Manila treats

Just before leaving work this afternoon, my friend asked me for some pastry recommendations from Manila. I managed to give her a couple before I had to pack up. On the ride home, I had planned to just chill and think of nothing in particular... then, I started thinking about treats from Manila. I figured I should just write about them and try to remember the joy I felt when I had them just over a month ago rather than focus on these hunger pangs.

Here are my top three all-time favourite pastries from Manila:

1. Mary Grace cheese roll.  I remember snacking on this after our wedding ceremony to tide us over until the reception.  Biting into this, you get a burst of sweetness from the sugar sprinkled on top coupled with saltiness from the soft strip of cheese inside. The buttery dough is light and pillow-soft. I think this is best eaten when warm so that the cheese melts in your mouth.  Hubby prefers their Edam cheese ensaimada which my mom got, but I am not too fond of Edam. I will take cheese roll any day. I can eat three in one sitting, but I will not admit that.

2. Silvanas from House of Silvanas. Light and buttery, these silvanas are such a delight to eat. Now this is one you have to eat cold. Flavourful buttercream is sandwiched between a couple of crunchy-chewy cashew-meringue wafers and coated with cookie crumbs. There are different flavours but I prefer the original.

3. Becky's kitchen brownies. Thanks to my cousin, I managed to get a hold of a box during our visit. These are best served warm, but we devoured them for breakfast, not heated, straight from the box, while waiting for our plane. The kids loved them, too! They were moist, chewy, chocolatey, yummy.

There are many more pastries and sweets that I like and surely there may be more that are even better than what I had listed above but these are the treats I HAD to have on our last trip. Now if someone can manage to send me a box or two of any (or all) of these, know that you will make my day.