Yes, your favorite Italian trattoria now serves great-tasting gelato at rock-bottom prices! Check out the menu!

The most commonly-asked question is this: what’s the difference between ice cream and gelato?

1. Gelato is churned slower than regular ice cream which results in less enveloped into mixture. Gelato only has 25 percent air compared to ice cream’s 50 percent.
2. Because of this slower churning process, gelato never freezes solid and is usually served at a slightly higher temperature compared to ice cream.
3. Gelato has more milk and less cream which is why it has less fat content than regular ice cream. Remove the milk and replace it with fruits and it becomes sorbet.
4. It’s cool to eat gelato than plain ice cream!

This is my favorite ice cream flavor, mint chocolate. It was a whole lot creamier than regular ice cream, and at price that is affordable even to students, P55.00 (US$1.15) per scoop!

Cara Mia is located along Connecticut Ave in Greenhills, San Juan City, Metro Manila. You can’t miss it because it’s right beside an Amici Trattoria! After having some of your old Amici favorites, I highly recommend you go for some of the gelato and gelato cakes! You can call them at 724-4206 for inquiries.

Just see the pictures below and decide what you’ll buy!

My favorite of favorites, Tiramisu!

Thank goodness the old Amici favorites are still there, like the Italian sausages,

And the meatballs!

Their pastas are just as good and the servings are much larger now!

Affogato anyone?

Try the Mango Sansrival!

I’m going to cut through the chase and tell you all good people out there what I think of this restaurant. Starting with the boo-boos:

1. The picture says it all. For a restaurant that serves good food, the decor needs improvement.
2. Entrance to the place is quite a chore. Unless there is another way in that I don’t know about, maybe from the church side, they need to do something about that entrance, which is so inconvenient especially on a rainy day.
3. The toilets are clean and well-provisioned, but it can be quite a walk from the restaurant. After eating a lot and you feel the need to run to the toilet to unload, you’d be sweating terribly and could be breaking in a panic before getting there.
   

1. I think the food is comparable to Gourdo’s, with the prices as the main difference. For those who want great pizza, pasta and pastries, Amici is more than friendly on your pocket. For the food I ate, I spent P470.00 total, VAT inclusive. See the pictures below.
   
2. Free parking! Yes, all customers who buy P300.00 worth or more get free parking for two hours at WalterMart. Not bad no?
3. Service is lighting fast. Not sure if it’s that way most of the time. I will have to eat there again with the lunch crowd to find out (nice excuse).
   

One of the nice things about Amici, the prices. Have a look-see and tell me how good it is to know an authentic Italian restaurant that’s affordable to the working class. Water is purified and readily available from the corner chest freezers around the restaurant. The customer pays at the counter and waits for the food to be served. There is a few minutes waiting time for the pizza because only then do they cook it, after it is ordered. Take your family there and enjoy a great Italian meal.

This is Amici’s Pasta Montanara. It’s got home-made spinach fusilli, with Italian sausage, pepperoni, salami, and generous amounts of cheese sauce. The bread is your usual baguette, rubbery and tough but delicious when masticated. Yes, I hate spinach pasta. But because the menu indicated that it was one of their bestsellers, I gave it a try. Not salty at all. I really hate salty food. The sausages provide the salty flavor, but in ample amounts. Their cheese sauce is good. No, it was great. I don’t wonder why it is a bestseller. It outflavors Sbarro and Pizza Hut by leaps and bounds.

Amici’s Calzone shown here. Served hot, it contains ham, mozzarella cheese, artichokes and mushrooms. The tomato sauce is what you see on top. The calzone is big enough for two people and is surprisingly not salty. While most pizzas available locally are usually too salty (for my taste), Amici’s isn’t, while the taste of the ham is very distinct. All flavor and goodness, nothing else.

Ah, the Amici Tiramisu. It literally melts in your mouth. I admit I was slightly skeptical about this dessert. First, because I don’t like Tiramisu. Second, my past experiences with Tiramisu were never pleasant. Tiramisu only leaves me craving for Krispy Kreme and would usually burn a hole in my pocket. But Amici paved the way for a drastic change of heart. Because I’m not a coffee drinker, I am usually slightly aversive to the taste of espresso (no Starbucks gift certificates for me guys). However, this quaint little cheese cake was a real eye-popper: I hate it but I loved it. Makes sense?