includes a recipe and a video on how to make yema.
When I first saw this dessert I thought it might be yema but didn't see eggs in the list of ingredients. I'd only associated yema as a round ball shaped dessert (having seen it at Lisa's Desserts and in recipes in my Filipino cookbooks). Turns out that yema is also shaped like pyramids.
We only had a few pieces of the yema while in the eatery and saved the rest for later. I liked the crunchiness of the almonds but not the gooeyness. TC liked the texture as well as the sweetness. I'm glad that we tried this out. I'll have to try making this as it seems easy enough. I'm not sure if I could wrap it as nicely; if not, I can always form the mixture into ball form.
Of course, there was a religious figurine in the eatery...
I'm not sure of his official name but I'm guessing it's JC as a child.
Somewhere along East 8th was this really cool painted Santa Claus. It was not a slapdashed crappy painting, but one that was more painstakingly detailed than any I'd seen so far. It happened to be on the storefront of APC, or the Appliance Parts Center, which is celebrating 50 years! Wow, that's a long time!
I liked the wintry scene complete with falling snowflakes, trees, birds, and even a fawn! The colors were subdued and not garish and cheap looking. Their other window had a snowman on a similar landscape. Very nicely done windows these were.
Pinoy Fiesta
550 East 8th St., Suites 8 & 9
National City, CA 91950
(619) 434-6255
They do not have a website but take a gander at the crappy yelp reviews, mainly about the rude customer service! One star reviews galore! I hate to say it, but there IS rude service at A LOT of Filipino places. It sucks that it's so commonplace and even expected. The service we experienced that day wasn't as rude as some folks described, well at least not rude enough to complain online about it.
I'm not sure if I'd go back for the food or their dessert, except maybe for the yema. Those would make great little food gifts.
2 comments:
Hey CC - I've never had terrible service at Pinoy Fiesta....just rather blase' and not nearly as awful as Tita's. Funny, I was just there during the end of December.
hi kirk - Blase is a good word for the customer service (or lack thereof)!
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