Manila Restaurant Review: Chef Jessie at Rockwell Club

Sunday, September 22, 2013

Chef Jessie by regular nominee for best chef Jessie Sinsioco is one of the regular nominees for best French restaurant in Manila and well famed for their great ambience, French food and of course their soufflés! It’s quite easy to get to Chef Jessie – just take a cab to Powerplant Mall and Chef Jessie is within Rockwell Club, which is just next to the mall. For great French Food in Manila, check out Chef Jessie.

We checked them out during lunch time and loved that there’s a good amount of natural light from the sun.

Great seat for a good window view and comfortable sofas

For simple coffee and tea catch up ~ a perfect small coffee table setting

The roundtable set up for business meetings or just a bunch of foodies gathering together ~~

Gorgeous flower at my table

The condiment that comes with their complimentary breads – I enjoyed the fresh tasting flavours and it’s a good pair with the bread – beats the typical butter spread!

We tried to go easy on these appetizers because we were going to have a feast but simply couldn’t help having more of these!

For starters, you simply can’t go to a French restaurant and not order Escargots – so we ordered their butter and garlic escargots. Delicious and they shelled them for you.

My second starter is a Trio Tartare – three different types of tartare with salad. Fresh tasting and the light dressing enhances the flavours of the raw seafood.

Another item that’s iconic to French restaurants is of course – the French Onion Soup – which takes a lot of patience to caramelized the onions slowly and served with melted cheese!!

Packed with natural flavours of onions but a tad salty for me.

Duck Orange! A classic French style seared duck served with orange sauce. The citrus acidity helps cut the fatty duck. Oooh yes ~ Nom nom nom nom ~~

The most raved about main course in Chef Jessie – their Lamb rack – crusted with herbs! I ordered mine medium rare ~~

I personally loved the flavours of the crust and the perfectly medium rare doneness to the juicy lamb but the sauce was a tad salty to my palate. Perhaps it suits the local taste buds better.

Luckily for me, they also served it with this Mint Jelly that goes superbly with the lamb! The lamb was good but it would be better for me if the sauce was less salty. Maybe you should order the lamb with sauce on the side. Another tip is to eat it with the mint jelly!

For desserts, we had this banana flambé, which is flambé bananas till caramelized and served with ice cream. A yummy treat for those who love bananas!

Our meal would never be complete without the famous soufflés of Chef Jessie – they got quite a lot of flavours to choose from!

*SWOOONS* It really does live up to it’s expectation! *MUST RESIST and EAT LIKE A GENTLEMAN*

Last but not least is this dessert which won me over. This is called Princess Carmen, named after Chef Jessie’s mother.

Layers of wafer and cream, covered with pistachio nuts and topped with a mango flower – this is a delicate French dessert. Simply heaven on a plate! Sophisticated and beautiful. And guess what… it’s delicious! It actually took the spotlight off the famous soufflé! With every good food, comes with a story which inspires it. Princess Carmen is a TOP TOP Quality dessert!