It just came from nowhere!
Out of a sudden, my stomach grumbled from fried lumpia dipped in vinegar and I found myself going around the city looking and trying to satisfy this craving. First stop was at Dapli by Breakthrough along Lasalette building but they only make vegetable lumpia on Fridays - I really wonder why. Then at Dainty House Restaurant around the block, I missed the last order then. Over at the foodcourt at The Grand Tower, actually I never got there since it looked closed across the street.
That brought me to The Atrium mall and to the foodcourt I directly went. And there it was, a plate of fried lumpiang shanghai beckoning me in silent screams of "come and get me". Indeed I wasted no time getting an order to which I complemented with a another craving - kare kare. So it was a very late lunch and an early dinner too ( 'twas around 5pm). At PhP10 each, the lumpia was quite filled but I didn't really quite appreciated it since I literally let it swam in sinamak - the Ilonggo spiced vinegar. The kare kare from the Breakthrough stall (they ran out of veggies that time :( ) was just okay, made with cow's skin (usually for the Ilonggo pata). The guinamos (bago-ong) was much better for it was very flavourful and not the usual sweet style used in most restos in Manila or elsewhere. This one had the typical Ilonggo smell and taste of guinamos, that I finished my two cups of rice with 2 and a half pieces of lumpia left. And then i finally devoured and savoured each piece - saving the best for last!
The next day, I was out again, still craving for fried lumpia. I looked around town and finally settled for these freshly made ones at four pesos each. It was a fiesta as I bought ten pieces but regretted it on my first bite since it was like lumpia wrapper wrapped lumpia wrapper LOL. It almost had no filling at at all. To remedy this, I drowned them in vinegar - yup I used a bowl rathen than a platito for the sinamak so that each bite would still be as tasty as they can be not to mentioned the sides of my mouth having that burning sensation for hours.
Indeed I got what I paid for for both instances and sometimes, it doesn't really matter as long as I satisfy my cravings. Now looking at these lumpia, makes me feel dizzy ...