A good friend recently came home to Cebu from abroad for a visit and what better way to catch up than to organize an intimate reunion over good food. With all the new dining concept popping up here in Cebu, Cur8 is one of the restaurants that I have been meaning to try. Thus, I immediately called and booked us a reservation on a Friday night.
Cur8 just launched a few weeks ago at Banilad Town Centre Cebu. Despite being new in town, I’ve already heard good reviews about it from my friends. It is said to be Cebu’s first progressive dining concept, offering its version of all-day dining, highlighting modern Asian cuisine.
Opening from 11am to 12 midnight, you can literally spend the whole day at Cur8! You can have lunch as early as 11am. Have coffee, tea and pastries at 2pm and then move on to happy hour at 4pm. Invite friends over for dinner and at half past 9, the lights starts to go dim, creating the nightlife mood until doors officially closes at 12am.
Before I proceed to the food, can we all talk about the interiors? We visited at night and I love that it has the right lighting that hits the right spots that we still get to see and enjoy our food and I cannot not mention that! For an interior designer to consider that is always a plus for me.
Now moving on to the dishes. I’d be lying if I told you I didn’t have high expectations coming into the restaurant because I sure did. I was just so glad it did not disappoint! From the plates, the food presentation, down to its taste, you sure know that every dish is well-thought-out.
When visiting Cur8, Dragonfruit kinilaw is a must-try! This one of a kind classic appetizer (shown above) consists of scallops and shrimp with coconut dressing infused and topped with dragon fruit to complement the fresh shellfish. To add a sprinkle of texture, rice puffs are mixed in while aged ponzu jelly create acidity. Just as pretty as it tastes! I never knew dragon fruit goes well together with scallops until I had this dish. Must be the reason why it’s on the top of their menu!
We also got the Chicken Karaage and Salt & Pepper Squid (shown below) – both as part of their “small dishes” or appetizers.
Dragonfruit Kinilaw (P395) | Chicken Karaage (P395) | Salt & Pepper Squid (480)
Next is their Curries and Mains part of the menu. We had the suggested Cambodian Yellow Curry (shown above) that is served with tamarind chicken and holy basil. It is best paired with pita bread (not photographed). We also got the Steamed Pompano (shown below) with asian sauce, confit garlic and coriander. (not the original presentation of the fish as we flipped it already! haha) My pescatarian friend was so happy about this dish and so are we!
Cambodian yellow Curry (P495) | Pita Bread (P65) | Steamed pompano (680)
They also serve rice bowls and the one we had is the Sri Lankan Salmon Curry with marinated cucumber and dill (shown above). Know that all curry dishes can be served mild or extra spicy as an option. You can also order a separate turmeric rice to pair all the main dishes above. Our server was kind enough to tell us not to order a lot of separate turmeric rice and just order if we need more – which turned out to be a really helpful advice.
Sri Lankan Salmon Curry – rice bowl (P550) | turmeric rice (P85)
For desserts, we had the Dragonfruit & Cheese Semi Freddo which I was pretty intrigued by but the Tablea cake was my fave and was a good contrast to the semi freddo’s sourness.
Dragonfruit & cheese semi freddo (P195) | Tablea cake (P250)
Good food + good company is always a perfect match to have a great time! Definitely no regrets spending it at Cur8. And no it’s not my birthday, we were just so fond of how my top matches the dragon fruit dessert. lol
Below photo by @lykkaduites (left) and @DitEscoto (right)
Sharing the menu below for reference (as of October 2022) – may change without prior notice.
It has been three days since we had our dinner but I still can’t get over the dishes that we had in CUR8. How can I not blog about that? I haven’t blogged in a while so I hope you find this post useful as I’m sharing this for you all to have an expectation if you plan to visit CUR8 soon. You will surely see me trying out their coffee and pastries next! 😛 ’til the next post!!
keiseeeinthecity 