Happy birthday, Mom

Finally! After being stressed on what cake to give to my mom, I was able to make up my mind. I have shared before that one of my mom's favorite cake is Crema de Fruta from Goldilocks. Next to that is Conti's Mango Bravo. But before I have decided on the cake, I had missed my chance of the Php360 (almost $8) off discount from Grab yesterday. I was suppose to buy from one restaurant that we have eaten days before the pandemic started last year but I guess it was not meant to be.

So this morning I decided to buy from Conti's. Good thing that my mom was fixing herself when the cake was delivered. We immediately placed it on the freezer and I continued cooking the pancit canton. When my mom had finished, she kept on opening the refrigerator and I was afraid that she might find out my surprise but thankfully she did not.

Since my brother and his family would not be joining us because of the ECQ (Enhanced Community Quarantine), we have decided to have ala boodle fight themed party. We just ordered the food from one restaurant near our place. We found out about this through my cousin's wife. They have ordered from them a few months ago in their Parañaque branch. She told my mom that they have a branch in Quezon City and upon hearing that, she really wanted to try it right away for the next occasion. 2 occasions have passed and this time we were able to have ala boodle fight celebration.

What is a boodle fight? Boodle fight is what they say like a military style of eating. The food are arranged on top of the banana leaves with rice on the center and the dishes surrounding it. Most of the dishes are grilled, fried or boiled. If in case the food has broth, it has to be placed on a bowl. Here comes the best part, all are to eat with their bare hands or "kamayan" style. No utensils.

But because we were only 4 who celebrated my mom's birthday, we did not laid the dishes on banana leaves. We just served it in a bilao as how it was delivered to us. For me, boodle fight is great for 8 or more people. So we just had rattan plates with banana leaves on top to have that native feels.

What is a bilao? According to tagaloglang's website, a bilao is a flat round-shaped rice winnower, a traditional implement in the Philippines. It is usually made from woven wood. I am not sure if you have heard of it but our bilao became famous a few months ago when Pottery Barn sell it as a wall display art at a price of $299.

Going back to my mom's birthday, it was 11AM when my dad had said that he wanted to eat already. My pancit was not yet ready as he wanted it to be saucy. It was already saucy but it was not yet to the right consistency. We had no choice but to serve it since the boss said that he was already hungry. My mom had already set the table and I asked her to stand behind the table so we can take a picture of her with her food. I grabbed my phone and I asked if all the dishes were already on the table and she said that it was all complete and I took the cake out of the freezer and sang a happy birthday song while taking a video of her.

Actually, I just only said "haaaaaappy birthday" because she was really happy when she saw the box. She was really surprised and by the tone of her voice, she was about to cry so I stopped at the word "birthday" because I also felt like I was going to cry. Our helper and I sang when I was able to hand over the cake to her. Good thing I had that on video but I only started at the part when I came out with the cake. It could have been nice if I was able to capture the part where I asked her if all the dishes were complete. After we have eaten, my mom, our helper and I were talking about the surprise because it was like how some vloggers do when they surprise their loved ones. Plus the video really came out really good that I sent it right away to her sisters.

The reason why my mom did not expected the cake because she knew that the crema de fruta was temporarily phased out because of the ECQ. I mentioned it to her last Friday that I did not see her favorite cake in a lot of their branches since Wednesday. She called the branch near us and I called their delivery hotline. We both found out the reason why the product was unavailable. It made her sad and it made me stressed. LOL. I am just glad that I still bought her the cake even if it was thrice the price of what I should have been my gift. Nevertheless, it was really a good idea to buy her a cake.

After dinner, I asked my mom if she was happy and she said that she was. My heart melted.

Thank you, Lord for this day. To all the people behind read.cash and noise.cash, a big thank you. To all who reads, comments and upvotes my articles, thank you. Thank you also to those who greeted my mom. You all made me and most especially my mom so happy.

P.S. lead image was from today's event.