While looking for a restaurant to dine at Greater San Juan, we bumped into Chef Pals, its at the back of Wilson, corner of Leige and V. Cruz st. It is a humble restaurant that is beside the owners house and specializes in home cooked food like embutido, morcon, and lengua.
We had all three to be shared plus their tapsilog. All of us agreed that we liked the embutido. It's abit sweet, but the taste is what we grew up with. The downside for me, i prefer it just steamed, not steamed then pan fried that formed a crust.
The morcon was a bit tough and chewy. The gravy/sauce was salty for our taste. The sauce has the rich, beefy taste, but was salty. It was okay, but overly seasoned that destroyed the flavor.
Lengua was cooked right, soft and tender. The sauce was too buttery that overpowered the lenguas' taste. I've had better lengua. The sauce that I usually see is a mushroom sauce that is made from bechamel, but their version lacks the flavor.
I hope they would recheck their recipe for everything. I mean, I've had meals in the past that is similar to these kind of restaurants, homegrown, beside their house, growing through food delivery. Some serve fantastic heirloom recipes, but some just do it to earn a living. At the end of the day, its not how much the business earn, but its how it can tie to generations of memories that brings people together. That is, a good business, because thats were loyalty comes in.
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