Your Local — Restaurant in Makati

I don't think Your local respects asian cuisine as it should be; especially southeast asian.

Fusion is supposed to be a celebration of the best aspects and spices of each cuisine. We ordered a lot of dishes for sharing, but were impressed by very few.

I'm not a chef but I like studying flavors. Salt Fat Acid and Heat. In a nutshell, none of the dishes we ordered had acid or salt. Everything was just a lot of cream mayo and/or sugar (fat)

Karekare chicken satay tasted like a bland and less viscous version of satay peanut sauce. They're good with the ingredient combos, but there's no spices. So you're kinda just eating peanut butter sauce chicken skewers. I wouldn't have guessed that was an attempt for kare kare. They also have a lemon wedge which doesn't fit either the kare kare or satay aspect.

Glazed pork. Hard no for all of us. It's too stringy which makes it weird despite being tender. It's not what you'd want from braised pork. The meat itself has no flavor - not an ounce of salt in it, which doesn't help the fact that the "glaze" is literally just sugar. No soy sauce, no sauce. It's just sweet stringy pork pretty much. It doesn't even taste like pork. The flakes that come with it are oilybut very light and crispy. Again, a little salt would've helped a LOT

Striploin hokkien mee - not sure which version of hokkien mee this is representing, but it's not bad. Too sweet compared to hokkien mee ive tried, and overall it tastes more japanese. I wouldn't have guessed hokkien mee and I've had singaporean, KL, and fujian variants. The striploin was cooked to medium actually very nicely and very tender although a little more seasoning would improve it even more. The quantity of the striploin was more impressive than the quantity of the noodles

Tofu steak - now this is actually the only thing that impressed me. It's not trying to be extravagant or anything, just a good quality tofu that's seared. Worth 425 for that with 2 eggs and good quality black rice? Maybe

Truffle aburi pork chasyu - chasyu should be a rolled pork belly that's braised like you see in ramen. Instead you get fried rice with some diced pork and mayonnaise. I love the ambiance of the resto, but mixing bits of pork in black rice makes it look like you're just eating rice. Not a huge fan of mayonnaise mixed in rice, but if you like it, it's a pretty good dish. The sousvide egg is great though it's a nice touch

Mentaiko brown butter udon - to break it down, mentaiko is pollock fish roe. Sounds fancy but it's just a bit bigger and more flavorful than tobiko. It adds good texture but there really isn't enough to include it in the dish name because I didnt think of it until i checked the dish name. Brown butter is pretty much absent because of how thick the white sauce is. It's like a sweet japanese version of an creamy white sauce. Bonito flakes are a good touch and udon is cooked well. Overall it's okay. Decent size for this type of resto

This restaurant has a lot of high ratings and returning customers, probably because generally it's decent food at a decent price with beautiful plating and a good atmosphere. The service is also excellent as when we were standing up and my friend's milktea wasn't finished they automatically offered to take it out.

Yes, the menu is beautiful and the ingredients are great. They even spell it out for you in the menu, but that's it. The ingredients seem like the only contents of the dishes.

Almost everything here is sweet, and there are pretty much no spices in any of the food. If you're someone who's explored southeast asian food, or just generally love the richness of dishes that use spices rather than depend on oil and other ingredients, this might...

As it was my first time to try your local, I was really excited and intrigued as to how the experience would be.

Long story short, the overall experience was very disappointing and it’s mostly due to service. When we arrived, they were not as welcoming but that was completely understandable since we had a 9pm reservation. However, the main issue or problem was their way of giving the check, asking us to pay, and making us leave.

1.) when they gave the check — the waiter got our attention and cut our conversation midway as he placed the bill in our table at 10PM without saying a phrase or even a word.

since it was an hour before closing, we didn’t think we needed to rush as the waiter didn’t inform, which is why we just continued our conversation.

2.) the waiter then went back to our table mid-conversation again and got the bill and opened it. We were confused so he asked “so how do u plan to pay the bill?” — so we had to clarify and say “did you want us to pay the bill na po ba” cause a bit of information as simple as “sorry to disturb but is it okay if we settle the bill already so the front of house can close?” would have helped us be more aware.

He then on said that we could stay until 11 but they want to settle all the bills already.. so we settled the bill and proceeded to have a conversation.

3.) At 10:45 (im sure of this as I have timestamps outside the restaurant) they said: maam we’re closing at 11. So we were like “oh okay, we will be leaving soon.” And the waiter rudely just said “ as in we will be offing all the lights and there will be no electricity”. So we decided to just leave. What irked me and my friends were the tone, no sense of emotion, hospitality or such.

The whole time, the service felt like we had to be apologetic or embarrassed about simply being there. It made it seem as that we were a hassle for being there and it was so unpleasant.

Like what others mentioned, the food is amazing and is truly unique with the correct flavors. However, the service just made the experience so undesirable and frustrating that it just ruined the whole place for me.

I hope this is an isolated night and improve on this as I hope no one experiences the same things we had...

I'm still raaaavinnng about this restaurant (and writing this right after my meal). Every dish was such a delight. We ordered primarily Southeast Asian/Japanese dishes with a twist. We had for starters: Chicken Pride, Shrimp Salad, Aburi Fries, Crab Bun. For main dishes: Indo Smash Chicken, Roasted Halibut, Ginger Scallion Chicken, and the BEST ONE that made our jaws drop---Torched Salmon Donburi.

We were smiling throughout the meal. Our dinner was like a non-skip album of your favorite pop artist that you enjoyed during your high school :) We are grateful for discovering this restaurant. And proud we have something like this in Manila. Southeast Asian dishes can be too basic to recreate and yet easy to ruin, and yet their dishes have this "comfort food" feel with an elevated style. You can really see how the chef placed attention to details and it feels they are coming from a place that this is something they would cook for themselves in their kitchen.

NEVER skip the dessert. The "Choco na Gatas" and "Mais Con Tres Leches" were unforgettable (also, note that this review was written June 2024 and menus may change). Many restaurants have good mains but meh desserts that feel like an afterthought. But this restaurant obviously wants to impress harder when you end the meal, and they do it so well.

Restaurant is perfect for a romantic date, a special night out with your work colleagues, or a family dinner. The space has this dark, sexy vibe. Acoustics are good (something a lot of restos take for granted) so even if other diners are chatting, they can't easily bother your privacy.

I would eat again this restaurant in a heartbeat.

p.s. I regret not taking enough photos. Those 2 pics I posted were our first 2 starters. But got too busy wolfing down on our amazing food for the rest of...