Chef Bruce Ricketts of Sensei Sushi & Mecha Uma won Manila’s Best Emerging Talent!
I’m happy that my favorites–Chef Robby Goco, Chef Bruce Ricketts, Chef Antonio Escalante, Café Juanita, Gino’s Pizza, and Blackbird–all won in the 2014 Manila’s Best Restaurant Awards!
On the down side, some were disappointed at the block voting for an entire restaurant group. Also, since the judges could just vote for the restaurants they have tried, only the old restaurant favorites won the awards.
Nevertheless, the awards are very meaningful since they are voted by peers in the industry.
Congratulations to all the winners in the Manila’s Best 2014 Awards!
And the BEST Restaurants (✓) in Manila in 2014 are… (My votes marked with ✮)
Best authentic Spanish Paella in town–ArroZeria!
Manila’s Best Italian Restaurant:
- Carpaccio Italian Dining
- Caruso Ristorante Italiano ✮
- Cibo
- L’Opera ✓
- My Kitchen by Chef Chris
2014 winner: L’Opera
2012 winner: Va Bene Pasta Deli
Manila’s Best French Restaurant:
- Brasserie Girolle
- Champêtre ✓
- Chef Jessie ✮
- Le Jardin
- L’entrecôte
2014 winner: Champêtre
2012 winner: Brasserie Ciçou
Manila’s Best Spanish Restaurant:
- Cirkulo ✓
- Donosti Pinxos y Tapas
- Las Flores
- Rambla ✮
- Vask
2014 winner: Cirkulo
2012 winner: Terry’s Selection
Manila’s Best Japanese Restaurant:
- Kikufujji ✮
- Nihonbashitei
- Sensei Sushi
- Seryna
- Tsukiji ✓
2014 winner: Tsukiji
2012 winner: Sugi
Tacos Callejeros Mexicanos Taco Truck by A’Toda Madre!
Manila’s Best Chinese Restaurant:
- Choi Garden
- Gloria Maris ✮
- Jade Garden
- Peking Garden ✓
- President Grand Palace
2014 winner: Peking Garden
2012 winner: Hai Shin Lou
Manila’s Best Continental Cuisine:
- Antonio’s ✓
- Blackbird
- Lusso
- Stockton Place
- The Gallery Vask ✮
2014 winner: Antonio’s
2012 winner: Sala
Manila’s Best Thai Restaurant:
- Azuthai ✓
- Basil
- Nav Modern Thai
- Silk Road Thai bistro ✮
- Som’s Thai Noodle House
2014 winner: Azuthai
2012 winner: People’s Palace
Manila’s Best Filipino Restaurant:
- Café Juanita ✓
- La Cocina de Tita Moning
- Milky Way
- Nam Nam
- Sarsa ✮
2014 winner: Café Juanita
2012 winner: Abé
Congratulations to Chef Robby Goco of Cyma for winning Manila’s Best Specialty Cuisine!
Manila’s Best Middle Eastern Restaurant:
- Arya Persian Restaurant
- Behrouz Persian Cuisine
- Beni’s Falafel
- Café Mediterranean
- Ziggurat ✮✓
2014 winner: Ziggurat
2012 winner: Hossein’s Persian Kebab
Manila’s Best Korean Restaurant:
- Dong Won Garden
- Jang Ga Nae
- Korean Garden ✮✓
- Korean Village
- Ye Dang
2014 winner: Korean Garden
2012 winner: Kaya
Manila’s Best Indian Restaurant:
- Bollywood
- Kashmir ✓
- Legend of India
- Queens Crystal Garden
- Swagat Indian Cuisine ✮
2014 winner: Kashmir
2012 winner: New Bombay Indian Cuisine
Manila’s Best Mexican Restaurant:
- A’ Toda Madre
- El Chupacabra ✮✓
- Hermanos Taco Shop
- Mexicali Orale
- Not competing: Chihuahua
2014 winner: El Chupacabra (new category)
Manila’s Best Specialty Cuisine:
- Brasas
- Cyma Greek Restaurant ✓
- Juju Eats
- Tao Yuan -Singaporean
- Van Gogh is Bipolar ✮
2014 winner: Cyma Greek Restaurant
2012 winner: Corner Tree Café
Chef Ed Bugia and Jutes Templo of Gino’s Pizza winning for Best Pizza in Manila!
SPECIALTY
Manila’s Best Steakhouse:
- House of Wagyu
- I’m Angus
- Highlands Prime Steakhouse
- Mamou ✮✓
- Melo’s
2014 winner: Mamou
2012 winner: Elbert’s Steak Room
Manila’s Best Modern Casual Dining:
- Apartment 1B
- Chelsea Market and Café
- Green Pastures ✮
- Kettle
- Wildflour Café +Bakery ✓
2014 winner: Wildflour Café +Bakery
2012 winner: Sala Bistro
Manila’s Best Burger Joint:
- 8 Cuts Burger Blends ✮✓
- Brother’s Burger
- Mr. Jones
- Burger Project
- Burgers and Brewskies
2014 winner: 8 Cuts Burger Blends
2012 winner: Charlie’s Grind & Grill
Manila’s Best Pizza:
- Gino’s Brickoven ✮✓
- Nolita
- One Way
- Woodfire
- Yellow Cab
2014 winner: Gino’s Brickoven (New category)
Enzo Lim, one of the best Filipino mixologists. 🙂
Manila’s Best Bar:
- Draft ✓
- Hooch
- Rocket Room
- The Black Pig
- The Blind Pig ✮
2014 winner: Draft
2012 winner: M Café
Manila’s Best Nightclub:
- 71 Gramercy ✮✓
- Black Market
- Hyve
- Privé
- Republiq
2014 winner: 71 Gramercy (New category)
Manila’s Best Coffee Shop:
- Craft’s Coffee
- Edsa Beverage Design Group ✮
- Kuppa
- Refinery
- Yardstick ✓
2014 winner: Yardstick (New category)
Manila’s Best Dessert, Ice Cream and Cake Shop:
- Bizu
- Bono Artisinal Gelato ✓
- Cupcakes by Sonja
- Purple Oven ✮
- Sebastian’s Ice Cream
2014 winner: Bono Artisinal Gelato
2012 winner: The Cake Club
Manila’s Best Newcomer:
- Blackbird ✮✓
- Grace Park
- Green Pastures
- Rambla
- Your Local
2014 winner: Blackbird
2012 winner: Wildflour Café+Bakery
Chef Massimo and Carolyn Veronesi of Va Bene Pasta Deli!
HOTEL RESTAURANTS:
Manila’s Best Hotel Restaurant:
- Hotel Buffet Circles (Makati Shangri-La)
- Crossover Buffet (Dusit Thani)
- Escolta (Peninsula)
- Heat (Edsa Shangri-La)
- Spectrum (Raffles) ✮✓
2014 winner: Spectrum (Raffles)
2012 winner: Spiral (Sofitel)
Manila’s Best Hotel Restaurant: Fine Dining:
- Cru Steakhouse (Marriott) ✮✓
- Old Manila (Peninsula)
- Prince Albert (InterContinental)
- Sage (Makati Shangri-La)
- Strip (Solaire)
2014 winner: Cru Steakhouse (Marriott)
2012 winner: Impressions (Maxims)
Manila’s Best Hotel Restaurant: Specialty Cuisine
- Benjarong (Dusit Thani)
- Inagiku (Makati Shangri-La) ✮✓
- Lili (Grand Hyatt)
- Spices (Peninsula)
- Summer Palace (Edsa Shangri-La)
2014 winner: Inagiku (Makati Shangri-La)
2012 winner: Shang Palace (Makati Shangri-La)
Manila’s Best Hotel Bar
- Le Bar (Sofitel) ✮
- Long Bar (The Raffles) ✓
- Sage Tapas Bar (Makati Shangri-La)
- Sky Deck (The Bay Leaf)
- The Bar (Peninsula)
2014 winner: Long Bar (The Raffles)
2012 winner: Salon de Ning (Peninsula)
Best Lechon in Manila–Pepita’s Kitchen!
INDIVIDUAL ACHIEVEMENT:
Manila’s Best Emerging Talent:
- Chef Bruce Ricketts (Sensei Sushi) ✮✓
- Chef Celine de los Angeles (Stockton Place)
- Dani Aliaga (Rambla, Las Flores)
- Dedet de la Fuente (Pepitas Kitchen)
- Erwan Heussaff (The Fat Kid Inside)
- JJ Yulo (Pinoy Eats World)
2014 winner: Chef Bruce Ricketts (Sensei Sushi)
2012 winner: Martin Wisniewski (Raintree)
Manila’s Best Chef:
- Antonio Escalante (Antonio’s) ✓
- Colin Mackay (Sala, People’s Palace, Blackbird) ✮
- Cyrille Soenen (Impressions, Brasserie Cicou)
- Jose Luis Gonzalez (VASK)
- Robby Goco (Cyma, Green Pastures, Charlie’s)
2014 winner: Antonio Escalante (Antonio’s)
2012 winner: J Gamboa (Tsukiji, Cirkulo, Milky Way, Azuthai)
Manila’s Best Restaurant Group Entrepreneur:
- Abba Napa (‘Cue, Burger Bar, Phat Pho, 8 Cuts, Namnam) ✮ ✓
- Dixie Mabanta (Mexicali, Café Meditarranean, El Chupacabra)
- Erik Cua (Republiq, 71 Gramercy, Opus, Draft, Beso)
- Malu Gamboa (Tsukiji, Cirkulo, Milky Way, Azuthai)
- Sergi Rostoll (Barcino, Las Flores, Rambla)
- Werner Berger (Santi’s, Carpaccio, I’m Angus, Chesa Bianca)
2014 winner: Abba Napa (‘Cue, Burger Bar, Phat Pho, 8 Cuts, Namnam)
2012 winner: Annabel Wisniewski (Raintree)
About the Manila’s Best Awards
MANILA’S BEST 2014 is dubbed as “the Oscars of Manila’s restaurant industry,” organized by Ines Cabarrus-Habayeb and Elian Habayeb, authors of the bestselling coffee-table book Manila’s Best Kept Restaurant Secrets.
The MBKRS Awards determine the city’s best restaurants in a grand, bi-annual celebration with 30 award categories in total divided into the following groups: cuisine, specialty, hotel restaurants, and individual achievement.
There are some ground rules, however.
- First, reigning champs do not compete this year. They sit this one out. They will be eligible again in 2016.
- Second, MANILA’S BEST is all about homegrown restaurants. International concepts and restaurant brands are not eligible for nomination.
- Third, except for Manila’s Best Newcomer, restaurants may only be nominated for one award category.
It all started one night in 2006 when Inés and Elian decide over dinner at a hidden restaurant in Alabang that the city needed a beautifully laid-out coffee table book featuring Manila’s most loved restaurants. Two years later, their dream became a reality, and their book Manila’s Best Kept Restaurant Secrets a success.
On their book tour at various restaurants and bookstores, they were struck by the number of times they were asked this singular question: “which is the best restaurant?” Confident there must be a way to arrive at a satisfactory answer, they surveyed restaurant industry leaders they met in the process of writing their book, and concluded that an Oscars-style awards event may very well be what the city needs.
The rest is history. This year, Manila celebrates its fourth MBKRS Awards (a.k.a Manila’s Best 2014), recognizing excellence in the city’s dining scene. “It’s an awards show of the industry, by the industry, for the industry,” says Elian, who along with his wife Inés manage the growing Chihuahua group of restaurants.
Live an Awesome Life,
Founder, www.OurAwesomePlanet.com
Disclosure: I wrote this article with my own biases, opinions, and insights. Read Our Awesome Planet Complete Disclosure Policy here.
P.S. Here’s the list of judges for Manila’s Best 2014…
