Trining's Bakery & Cafe — Restaurant in San Diego

We have been here quite a few times to pickup warm and fresh pandesal as well as a few other times for lunch. Service is consistent, energetic, welcoming and always smiling faces to take your order. Depending on the time of day you visit, there could be a short line or none at all.

As for the pandesal, it is good! They’re not the traditional smaller sizes that you would find back home but almost tastes the same and is also packed in brown paper bags. The dough is somewhat airy and not too thick like another local place. As for the dishes, we have tried a few off the regular menu and they’re ok, nothing too fancy, more on the mediocre home cooking side.

What prompted me to give a review today was this was the first time we tried their “silogs”. I’m a big breakfast person and always give credit where credit (and props) are due, so my small amount of criticism is not an attack on any establishment or the cook for that matter. Maybe it was not the regular cook today but breakfast was not enjoyable at all.

You are asked “how do you like your eggs” when placing an order for any silog platter. To my surprise, all of the eggs in our orders were cooked the same, over hard; a far cry from sunny side up or over easy. The tosilog, tapsilog and longanisa were dry and hard with little to no fats (taba). Not sure if it was old meat, leftovers from the previous day, I don’t know, just speculating. Now one can argue that they were in to go packaging so the steam overcooked everything. But the food was opened and consumed within 5 minutes of leaving Trining’s.

Some in our culture might say that I’m being “maarte” and to be thankful and just eat. But there is a certain expectation that when we eat out, the food will be somewhat better than your own home cooking especially when the prices for eating out have gone up. The sinangag ( garlic fried rice was bland), I did not taste or see any garlic and felt like it was fried in old oil. Although the portions were large but unfortunately, the meats or “ulam” and eggs were too dry and overcooked which made for a disappointing breakfast.

Generous with the 5 Stars for service with a smile and warm greeting and also for the pandesal always being consistent. But it’s 3 stars for the silogs since it could be better,...

Trining’s is “in transition” and it shows. The front is a bit disorganized, but well divided into baked goods and ready-made take out products. The menu is hand-written on a wall-mounted white board (see pictures), but is easily understood and clearly legible.

Now, for the food—Very good! Loved the lumpia. The sweet chili sauce had just a hint of heat to it. Perfect!

We also got chicken adobo and pancit. Both were excellent. Since I ordered two combos to go, I was very careful not to tip the containers and tried to avoid contaminating the pancit with adobo sauce. All for naught. I must have leaned on the brakes a bit too heavily because the very fluid adobo sauce obeyed the laws of physics and colored both the pancit and lumpia. With dark, rich, peppery adobo flavoring. But—it was still great! The chicken adobo was tender and tasty, and the pancit was yummy, even though it tasted more like adobo than pancit. The lumpia, as I expected, was to die for. Crisp and crunchy with a hint of heat from the chili sauce. So good!

Well done Trining’s. Get your front together and I’ll be back. Can I bring some friends with me? I’ve got some East coast buddies who think egg rolls are the bomb. Your lumpia can easily blow that theory out...

Their food is not bad but they need to improve their customer service.

I called in an order for pick up so as to minimize wait time at the store because as an adult I have other obligations to take care of. They took my order asked for my name then hung up. I called back right away just to ask how long it was going to take and the lady on the phone said to "just come here to the store and wait for it" in a rather rude and impatient tone then hung up again. I called back to cancel my order.

I don't understand how such a simple question from a paying customer about a transaction could be met with such hostility. I'm never coming back...