These days, I like a good cold-pressed juice or a fresh smoothie better than sugary and fizzy…read moredrinks. Cold-pressed juices from healthful fruits and vegetables are just so much better than soda or soft drinks that are packed with unhealthy food coloring, additives and a lot of sugar that spikes your energy level in a flash but gives you a nasty crash. I find that what I really need most of the time for that healthy energy and vitamin boost are natural and green juices that help rehydrate and load me up with electrolytes and nutrients. I like The Daily Jusa because it is a very convenient way to add vegetables and fruits into my diet. I don't get to cook much these days and I like to replace my fruit and veggie intake with one of their meal replacement juices. I always get the Green Energizer juice, which is cold-pressed greens with papaya and pineapple. On detox days, I would also get the Lemon Flush, which has lemon and cayenne pepper. They also have a bunch of different nut milks, and people who are lactose intolerant (or mildly lactose intolerant, like me) will love their cashew milk. The prices are a bit expensive, but I think juicing in general is expensive and its only fair that you pay a premium for well-prepared juices. I think it's worth it and The Daily Jusa is one of the cheaper brands for cleanses, juices and detox plans in the market. You can order their weekly plans which comes with your very own thermal bag. You can subscribe to their bottle programs, and be on your way to a healthier diet. I am glad The Daily Jusa is only a few blocks away.

This place reminded me of Go! Salad without the salad customization options. It has the same…read moreblended veggie-fruit smoothe juices in a bottle that you can get a set of which is apparently good for you and they do have salad. Personally, the juice is ridiculously expensive. Again, something I've come to expect from eating organic. Personally, the salads are a better deal. They're around 110php which is definitely much cheaper than going to the grocery and buying all these ingredients and making the salad myself. It's good for a light (and I mean really light. Fruit and veg burn easily) lunch or snack. What I do like is the fact that they mix fruit with vegetable. I've never been a fan of purely vegetable salads. I blame my sweet tooth. But fruit? I can have fruit all day. (The watermelon mint is great in the summer)

Note: I went to the MegaMall location in Mandaluyong, but couldn't find a Yelp page for that…read more I saw this on my friend's Instagram from his recent trip to the Philippines and made it a point to go too. The place is cute and tropically decorated. The cashier was very helpful and informative about the different toppings/flavors. We ordered two s'mores Sub-zero soft serve cups and one mini s'mores shake for my grandma. It was aesthetically pleasing and tasted pretty good. Nothing too crazy special about the flavor since ours was all blue-colored vanilla. There was a good amount of ice cream though, and I love anything s'mores so the marshmallows and graham cracker went well with it. Also loved the chocolate syrup syringe!! I knocked off a star because we actually got lost trying to find it (no one working in SM knew where it was but that's more the mall's fault than the actual place. So frustrating!). Also 4 stars because the inside is very small and so are the tables and chairs, and it took a while for our desserts to come out. It was good but probably won't be back anytime soon.

Disclaimer: I went to the MegaMall location. I think the MegaMall location is a new, because…read morethere's no Yelp page for it. I was wandering around the mall and stumbled upon a pastel-y colored shop filled with a lot of people taking pictures of their drinks and soft-serve. I decided to drop by and order the Baby Cookie Jar and Chocolate Popcorn Soft Serve. Baby Cookie Jar: a smaller size of the regular-sized Cookie Jar. It's filled with brown sugar cinnamon, chocolate cookie, and cookie dough ice cream. I thought that the drink was too sweet. I was expecting the drink to taste like a chocolate chip cookie, but it tasted more like a snickerdoodle because it had a very strong cinnamon flavor. I wasn't fan of the drink. Chocolate Popcorn Soft Serve: since it was the holidays, they only had a Gingerbread Cookie Crunch flavored soft serve. It was so good! The chocolate popcorn with the soft serve wasn't too sweet. It also came with a syringe filled with chocolate syrup, so you can put as much chocolate you want on your chocolate popcorn / soft serve that is served on a chocolate cone. Chocolate-overload! Overall, this place serves very Instagrammable drinks and desserts. If you want to satisfy your sweet tooth, then come try this place! Since I am not a fan over overly-sweet things, I would take a pass on the drinks and get a soft serve.

I'm starting to wonder if milkshakes are trying to be the next milk tea thing. I've never been…read morereally too big a fan though. Maybe I'm just biased toward milk tea (or tea in general) or maybe I just like my strawberry milk too much. Most milkshakes tend to be too heavy for my tastes so it's hard to find a milkshake place that actually impresses me. It's either too heavy, too sweet or too plain. Plain, ie, been there done that. Gimme something more. Maybe I'm just getting old, I dunno. Sadly, Taste of Heaven isn't the place either. Trust me when I say I wanted to like it. I wanted to like their menu because it looked promising. I wanted to like the idea of a milkshake because it's such a guilty pleasure thing: milk, ice cream, all the trimmings. And salted caramel milkshakes. If there's one thing in the world I absolutely adore, it's salted caramel. But alas, it was not meant to be. For what it is, it's a good milkshake: thick, creamy, no frills and the flavor is definitely there. It's also a good sized milkshake. You definitely get your money's worth. Would I recommend it to someone? Definitely. The menu's pretty decent and they have a lot of selections, from the basic vanilla-strawberry-chocolate to said aforementioned salted caramel to strawberry cheesecake to matcha green tea. Not bad, Taste of Heaven. Not bad at all. Sadly, the milkshake line to make a believer out of me has yet to be conceived, it seems. A second trip is in order, methinks... just to see if it was just the salted caramel or if another flavor will give surprise me.

Milkshake brings all the boys to the yard, according to Kelis. Not just the boys apparently, and it…read morebrings everyone not just to the yard, but to heaven. That's how good they are. A Taste of Heaven Milkshake Hub's gloriously blended dairy confections are SO good and addictive, they could sing the "Damn right, it's better than yours" line from this song convincingly. They could teach me, and I have no problem with them charging me. PROS: Have I mentioned milkshake? Or have I not referenced the song enough?; They offer so much flavors that all sound so good that you consider going every day for a month; The taste is smooth and creamy - not too lumpy; Décor and ambiance is calming and comforting, you could stay there for a day; The staff work promptly and are extremely helpful. CONS: If you go for the premium flavors, the toppings might be a tad fewer than what you've expected; Few seats and little space. It makes you feel guilty about staying too long when people start too pour in. But the interiors make it feel "maaliwalas" and not stuffy. TL;DR: The only reason you won't grab a milkshake here is that you're lactose intolerant.

This is the place to go for delicious but affordable fruit shakes at the Shopping Center,…read moreespecially on a hot summer day, which I did just recently, when I had to attend an event in UP. The taste is always fresh and delicious. And the price is good, with shakes starting at P35. When you enter their stall, you are greeted with a rainbow of fruits to choose from for your shake. Great thing is, you can combine fruits! They have a list outside which you can use as a guide or you can simply point to fruits you want to mix. I love strawberry mango! There are event suggested fruit and vegetable combinations, like carrot, apple, and pear. Once you choose, you mention your selection and you pay for your order. Then you wait. It can be quite a wait, but it's worth it. That has always been the case for me.

Whenever I'm in UP Diliman, I always make sure to go by the shopping center or SC, for those in the…read moreknow, for fishballs and a shake at the very appropriately named Healthy Fruit Shakes stall. The second best part about the shakes here is that they are customizable: they have a great variety of shake ingredients you can choose from, which you can combine for your drinking experience. You can totally create some bizarre Frankenstein's monster of a shake and they'll do it for you. The "healthy" and "fruit" in the your shake here are certainly relative, as there are options like milk chocolate chips, cookies, and cheese, as well as the usual, much more nutritious fruit and vegetables. They add sugar syrup and milk to the shakes most of the time, and you can opt out of either of those as well. The first best part about the shakes is that they're CHEAP. A twelve ounce cup is around thirty to forty pesos, which is likely half of what you would pay for in most other shakeries, and the price of bigger cups aren't that much. Even for non-local or seasonal fruit like strawberries or kiwis, it's still the same price, and another ingredient to your shake is just a five peso addition. It can get a little hot and cramped in their tiny stall, but at least you know the stuff is fresh since you're surrounded by their produce, which you can buy as well, and their makeshift order and payment system is pretty efficient. Whenever you're in the area, just look for the last shopping center stall closest the UP COOP.

I miss Jamba so much from back home so I'm glad they have some here in the Philippines. The one on…read moreTomas is pretty small but on a Saturday afternoon it's not busy. Studying here isn't bad...they don't blast the music. Music is good here :) I order Caribbean passion it's what I expect, fruity haha. 5 stars because every order I've had has tasted great. I remember in the states there were times it just didn't taste right. I wonder if they know the secret menu...probably not. I'll ask next time. I'll just keep my order simple for now. After overloading on coffee all the time Jamba is perfect!

I'm so glad Jamba Juice came to the Philippines and into my life, as few else things really give me…read morethat unfettered joy than sipping on a good fruit smoothie. I love berries particularly, so I'm all about the Five Fruit Frenzy and the Razzmatazz. I have a best friend in their Strawberry Surf Rider though. Most people can't take its intense tartness but I can't live without it. It's all just pulverized fruit, I know, but it gives me so much pleasure, that when the Jamba Juice at Magnolia packed up and left, I could have cried. That mall is now a sadder version of what it once was without a Jamba Juice. Luckily for me, they opened another branch at the nearby Tomas Morato. It lacks the particular homeyness of the Magnolia store--it's kinda small and too open and visible from the street, I feel--but I can make do. For the sake of the smoothie.

Out of all these fruit juice bars, I think Big Chill is probably the most filling. While most…read moreplaces just feel like fruit and ice, there's something about Big Chill's smoothies that actually make them feel like a light meal. If I'm running late or if I have an early thing that needs getting to, I usually end up having one of their Power Blends for breakfast. These power blends are actually pretty good, too. They don't suffer from the "tastes like the same thing" factor some places have. You know how it is: you order something but it ends up tasting like the last thing you ordered even if it was a different thing entirely? That. And they all have different "functions", too. Supercharger has nutrients, anti-oxidants and amino acids. Coldbuster C is a good boost of Vitamin C. The Power Breakfast is kind of like bananas and oatmeal in a cup. Personally, I prefer the Coldbuster C. Given my tendency to get a cold at a drop of a hat? It's my best friend. Also, don't let the color Spirulina drive you away. It's actually pretty good for you. Also if you'd like something a little more filling, they actually have pasta and sandwiches, too. This particular Big Chill has seats but since they're pretty close to the food court, it'll probably be easier getting a seat there since it's actually just a stand with a smaller fenced off seating area.

I'm going to be honest: when I tried Starr's for the first time last summer, I thought it was…read more.. okay. Good, but what makes them worthy of being called "famous?" Fast forward a year later, I now know why. I happened to pass by this milkshake bar when my dessert cravings were suddenly up after dinner on a Sunday night, so I decided to give it another shot. And thank God I did because I don't remember Starr's being as great as this before! New flavors, more mix-ins, and they even have sugar-free, low-fat yogurt options for the health-conscious and lactose-intolerant. I got one of their bestselling VIP milkshakes, the Flintstones - a thick and creamy chocolate base with stone chocolates that look like actual tiny pebbles (hence the name) blended in for bits of crunch. I also enjoyed snacking on their wedge fries with that tangy ranch dip (I wish they served more of it!) in the process. Maybe that first visit was just an unfortunate fluke, because I definitely won't wait another summer to have my next taste of Starr's rightfully famous shakes.

Starr's has been around for a couple of years and on the first few tries, I found their milkshakes…read moreto be a bit too sweet. Recently however, due to the extreme summer heat, I've had a particular craving for milkshakes and Starr's has been my go-to ever since. The only drink I order is the banana split milkshake. It's not too sweet and the milkshake itself is very creamy. However, I'd prefer that the crew fill up the cup to the brim because I feel like people aren't getting their money's worth if Starr's does not fill up the cup. On my last three recent visits, the crew consistently do not fill up the cup, however, the one thing that's consistent is the taste. In addition, you can also DIY your own milkshake and I think that's pretty cool, however, I think they tend to scrimp on the additions if you want any in your milkshake. The place itself is pretty cramped and I don't think it's meant for hours of hanging out. Maybe you can hang out for a short time or just order and grab your drink and go.

I love Jamba Juice! I could have this for breakfast, lunch and dinner every single day. Don't worry…read moreI already have a plan to counter the sawa: MWF, their Kale shakes; TTH, their granola parfait. Or wait, can I just make it MWFTTHSS GRANOLA PARFAIT?! Because I love this too much!!!! I'm pretty obsessed with Açai bowls but since these are not easily available here and I'm very lazy to make my own, Jamba Juice's granola parfait is the next best thing. The best thing. Berry-soy shake with chunks of berries topped with organic granola and ripe bananas. THIS. EVERY SINGLE DAY. Ahhhh, the good life.

I snack a lot. Yup, no meals. Just snacks…read more A few weeks ago, I found out that Jamba Juice would be in Makati. I didn't really want to try it because I though, "It's just juice. How good can juice taste?" Well, okay, I didn't like their juice. But I did find something to snack on. Every. Single. Day. (Or every time I visit the store.) Fruit and Yogurt Parfaits. Where have you been all my life?? They have about three different yogurt cups and I'm hoping they come up with more. It's like having heaven in a cup and eating it. Eating a bit of heaven. Every. Single Day.