FOODIES

We’ve been back less than a week and we’ve eaten at Highlands twice already. Can you believe it? I think we need to slow down a bit on the eating out. What do you guys think?

Anyway, Brian and I love to eat and we love to play poker. Highlands is the perfect marriage of both. We just couldn’t resist.

We had taken Monday, November 3, off to recover since we knew we would get back into town really late on Sunday evening. We had dinner at Highlands that night. I wanted to play, but Brian wouldn’t let us. He was afraid we would be up late. We were up late anyway. =P

So far we’ve had the bacon-wrapped shrimp, drunken chicken, sliders, St. Augustine wings, and a peanut butter cookie ice cream sandwich. Most of these we had on Monday, but I didn’t get to try the St. Augustine wings until Friday.

I must say that the wings are my favorite menu item so far. They are delicious. I’m craving them now just thinking about them. I could order them for take out, make some steamed white rice, and that would be a great meal for me.

I shared my full order with Brian the other day. Well, he really only had a few pieces. I ate most of it. That’s because I’m a gluttonous pig. Anyway, he said he wanted some ranch or blue cheese dressing on the side. I like them just the way they are.

On Monday, we started with the bacon-wrapped shrimp. These shrimp were gargantuan. They’re more like prawns. Anyway, bacon-wrapped anything is good so I had to try them. I could only have two pieces before I was done. They were a tad on the greasy side. Might be all the butter? I’m not sure. I think if I would have eaten all of them, I would have suffered a coronary on the spot. We invited Brent and Tim over to our table to try some. Brent had one I think, and then Tim ate the rest.

We have this word in Cebuano, sum-od, but I’m not sure how it translates in English. That’s the way I would describe the bacon-wrapped shrimp. For instance, humba (a fantastic Visayan braised pork belly recipe that my grandmother makes) would be sum-od to me. I know this is of no help to you guys. Ugh. I wish I could find the words.

Maybe it’s really fatty? So you can only have so much of it before your body says you are done? Maybe that’s the way to describe it? It definitely is one of the most unhealthy things on the menu.

As for Brian, he had the sliders with regular fries. He seemed to like them. If I were to order them, I’d get the yam fries for sure. I love yam fries. I wonder if they are like the ones served at The Anchor? Those are good.

My main entree on Monday was the drunken chicken. The flavor is good, but it is very strong. I’m not sure what they did with the chicken, but it had a very salty taste to it. The chicken was very dark. Brian thought it was burnt actually. He thought it would be all dried up. Much to his surprise, the chicken was tender and juicy on the inside when he tasted it. The saying “don’t judge a book by its cover” applies to food also.

Anyway, it was drenched in this dark sauce which was very soy sauce-y to me. It was a good-sized portion of chicken so I had to take the rest of it home (had to save room for dessert). Plus, it didn’t really go that well with the smashed potato side. I was thinking I needed some rice to absorb the strong salty flavor. Unlike the wings, which I was perfectly pleased eating by themselves, I really couldn’t eat the drunken chicken by itself. I really, really needed rice to go with it.

The chicken was cooked perfectly, but the flavor was too strong for me. Other people might enjoy it the way it is, but it wasn’t my cup of tea. You have to try it for yourself, though.

For dessert, we had the peanut butter cookie and chocolate ice cream sandwich. It was probably the highlight of our whole meal on Monday. I would go there just for that. It was very yummy.

I’m inclined to order the wings again next time we come out, but I will try to order something new. We’ll probably be there once a week for poker so I’d have tried everything on the menu at least once in no time.

Here are some obligatory food pictures from Highlands…

P.S. I was disappointed by the food presentation of the bacon-wrapped shrimp. It looked sloppy to me. Then again, we had just returned from a cruise where they try to make even the most mundane dishes pretty. I think my expectations were a little skewed.

Also equally disappointing was that they couldn’t serve any alcoholic beverages when we went on Monday or Friday. Not that I’m an alcoholic but, after having been open for about a week (soft open), I was thinking that all that would be ironed out. We were told that they should have their liquor license by grand opening day, so I was looking forward to imbibing on Friday night. No such luck. Hopefully, the liquor license thing will be sorted out by next Friday.