Bok Lene - a good thing

It's always a good thing when one stumbles onto hidden food treasures. Bok Lene (beats me what this means) is one such gem, a smallish hole-in-the-wall chinese restaurant just off the banawe restaurant row (if you are along banawe, coming from quezon avenue, turn left on the retiro traffic light. The restaurant is on the second corner on your right). Literally a mom and son shop with the owner as waitress, cook, and cashier.

We've been back several times after our first visit; this alone is a testament to the restaurant's good food (my family is notoriously hard to please). Among the dishes we liked were the oyster cake, fish filet and tofu hotpot, various dimsums (hakaw, spinach dumpling, shiao long pao, taro puff, and radish cake). A word about the radish cake--Bok Lene's version is one of the best I've had in a very long time. One can order a whole uncooked slab, ready for pan frying at home (in fact, am having a piece right now).

Have also tried their dumpling noodle soup (quite good; the noodle was very soft, almost misua-like) and quick stir fried vegetables. The Yang Chow was also acceptable (reminiscent of the version of downtown restaurants of yore; deep yellow with lots of duck egg). There were some misses, notable among which was the beef tenderloin Chinese style (much to sweet and swimming in sauce).

Price points is at par with the most of the chinese restaurants along banawe (dimsum around P70 to P80; main dishes between P150 to P250). But the friendly service, good food, and generous serving size do make the difference.