Ube Halaya
Papaya Grill

Papaya Grill

280 Market Place, San Ramon, 94583, United States Of America

Grill • Grills • Seafood • Catering


"My wife and I visited on a Saturday at around 1:30 pm. We rode our bikes off of the Iron Horse trail from Dublin Bart station and then went east on Bollinger to the Trader Joes parking area. It was an easy 30 minute and 6-mile ride from Dublin to San Ramon. I'm going to improve my stars from a 1 (back in 2012) to a 4. There were only 2 women working this day. They were both very busy. The lady in the front takes your orders, answer phones, prepares your dish and delivers to your table. She politely acknowledged me at the cash register when I placed my order. She was patient and sweet. The other person was in the back, and she was doing all the cooking. We were there for about 1.25 hours, and she was constantly working. I give these two women 5 stars for how hard they worked. We dined in. There are about 4 tables with 4 chairs each and a counter bar at the front window with 3 chairs. Not a huge place but completely adequate. The bathroom was clean and well stocked. My wife ordered Tocilog. Very good flavor and perfectly cooked. Her eggs were over easy as requested and my wife just needed to add a little salt. I ordered BBQsilog-chicken BBQ sticks. The garlic fried rice was much better than it was in my previous review in 2012. 2 eggs were cooked well with the yolk half-way cooked. Blended well with the warm rice. My chicken BBQ was very flavorful, and chicken was soft and cooked well. It was easy to slide the chicken off the stick to share with wife. I asked for some vinegar (not spicy) and they obliged. The meat was colder than room temperature and for that I will have dock it one star. We then ordered halo-halo for dessert which was already partially prepped with all of the jellies, beans, sago, ube inside a plastic lidded cup stowed in their lobby fridge. The front lady added crushed ice, evaporated milk, and this rice crispy thing (I don't know what it is, but it's like rice crispy but a little harder crunch) and then topped it off with a scoop of ube ice cream. It wasn't too sweet and we didn't have to add anything to it. The fruit and everything inside it were very fresh. Overall, everything was delicious today with generous serving sizes. I appreciated all their hard work today. My only recommendation is to try to keep your food hot or warm when it sits in your serving bins up front. Food that comes directly from the back kitchen was hot. It's the BBQ sticks up front that need to be kept warm (please). We'll be back."

Starfish Filipino Eatery

Starfish Filipino Eatery

1830 Sunset Cliffs Blvd, San Diego, 92107-3191, United States Of America, S San Diego

Casual • Dining • Seafood • Filipino


"Starfish filipino eatery was one of my favorite restaurants to go to on my trip to San Diego. My friend who has lived in San Diego for a year or two now noted there weren't a lot of sit-down filipino restaurants nearby but that she's always wanted to try this place out. On Sundays they had a special going on of all silogs on the menu. A (insert meat item silog comes with garlic fried rice and an egg on top with your choice of meat. The only caveat is that they only serve silogs. They have tables and chairs for dining in but note there isn't a lot of sitting options. It's an open concept restaurant and you could see the workers in the kitchen. Everything was basically made to order which I liked. The woman working the cashier and I presume the kitchen (my back was to the kitchen was super nice. Our food was delicious! Garlic fried rice was super flavorful and our meat choice options was also very flavorful. The salmon seasoning was phenomenal. If I could go back I'd choose the salmon. The prawns were a good size and also flavorful. I was nervous the prawns wouldn't fill me up or wouldn't be enough for me but it actually was! I liked that they added a little garnish of edible flower pedals for a little aesthetics. I kind of wish it came with some sort of vegetable like tomatoes or something. Although there was a lot of flavor already, I would have liked to feel a little healthy with a side of veggies even though I know that's not very common in silog dishes. The only draw back I could see is perhaps they're still getting into their flow as a restaurant. I noticed the person providing dishes to the table gave a family reusable utensils while we received plastic utensils (not sure if all the reusable utensils were dirty?? The person at the cashier let us know we could purchase bottled drinks separately (water, coconut juice and etc however when we were leaving a couple people came in to eat and she served them a pitcher of water. Not sure if we just completely didn't realize we could order water or if they only gave pitchers of water to friends upon request but it was something I noticed... Overall I really enjoyed the food. I really wish we got to try other food on the menu! I was craving lumpia haha. I really do hope the restaurant continues to do well and that others support them. If I was in town I'd forsure go again!"