Rarely a sip of soda (softdrinks as we Filipinos call it) in this English-themed diner and bar at the ground floor of Nagaland, one of Camarines Sur's many-a-thriving hotels located at the heart of Naga City.
The diner will not satisfy your whim for a soda. Not your ordinary canned sugary favorite anyway. It has better in mind. An array of original concoctions of fruity-flavored Italian soda mixes that you'd surely drown to the last drop. It's a bit pricier but who cares, it's new, it's fresh and tastefully done. A way lot better than your fave one..
And the food, not on your ordinary run of the mill menu too. It comes with poached salmons and cream dories smothered with buttery strawberry sauce. Madness at its best.
Quaint, unassuming but at the same time a world of its own. Just sitting and killing time at the corner table, you'd be transported to another plane of existence not of your own. For a moment, you feel you're somewhere in the English countryside doing what they (the English) do best, enjoying the food and everything around with an attitude, 'proper' attitude.
And did I say that every table is adorned with paper charmer centerpieces? Shaped in hearts and 'not moving' pinwheels of different colors, they're bunched together in a bottle half-full of sand and stones.
Cheesy but very well thought of.
The good man suffers but to gain
And every virtue springs from pain
As aromatic plants bestow
No spicy fragrance while they grow
But crushed or trodden to the ground
Diffuse their balmy sweets around
-Oliver Goldsmith
