Jalapeño Cantina Mexicana

Abet and I skipped fine dining for our anniversary this year, we need to save our money for our backpacking trip next week. So instead of going to Paseo Uno which we originally planned, we wanted to go somewhere that wouldn't burn a hole in our pockets like a hotel dinner buffet would. My second favorite cuisine is Mexican and his is Japanese (#1 is Italian for us both) and on our shortlist were Jalapeño Cantina Mexicana in Ortigas Home Depot and two Japanese restaurants. Guess who decided to give way? He loves me, yes he does!

Boy, was he glad. The food we had was great, just great. It's my new favorite Mexican restaurant.

We always order quesadilla when eating in a Mexican restaurant, and here we got their Grilled Tomato and Cheese Quesadilla:

The tortillas were 8 inches across and were bursting with filling and came with generous portions of sour cream and salsa, and it was just P125. Compare with Mexicali's Garlic and Cheese Quesadilla which costs around P90:

Four small pieces, not enough filling, and paltry dips. I used to love these quesadillas, but Jalapeño ruined that for me. I don't think I can bring myself to order these from Mexicali anymore.

We also got the Baked Jalapeño Cheese Dip (P140):

The nachos it came with were good enough for three:

Abet had the Chili Beef Burrito (P125):


Pardon the bite mark.
I had the Grilled Chicken Fajita (P225, comes with 3 pieces of tortillas):


Sorry about the blurry picture, I've had my camera for over a year now but I still don't know how to focus. Meh. I got the fajitas, because at 26 years old, I still like to play with my food:


Make your own fajita--so much fun!
I have a low threshold for spicy food and rarely put chili sauce/hot sauce on my food, but theirs was really yummy, it was spicy-sweet. If they sold this, I'd buy a bottle or two:

My only complaint about the place was that it was too dim inside, in the indoor upstairs area where we were seated. Dim places strain my eyes. I had to take the photos above with flash. I avoid taking photos with flash in restaurants so as not to annoy other diners, but there were only two other tables occupied in our area, and both groups were really noisy, so I guess it was only fair, hehe.

Overall, we enjoyed the Jalapeño experience and I'm glad we dined there to celebrate our third year as a couple. The food were all great and reasonably-priced. For our meal above with two bottles of beer and two glasses of iced tea, our bill was just exactly P800. We were already too full to get dessert.

Of course, no dinner date will be complete without dessert, we walked to Metrowalk para magpababa ng kinain, and a little while later I got to have a Kahlua Chocolate Sundae, my favorite thing to eat at Icebergs:

It was a happy anniversary, indeed.

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Jalapeño Cantina Mexicana

Food Street, Ortigas Home Depot

Julia Vargas, Pasig City