Paksiw na Lechon is still one of our all-time favorites of Buddy's. Dine-in or takeout, that sauce…read moreis life! The meat was also easy to cut and chew. Pork Chop Steak was another saucy dish but with gravy instead. They were all served non-sizzling though anyone can easily expect it to be served sizzling on that kind of plate. Good thing the meat was still very hot! For us, Paksiw was the winner!

If you happen to stumble on this hidden gem in Lucena, you have to stop in. The restaurant is…read moretucked away behind an old antique shop which gives this place an old world ambiance. This is an outdoor-ish type restaurant, so don't expect air conditioning and white linen. Nonetheless, it's gorgeous and comfortable in its own special way. A wonderful treat for the palette, Filipino / Quezon provincial delicacies at its best for your tummy to enjoy. The food takes a while but totally worth the wait, I'm not sure if the food is prepared fresh when you order it, but nonetheless, it was well worth the extra wait. The view from the main dining area is beautiful, a stream running just below, with beautiful trees and a mountain as the backdrop as the cool breeze runs through. The servers are friendly and always helpful with a smile. The service overall is OK. The food: Binagoongan: a house specialty: I haven't had this dish prepared so well before today. The skin of the pork was crispy and meat was tender. The dish was not overly salty considering its contents. I'm no expert on Filipino cuisine because of my inexperience with it specifically, yet this is one of my favorite dishes overall, just superb to the palette. Chima: noodles which are stir fried with vegetables and meat: dish was very good, noodles had a perfect al dente texture which is rare for me here in the Philippines, noodles are usually cooked all the way through making them soft. Delicious! Pako Salad: my first time to have this: One of the best salads I've ever had. I cannot quite describe the taste, the greens were fresh, crisp, and I'm not sure if it's the vinegar based dressing or the greens themselves, but I enjoyed this salad throughly! Topped with onions, tomatoes, and salted egg, who would have thought this salad is one of the best I've ever had. Must must try! Halo halo: The ice is smooth and not chunky, so right off the bat, there's something going right here. The milk they used or cream was a coconut base, of course! We're in Quezon the coconut capital. Overall just a simply fantastic put together dessert. Whether you have room for dessert or not, you have to try this as well. Overall, 4 stars. The food alone does it for me, the rest was pretty much negligible. Simply awesome food!!! Al la cuisine! Stay hungry!

The food is prepared well, and the view is gorgeous. I'm from the U.S., so for other foreigners,…read moreplease don't expect nice bathroom facilities. Also, someone is raising chickens nearby, so sometimes you get wafts of that. Of course, there are mosquitoes, since the place is outside. With that said, if you want a great take on Filipino food, I would definitely recommend this place. Egg rolls, pinakbet, and the pako salad were all great. Wasn't the biggest fan of their version of Halo-halo--I could have used a bit more variety in the mixings, so it was average for me. The view of the river and the forest around is spectacular. The waiters were nice. Again, the food is the thing at this place. I wasn't disappointed. Also, the place is kind of hard to find. Don't trust your smartphone GPS. Good luck. The compound on which the restaurant is located is interesting: some kind of antique shop with beautiful plants and trees and a well. It's definitely a memorable place. There weren't many people around when I visited, so the antique areas were cool/creepy to see.

Ambience: For an afforadable outdoor barbecue experience, we…read moredecided to try their chill corner location. Apparently you can just park your car along the street near the establishment. Food: Grilled Porkchop and Grilled Liempo were both equally delicious! Serving size was fair, price was affordable, and grilled aroma was very appetizing. Quantity of fat was reasonably minimal. Chami was downright amazing! Firstly, we were impressed with the huge serving a Small can give you. Noodles had a lovely texture and the saucy flavor was as amazing as any chami should be! Service: They grilled our food on the spot, making us hungrier every minute. Although it's Pay As You Order, they still allowed us to pay after eating everything. :)

So far, so good! Everything we tried was pretty super especially the Crispy Pata and Kare-Kare…read moreGulay! The variety of their food choices is pretty big, leaving lots of room to try so much more. Looking forward to our next visit! Update: Gyro (traditional Greek pita bread sandwich embracing choice cut meat marinated in Mediterranean flavors, grilled and served with tortilla chips) This was supposed to be the most exciting part of our dinner since I was excited to try their version of Mediterranean, and to my extreme disappointment, they served me the dish in burger buns because they ran out of pita wrapper. What puts me off here is that they told us upon serving instead of in advance. We didn't get the chance to change our order instead. I didn't want them to change it anymore since it was already there and I was starving. Server needs more training because his verbal apology was hardly enough. Restaurant needs to learn how to satisfy customers more. Kare Kare Gulay This was the best part of our last visit's dinner. Sauce was spot-on nutty, tasty, and subtle. Vegetables came in a variety of three, each being fairly crunchy and "sounded" fresh. My favorite of the three would be the eggplant. Bagoong (shrimp paste) was not too strong and was a perfect partner for the nutty sauce. Soft Taco You have the following options: Pork BBQ, Chili Con Carne, or Fish. We tried the Chili Con Carne and it was deliciously simple. It was worth trying but I'll explore their other flavors. Texture of the wrapper was okay and the yogurt or sour dip was interestingly compatible with the Chili Con Carne.

The place is on a nice slope facing the ocean. Seating is individual Bahay kubos(small house). Nice…read moreview. Staff is not attentive unless you tell them that you will give them a nice tip. Food is 3 out of 5. Nothing special. That place could do a lot better. If you want to get away from it all and sit somewhere quiet.

Overall just average. The ambiance might be nice for some, but I'm used to going to "The…read moreCharthouse" in Laguna Beach, so this is quite different. The location is quite hard to find but easily accessible on the "Waze" gps app. Tucked away on a cliff this restaurant offers seaside dining with cabanas over the water. However the place looks like it needs a good cleaning and looks a little run down. The service is a little bit weird, because of the locations of the cabanas to the kitchen they have you order at the top and bring it down to you. There are servers at the bottom and near the dining area, but they're not so attentive. The food: Lapu-lapu: quite good, a little bland, but that's the way steamed fish is. Same quality as you would find in any typical Chinese restaurant. Ostrich: was quite good, but I didn't have enough of it to write a detailed review. Scallops: ditto on the fish, around average you could find at almost any other middle of the road restaurant. Seafood chowder: this was pretty decent, although quite honestly I would have preferred a bowl of some good clam chowder. Overall, the food was middle of the road, nothing memorable in my personal opinion. The view was nice, so I guess that's why people come here. Al la cuisine! Stay hungry my friends!

AMBIENCE Quite a number of parking spaces are available in…read morefront of their establishment and it is a relief that they aren't along the road. After spending some time inside, it seemed the restaurant could use more maintenance and cleanliness. FOOD Menu is HUMONGOUS! Several food items were available so we tried to take our time browsing. Bicol Express Rice Topping had too much fat with hardly any meat while the Bacon Mushroom Burger was delicious and okay for its price. Oreo Milk Shake was fairly good, creamy and not too sweet. SERVICE I would like to suggest that as soon as the menus are handed to customers, please give reasonable browsing time instead of waiting there in front of us right away; can be pressuring to some. As for the Bicol Express Rice Topping, we asked a server about it and, sad to say, they said it's supposed to be full of fat. We felt displeased because we've had this dish at other Filipino restaurants that gave more meat than fat. It's heart-breaking because we were excited to visit the branch that seems to be under construction at Rizal Street; now we feel hesitant unless someone could give a REALLY GOOD recommendation.

This branch is the widest I've seen so far. It was hardly crowded with lots of breathing room to…read moremove around. Water is self-service and although they have a friendly sign indicating you need to push the button, you need to instinctively lift it up before pushing it towards the back. We regularly order the Buddy Pizza Regular and the flavor is still just right: very simple and tasty. It's so good we don't need to try the other flavors anymore. It was our first time to try their recipe for Calderetang Baka and it was so-so, the type we wouldn't really look for anymore. Paksiw na Lechon is our favorite dish with rice. Flavor always succeeds in impressing us, though in our opinion, the quantity isn't enough for two people. But with a pizza, we're all set! Service was good since waiting time for the food was reasonable. We'd definitely return.

I don't know about the other branches of this restaurant, but the one I went to, which is on…read moreDiversion Road in Lucena City, was just plain terrible. I went there with my entire mum's side of the family. They ordered fried chicken and some pieces of the chicken were close to ROTTING. My relatives noticed green mould on the inside of the chicken, and it smelled funny. I ordered iced tea and mango float which never arrived. We could see the beverage machine from OUR TABLE. I think they source their waitstaff from Lucena's local crackhouses. I swear to God these are the most incompetent and stupid waiters I have ever encountered. And the restaurant's theme is so weird. It's like... sailor-themed. Since when have Filipinos been ever interested in sailor culture? Do not go to this restaurant, at least not to this particular branch. Waste of your time and money. If you ask me, the city's health department should be closing this shithole down.