Torch Restaurant is located at the Home Studio Bldg., 63 Connecticut St., Greenhills, San Juan. Tel: 477-3771.
If you?re looking for a way to impress your date this Valentine?s Day, then a fondue shouldn?t be far from the top of your list.
What could be more romantic than fondue for two? An innately sexy food, it?s hot, delicious, and perfect for feeding each other. Plus it isn?t something that we Filipinos get to enjoy often, so it provides a welcome and exciting change that?ll surely set the experience apart.
In fact, even traditional fondue etiquette helps create this ideal romantic setting. Custom has it that if a man loses his dipper in the pot, then he?s expected to buy drinks all around. If a woman loses hers, then she must kiss her neighbors.
With this being a fondue only for two, then you know who that?ll be. 
We were surrounded by these dividers made with green-painted bamboo. They were functional and looked fantastic, effectively dividing the space without closing off any sections from view.
I spy with my little eye our bottle of Cabernet Sauvignon right there in that orange cube on the wall. This deal, which we picked up from Deal Dozen, entitled us to a steak fondue dinner with pasta and a bottle of wine.
Vongole Pasta ? PHP 324.95 ? Mildly spiced sauteed baby clams in garlic olive oil.
We asked our server for his pasta recommendation and he suggested this vongole pasta, which apparently was their bestseller.
It was decent, though nothing remarkable in our opinion. It was pricey for the amount you were given, plus Ren got a slight allergic reaction from the clams, which only happens when the seafood served isn?t all that fresh.
Steak Fondue ? PHP 879.95 ? Melt-in-your-mouth Ribeye Meltique Beef with 5 sauces of geographically different origins.
Aaaah the fondue bourguignonne (steak fondue)?this was awesome!
If you?ve never had fondue of any kind before, it?s a lot of fun to eat. Kinda reminds me of roasting marshmallows around a campfire, except without the tents, nor the mosquitos. 
The cubes of partially thawed Ribeye Meltique beef and five dipping sauces, each one apparently from a different country of origin. I don?t remember exactly what each of the sauces were, but Ren?s favorite was the one in the middle, which was infused with truffle oil, while I preferred the sesame-based sauce to its right.
As for the beef that was only partially thawed, there are apparently two schools of thought on this ? one believes that this is a practical time-saving technique without any noticeable drop-off in quality, whereas the other points out that the steak may lose some of its tenderness, juiciness and flavor when cooked without thawing.
I guess it all depends on your personal preference. For me, cooking these still-frosty cubes of steak produced excellent results.
L: My eternal flame. R: Our bottle of Chilean PKNT Cabernet Sauvignon 2009. Inky purple in color, it had notes of black currant, plum and black cardamom on the nose, while the palate was medium to full-bodied with soft tannins and a jammy fruit character.
Google can make you sound really smart and sophisticated right? 
I may know diddly squat about wine, but I do know that this wine tasted pretty damn fine.
Step 1: Skewer a cube of beef with your color-coded fondue fork, then stick in the hot pot of oil and allow to cook for around 30 seconds.
Step 2: Remove from oil then tap tap tap all that excess oil away.
Now there?s my beautiful little meteorite! It may look burnt and overcooked, but it was absolutely, mouthwateringly dee-licious!
Crisp on the outside but still tender and juicy on the inside, each cube of beef practically melted in your mouth. That ?melt-in-your-mouth? description gets thrown around a lot, but it was no exaggeration here.
Step 3: Dip the steak in your preferred sauce, then allow to melt in your mouth. Fantastic!
As much as we enjoyed the steak fondue, I have to mention that the amount of food that came with this deal ? the pasta dish and the fondue ? was hardly enough for two people. They don?t give you a lot of steak and the serving of pasta, as mentioned above, wasn?t overflowing either.
Not that it was a bad deal though. On the contrary, it was still a good deal considering the fact that it came with a bottle of wine. I only bring this up to let you know that you?ll probably wind up ordering other dishes to supplement your meal like we did, unless you plan on just holding hands and looking into each other?s eyes all night. 
Classic Burger ? PHP 284.95 (with bacon +PHP 60) ? 100% US Angus beef patty served on a toasted burger bun.
Oh my God, was this a delicious burger or what?!
A burger lives and dies with its patty. If the patty is delicious, then the burger will be as well even with the sparsest of fixings, as was the case here. Some restaurants load up their burgers with all kinds of toppings, but if the patty itself isn?t good, then the burger won?t be either no matter what you put on it.
One bite was all it took for both Ren and I to fall heads over heels for this one. Ren doesn?t eat a lot of burgers, so for her to start moaning in gastronomic delight from the very first bite said a lot about just how good this was. Moist, char-grilled and only lightly seasoned, it was more similar in taste to American burgers than the often over-seasoned Filipino burgers. We ordered ours with bacon, of which they gave us a copious amount, so we really got to taste that smoky, salty, crunchy bacon flavor with each bite.
Though a little pricey, it was one of the best burgers we?ve had here in Manila so we didn?t mind that one bit. I don?t mind paying a lot for food as long as its taste justifies its price tag, and in this case, it did.
Bread Pudding with Sabayon Sauce ? PHP 99.95
This was really good as well, cold, creamy and not too sweet. It was supposed to be slathered with a Sabayon sauce, which is a light custard made with eggs and sugar whipped on a double boiler, but Ren pointed out that the sauce on this one wasn?t a true Sabayon. Nonetheless, we both found it to be delicious and a perfect end to our meal.
Ren loves bread pudding and makes a mean version herself, the recipe for which you can check out HERE.
Going back to Valentine?s Day dinners, call me overly pragmatic but I?ve learned to celebrate ours the weekend or two before the actual day, so this steak fondue meal at Torch Restaurant, which we enjoyed on the 4th, was actually our Valentine?s dinner out. I don?t know about you, but there?s nothing more frustrating and less romantic than spending five hours in your car getting to and from the restaurant during the Valentine?s Day rush.
So with our Valentine?s dinner already put away, how will we celebrate the actual day might you ask? Same way we did last year, with an intimate, romantic, distraction-free cheese fondue for two at the comfort of our own home. 
Source: http://websushidesign.com/blog/2012/02/06/torch-restaurant/
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