My mother saw my social media post where Matti was at Jagna Baywalk, she exclaimed, why Matti sure had gone to many places already! Unfortunately for her, although the spot is just two towns away, she and papa have never visited it yet. And so Saturday evening, I urged them to get into the car so we could experience the new Jagna Food park.

A few days ago, Matti, my husband James, and I had lunch at the food park. It was a different vibe going there in the afternoon and in the evening. I was already anticipating that there will surely be many dinners and I wasn’t wrong.

It was quite overwhelming seeing this crowd, the pandemic has truly ended! Although everyone was wearing face masks, it was evident how close people were to each other. Tables were just a few meters apart, some diners were even elbowed to elbow with those from the other tables.

My father immediately told me, it would be so hard to have dinner there as there were many who were still waiting for their orders. He bet we might have dinner at nine in the evening. But I was enthusiastic, we have to dine here, and we have to get our orders placed immediately.

After one round of roaming, I decided to order from Chef Reich Food Hub.They got sizzling options, I got fish sisig, chicken sisig, fish steak, grilled baby back ribs, all in family orders which were good for 3-4 persons. Their pricing range from Php 100-300. I also got a platter of Java rice and two platters of plain rice. We had to order another platter of plain rice though afterward.

My mother also checked the next stall, Lynn's Kitchen and ordered some calderetang kanding, chop suey, and pinakbet.

Our bills were more or less Php 2,500 for both stalls. As for our drinks, there’s a bar dedicated to the drinks, so stalls don’t offer them, we got to get the drinks from that specific bar, they also sell liquors.

The challenge though was getting a table, especially since we were nine adults and three children. At the food park, there were attendees and bouncers who will help you look for a table. Fortunately, we found a family who was just eating desserts. It took a few minutes before the youngest of their family finished her special halo-halo but as soon as she was done, they went on their way and we were able to take our seats!

While waiting for our orders, we got entertained by the first set of singers, a band of three men who sang some “maoy” songs. Maoy songs mean emotional ones, those being sung by broken-hearted.

Without knowing, our orders started coming. They were served one by one. The first one to come was of course the rice. Then the caldereta, the vegetables, and then the sizzling plates. It didn’t take long, we were already giving thanks to the food and everyone started digging in.

It was noisy and a little hot in the area due to the crowd. It was even noisier listening to the singer onstage, at some point, he was not on the right tune but it was fine. He finished his turn before we could finish our dinner so we were relieved. Sorry about that but I am just telling the truth.

Surprisingly, all the viands on our table were good! Even the Java rice was great! I am not sure if it was because we were all hungry or if the food was really good but we ate them all. Like all of the plates were clean! As mentioned earlier, we even ordered another platter!

My favorite though were the vegetable viands, pinakbet, and chop suey. They were both appetizing, the chop suey got shrimps in it and I just love the sauce too! As for the pinakbet, the vegetables were just cooked the right way, the squash was not overcooked! For the meat, it was of course the chicken sisig! It was a definitely good plus, although there were green chilis in them, the spiciness was not too much.

As we were finishing our food, my mama exclaimed and appreciated how good the food was, she said she would love to order here every single day! Oh well, that sounds scary!

Anyway, we were done with dinner when a rapper from Cagayan De Oro and another guy came up on stage and started singing and rapping. He introduced himself but I forgot to take note of his name but they were both very energetic and passionate about what they were doing. They performed around six rap songs I guess and then we went to the other dining spot in the Baywalk.

Overall, we were really satisfied with the food we had eaten, except for the rice though, it cost Php 100 per platter which was just good for two to three persons. Someone suggested that we should bring steamed rice the next time we visit this spot so we don’t have to pay a huge amount for the rice. I agree with the idea.