Mexican x Asian Fusion with Chino MNL’s New Lunch Menu
Opened in June 2018, Chino MNL has been serving delicious Mexican-Japanese fusion food at One Bonifacio, Bonifacio High Street in Taguig, Metro Manila.
Owned by Tracy Wei and Erik Idos, it’s their second branch under the Chino brand after the one in Hong Kong. Both restaurateurs were former chefs of the famed Nobu brand of Chef Nobu Matsuhisa, working in both their California, New York and Hong Kong branches, clearly knew how to create delicious food.
As entrepreneurs ourselves, we know very well the growing pains from starting a brand from scratch in Metro Manila and though it’s often a bit more expensive, we do our best to support other SMEs over larger, more established enterprises. With the immense talent behind the Chino MNL brand, we knew we had to make time to visit them.
Combined with an unusual concept and execution, the agile menu and price changes in the last year, you can see their commitment to unlocking the key to being the neighbourhood restaurant in BGC. When Chino MNL first opened, they only served dinner and had no reservations. When we heard that they had a relatively affordable lunch time menu that they just recently launched in April, we took it as a sign that maybe we should finally give it a try.
The interiors were cozy, slightly dim and industrial in feel with its cement finishes, metal frames and wooden tables. More fitting for an evening dinner date than an afternoon lunch, I could see why most of its crowd decide to come at night. With a beautiful, long bar table that is fully stocked, I can imagine ending the night chatting up with a cocktail in hand after a good meal.
Their lunch plates are inclusive of garlic rice, grilled corn salsa and tortillas. We were expecting smaller portions from our experience with other similar restaurants but were surprised with the sizes and how filling each dish was.
The first dish we had was the Fried Mahi Mahi, which in my opinion, tasted amazing with their salsa. The deep fried fish was cooked perfectly and I had a kick out of hearing the crunch. Combined with the Chipotle Kewpie, this was my favorite dish out of the two that we had.
The second dish we had was the Soy Braised Pork Belly with picked Jicama, flavors closer to the Japanese food that both chefs were trained in. The meat was very flavorful and paired really well with their garlic rice.
And of course, we wanted to end the meal with dessert. With one of the other owners being a pastry chef, we were slightly disappointed there weren’t more on the menu. We ended the meal with their unusual Thai Trea Tres Leches cake. Regular tres leche cakes are spongecakes soaked in three types of milk: evaporated, condensed and heavy cream milk, except theirs had a distinct tea flavor and crunchy boba pearls.
Having a go at Chino MNL’s lunch menu made me wonder what their dinnertime experience had to offer and how different it is from the food at their Chino HK branch. I hope they don’t stop innovating their menu and keep on creating such interesting flavours for us in Metro Manila. I’m excited already to have another go!
Chino MNL
Address: One Bonifacio, Bonifacio High Street, BGC, Taguig.
Store Hours: Monday to Saturday, 12:00pm to 3:00pm, 6:00pm+ and Sunday 11:00am to 8:00pm.
Contact Number: 0917-1420588
Facebook Page: Chino MNL
Website: www.chinorestaurant.com
