May 18, 2019

Lime by Chef Arch - Street Food with An Attitude

Street food is ready-to-eat food or drink sold by a hawker in the streets or any other public place, such as at a market or fair. It is often sold from a portable food booth, food cart, or food truck and meant for immediate consumption. Not everyone has the stomach for street food. But for the fastidious ones who can’t stand eating food cooked without closely monitored safety and sanitary standards, well, fret not. There are a lot of places that you can visit to eat or try street food without the fear getting Hepatitis or food poisoning.




One of which is long established restaurant that serves street and comfort food since July 2007: LIME by Chef Archie Val Juanta. LIME is Chef Arch's first concept restaurant years before Kanto Freestyle Breakfast. I've been here a few times in the past, out curiosity, because they serve Filipino street food in quite an upscale manner as well as comfort food with a twist.




As the restaurant’s name implies, it’s all about giving the dishes and artistic twist. Just like how you have to twist a Lime in order to extract the juice. The restaurant offers both international and local inspired dishes using the best and freshest ingredients. Chef Arch created a menu representing some of the diverse flavors from all over the world tying together food and art. 12 years later, LIME fares well because of its very unique concept and is probably one of the first ones who turned a residential house/community into a food destination even before Maginhawa, Kapitolyo and Poblacion existed




Although during my recent visit I stroke a luck because me and my friends got to eat other items from their menu. Since, back then, whenever we dropped by, we would only order alcoholic drinks paired with bar chows.

Street Style Barbecue Platter - includes charcoal-grilled skewered pork intestines, chicken intestines, chicken feet, chicken blood, pork pancreas and pork ears served with a side of greens, Sinamak vinegar and peanut sauce for dips placed in cocktail glasses for the flare. This is probably the best-seller at the restaurant. I loved that this has pork pancreas as I rarely see or eat this and I don't care if you think it's weird or stomach-churning. I like how gamey these skewers were plus the peanut sauce was a good twist to the usual vinegar dip which kinda reminds of the Indonesian satay.



Osso Buco Kare Kare - peanut stew and braised low and slow until the meat is fall-off-the-bone tender. The peanut sauce was pronounced and very thick.



Thrice Cooked Lechon Bagnet - boiled until tender crispy pork belly slab then deep fried twice to attain the extra crispy texture.



Balut With Red Wine Sauce - 16 to 21 day-old fertilized duck egg with sweet-tangy red wine sauce served in a sizzling plate. Balut is a popular local delicacy and streetfood I’m not a fan of balut so I didn’t tried this one, but I did tasted the sauce.



Quail Egg Tempura - quail eggs covered in tempura batter with soy Mirin glaze and Sinamak dip. This is Lime’s spin with the famous and favorite Filipino street food qwek-qwek. It’s weird to eat at first because I’m used to the orange and thick coating. But since tempura batter is light and airy, this was easier to eat and good with the dips that it came with.



Creamy Tuyo Pasta - spaghetti noodles with cream sauce, gourmet dried fish and pesto sauce. The flavor of the gourmet tuyo goes very well with the pasta and cream, quite creamy and tasty.



Lime Pork Belly BBQ - sweet glazed pork barbecue skewers. These were tender because instead of the usual meat cut from the shoulder of the pig, they used pork belly.



Chicharon Bulaklak and Isaw Pizza - medium thick crust pizza topped with cheese and grilled pork intestines, deep fried pork intestines and slices of local chili. All I can say is that this pizza was intense and everyone of us loved it.



Pan Fried Dory with Longganisa and Salted Egg Salsa - this was my least favorite of all the dishes that we tried. I don't know why but I just can't put my fingers on it and probably because I am not a fan of cream dory fish.



Four Cheese Caldereta - tomato based beef stew topped with 4 kinds of melted  cheeses. next to sinigang, caldereta is also top favorite dish of all time. I also like it when caldereta is topped with cheese as this gives the sweet and tangy sauce the salty flavor to balance everything. This was my favorite of all the dishes that we got to try that afternoon.



Embotido-Stuffed Crispy Pata - two favorite Filipino dishes: crispy pata and embotido rolled together into a delectable dish.



Indian Nachos - papadum flatbread with pico de gallo. Papadum is a thin, crisp, disc-shaped food from the Indian subcontinent, typically based on a seasoned dough usually made from peeled black gram flour. First of all, where have these flatbreads been all my life??? These are freaking amazing!!! Even without the salsa, I can eat a handful of these! From what I reckon, I was the one finished all these papadum flatbreads. I loved its taste and grainy texture.  One of my fave dishes too!



Pork Kebab - skewered pork cutlets and vegetables with Mediterranean spices served with garlic yogurt dip and papadum flatbread. Another one of my favorites as I love Mediterranean  food.



It was election day when we visited so there was a liquor ban, thus we were not able to enjoy these dishes with Lime's signature cocktails/alcoholic drinks. Not even with beer, very unfortunate yes. But we got to stay until the sunset and exchange anecdotes and other social media-related stories. We were drunk on food (more like food coma) and not alcohol, and yet we had so much fun!



CHEF ARCH'S LIME
160 San Rafael Street, Plainview,
Mandaluyong City
Contact Nos: 02 7755428 / 09053127799
Email: chefarchslime@gmail.com


For more information, complete menu and restaurant reviews, check out their Zomato profile: 
Chef Arch's Lime Menu, Reviews, Photos, Location and Info - Zomato



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