Saturday, September 29, 2012

Cupcakes Fit For A Princess. Pastry Princess Cupcakes


Let me live up to my blog name with this sweet, sweet post. :) 
After my baking classes near Camp Crame. My mum and I went to Greenhills Town Center to check out this lovely cupcake shop that is being hyped around the blogsphere.


I was so hungry after making cakes and cupcakes all day. We went to the McDonald's at the foremost part of Greenhills Town Center. I know there's like lots of new places with really good food around here, I wanted to try those too, but I was so hungry that I just wanna eat something fast and familiar. I promise, I will go back and try those new spots there.


Yay! Twister fries! :)


A good ol' plain Quarter Pounder
I don't like condiments and veggies on my burgers. Only the bun, patty, cheese and I'm good to go. I finished my burger and fries, then we head on to the back most line up of restos.


TA-DA!
PASTRY PRINCESS, where all your cupcake cravings are fulfilled. It started as a home based business like most cupcake shops and only opened their store earlier this year. Pastry Princess is a fairly new cupcakery in town, but is already garnering a lot of raves. Can you believe that the owner started this business when she was only 16! How awesome is that!


A dainty little cupcake shop. The small shop gives a homey feel to it and has all those cute pink accents and decorations all over the store. The place really is small but cozy, with only a few seating arrangements inside. 

The Menu


Their cupcake flavors are by schedule. The best sellers are, of course, sold everyday. The more unique flavors are scheduled through out the week. All home made and baked from scratch. Ahhh, home made cupcakes! :3


Decisions, decisions. Can I just buy them all?

Red Velvet
Red Velvet cupcake with Philadelphia cream cheese frosting. Like most of their cupcakes, it is topped with a mini fondant heart. Which reminds me of DC Cupcakes.

Salted Caramel
Caramel cake with salted caramel frosting

Banoffee
Banana with whipped cream frosting

Nutella
To all you Nutella lovers out there! Need I say more?

Choc-Nut
Made with the pinoy favorite, Choc-Nut!

Lemon Blossom
Sorry, I don't know much about this cake, but it's obvie that it's lemon flavored.


They also have other baked goodies like cookies. I was curious about the crinkles, they kinda didn't look like the normal chocolate crinkles.


How cute are these tea cans/tins? They're one of the many decorations and knick-knacks around the store. I am loving that traditional british red phone box can.

Of course, I love this pink one as well. :)

These things just give that homey personalized touch to the shop.

There's a long couch that goes all along the wall. Which are filled with cupcakes, I took a closer look and those cupcakes all over the walls are hand painted. Check out the photo clothesline. :)

Cork board filled with doodles and praises about the cupcakes or the fans' message to Pastry Princess herself.


I was still kinda full from my mirienda at McDonald's so we had the cupcakes to go. Can you guess what flavors I chose?


The place is so cozy that it's a perfect spot to hang out with friends. Like these people. There are also lots of people who drop by the store to grab a cupcake or two and go.
Hindi naman masyadong relaxed si kuya?


I was surprised when my mum ordered lasagna since we were both very full from our snack. But then again, lasagna and pasta dishes are her favorite.


The lasagna was okay. It was a little bit like left-over lasagna though. Some of the lasagna parts were dry, I'm not sure if it dried up or it was uncooked. But I guess if it was made fresh, it would've been a little better. And I really hope they improve the plastic cups and straws that they use, it just doen't go with the whole look of the store, it gave a sort of carinderia feel. The meat sauce was average. It's okay though, I came for the cupcakes!

More seating outside, alfresco!
We went home anxious to try the cupcakes.

Their packaging is cute plus it's pink! <3


My goodies!
Salted Caramel, Nutella, Tiramisu, and of course, Red Velvet!

Don't they just look delightful? 

The mounds of frosting look like sweet little hills.

Up first is the not so red, Red Velvet.

It was more on the brown/copper-ish side than red. But hey, it's all about the taste.

You can tell just by looking at it that it's a really moist cupcake.


Yes, it was! Moist and soft, oh one bite and you will immediately know that it's a good cupcake. It has the perfect Red Velvet flavour! I have a specific taste that I want in Red Velvet and this just won me over. The cream cheese frosting was a little bit tangy, smooth and creamy. There's a good cake and frosting ratio, the frosting did not over power the cake. I love it! More on the vanilla side, but with the right hint of cocoa.

I was excited to try their salted Caramel. Caramel/ Salted Caramel is one of my favorite flvors.

This one is more dense, not as moist as the Red Velvet.


This was my least favorite among the cupcakes. It was too salty if you ask me. I know, Salted Caramel, but it is just plain salty and not really much caramel flavor. The saltiness of the frosting was way too overpowering. The cake was just okay. A little too much salt that day? I could not finish the whole thing. But I'm willing to give it another try next time.

Nutella, I like you, but I'm just not that in to you.


This was great! The cake was moist and its quite good. The frosting was really sweet and you can really taste the Nutella. I liked it enough to finish the whole thing. A pretty good Nutella cupcake, but I'm just not that in to Nutella and chocolate makes me "umay" faster. But this is definitely for all you Nutella lovers!

Tiramisu
Vanilla cupcake drizzled with rum/coffee liqueur opped with cream cheese frosting and dusted with cocoa on top. 

As you can see, it looks like a really good vanilla cupcake and generously drizzled with the flavored liqueur.


Surprisingly, I loved this one! I hate coffee, but this is really good. The coffee flavor is not strong at all. Everything just comes together, all the flavors are well balanced. I'm really surprised that this ended up as my favorite along with the Red Velvet. There is a coffee flavor but doesn't give a bitter taste.

Here is their new cupcake schedule. Click!

I love the cupcakes at Pastry Princess! The cupcakes are really delightful, a great sweet fix, though not too sweet, just perfect! I'm coming back for the Vanilla and other flavors. The prices are fair and you can definitely afford to have a cupcake fix everyday! If only I lived near the place haha! If you love cupcakes, you must try Pastry Princess, must! Really good cupcakes with a home made taste and you can tell these are made with love.

click to enlarge the map

Another thing, you really have to give other flavors a try, you'll never know it might end up your favorite haha. And the owner, so inspiring! There is really no restrictions when it comes to your dreams that is fueled with passion.


Pastry Princess
#2 Granada St.
Greenhills Towncenter, Quezon City.
P.S It's not on the Greenhills/Promenade area. Behind the McDonald's and Sumo Sam line of restos at the GH Towncenter.


XXXOOO,
   Les :)

Tuesday, September 25, 2012

My Amazing Sulit and Maroon 5 Experience (Overexposed Tour Live in Manila)

Sorry for the brief hiatus guys, things have been kinda crazy. But I have a lot of of things in store to make up for my absence and this post will be more than enough to make up for it. What happened? Well,

I WON VIP TICKETS TO SEE MAROON 5! :)


Yesss, I did! I wasn't expecting to win, okay so maybe there was this small hope, like a little gut feeling that I was going to, I even joked to my mum and asked her to come with me when I claim my ticket, a day before they announced the winners.

I've loved Maroon 5 since my elementary days, more or less 8 years! Okay, that just made me feel old, but pretty much. You can't blame me, they're really good! There isn't a single bad Maroon 5 song, all their songs are great! All their concerts here in the Philippines are sold out every time. The Overexposed Tour here sold out months before the concert. I waited too long and the tickets were all gone, I love Maroon 5, but I wasn't going to spend 15,000php on Upper B tickets from those online extortionists. But I really wanted to go, it was their third time here, I missed the first two (with good reasons), and I wasn't going to forgive myself if I missed this one.

How I Won


I joined the "Sulit.com.ph x Maroon 5" promo. I tweeted and posted on facebook like crazy everyday for the duration of the contest! I even used my mum's and boyfriend's facebook. It's just great cause I love Sulit and Maroon 5! Whenever I need anything, specially those things that aren't usually found at the malls, I just go to Sulit and find what I need or just want hihi. "Hanap, Usap, Deal" and this time, I really got what I wanted and needed! I was really desperate to see Maroon 5. But who wouldn't want that opportunity? It's Maroon 5!

It was the day of announcing the winners, watched the Sulit pages like a hawk the entire day. They were already tweeting to people and I just lost hope by then, I was really bummed, like I just wanted to drown myself with ice cream. But then they posted a new tweet saying that the others were disqualified and that they were drawing out new winners. Next thing I knew, I got a DM from Sulit saying I was one of the possible winners. I sent the info they asked for right away and was told to wait for further announcements. I waited like a well behaved little girl, the suspense was killing me. Then this!


5 Sulitizens were given the chance to watch Maroon 5.
3 from facebook and 2 from Twitter,
Each winner will receive 2 Patron tickets.

And I was just asdfghjkl! Screaming and jumping around, oh man! It was really unexpected. It was as if I was high on red bull when I saw that tweet.

click to enlarge

We were told to claim the tickets a day before the concert. Monday came and we were off to the Sulit main office at Ortigas.


Their office was a cool looking pad. Me being extremely shy, I didn't get to take much photos of their office and felt like I was going to stutter when they were talking to me. But everyone there was just so nice!

I got my tickets, yay!
My mind was already blown when I won, but then they said we got upgraded to Patron VIP and my brain just turned to mush. :))


The Day of The Concert
Que the elevator music! Before the concert I had to go to the dentist to get my braces adjusted, haha it just felt like It killed a little bit of the momentum, but that appointment was just long overdue. After that small speed bump, we went straight away to the Smart Araneta Coliseum. The traffic was moving like molases, the roads near the venue were congested. I wanted to get there early so I wouldn't miss a single thing and I had to pass by the Sulit booth, but the traffic and the trouble with changing the clothes, I missed The Cab. :(

Anyway...
The Sulit Team
Hello! :)

It's not everybody, but they are just really one of the nicest and were so friendly. I passed by their booth, a short interview and had our picture taken at the photo booth, but I'm not gonna show you. :p

So I heard it was The Cab's last song and we just ran, we had to look for the right entrance, good thing they still had to do a sound check after the front act. I got to watch The Cab for like less than a minute.

Me and Le Boyfie.
hihi I curled my hair so when things get crazy, di masyadong halata na buhaghag. Girl Scout!


The shirt wouldn't fit me, Sorry! So I'm putting it on here na lang.

Loving my ripped jeans. :)


Full house at Araneta that night. Every row, aisle and seat filled! Even corners haha, more than 15,000 fans that night inside The Big Dome. There were even more people waiting at the ticket counters, waiting for a slight chance that they would release tickets. The people were like panicing when they released a few general admission tickets.


It was about 9:30, the lights dimmed and the crowd went wild. Their opening song was Payphone.

Overexposed Tour Setlist





OMG, OMG Adam! I was just smitten by him. One of the sexiest and most talented man alive! His voice, his moves, even his sort of rockstar stance was just the sexiest thing ever!




Don't get me wrong, I love the band as a whole! It's definitely their music and not just because the front man is hot. Adam is like a sexy cherry on top of a really good ice cream sundae.



James. :)

My only picture with the entire band in it.

Adam Levine (vocals), James Valentine (rhythm guitar),  Mickey Madded (bass), PJ Morton (keyboards), Matt Flynn (drummer).




It's funny cause I cried when they posted the winners on facebook and I really thought I lost, I cried like I was heart broken. But the winners that they announced was for the facebook winners. I cried for nothing. 



Matt was killing it!

It was kinda hard to get a photo of the other members, specially PJ and Matt. And it was just hard not to look at Adam. A few times, I didn't notice that I was already focused on his sexy arse, without even realizing! Haha it was unintentional okay. :))))





Full house with a sea of glow sticks. It looked so cool, like a bunch of colorful fireflies!

The ladies absolutely went wild when Adam called out to the ladies and serenaded the female audience with an acoustic version of She Will Be Loved.



 Adam during Wipe Your Eyes. Yes, the ladies got kilig! He is so adorable.
But it was still adorable < hot. 


As encore, their last song for the night was Moves Like Jagger with a Sexy Back snippet. But that's not just what the crowd got, there was a little Gangnam Style twist in the mix. The crowd loved it!
They took the stage one last time and took a bow together.

Here's a really good video by Magic Liwanag.
Check out his website and facebook for more photos. Check out his other works as well! Super galing! He's an in demand photographer, mainly concerts, but his photos are just wow.

It was beyond UH-MAZZZING! Just unbelievable, I really had the time of my life! I sang and hihi danced along to every single song! I really have to also give credit to the lighting director, those lights were awesome! It just made the concert cooler, I was in awe. Though Adam was kinda tired from his busy schedule, he was just amazing. They were all great!
I LOVE MAROON 5!



THANK YOU SO MUCH SULIT!
Thank you! One of the coolest things to ever happen to me, it was like a dream come true! Seeing them live and so up close was sureal. Thank you for this once in a lifetime experience, I will never forget this! Until now I still have a Maroon 5 hang over.
SULIT, The #1 Classified Ads Website.

Sulit.com.ph
hanap, usap, deal

Maroon 5 Overexposed World Tour Live in Manila
September 18, 2012
Smart Araneta Coliseum
Presented By:
and


P.S
I wanna thank my Mum! Thank you, Ma!
She Dropped me off and waited for me even though she wasn't feeling well. I love you, Ma! :D

XXXOOO,
   Les :)