MANA! Fast Slow Food
MANA! is the temple of the local clean eating community. It really does resemble a temple with all the exotic-looking sculptures. There are two types of people you see here, namely: yoga-pants-wearing, health-food-jargon-speaking type, and pseudo-healthy-eating type that believes a healthy resting heart rate comes from munching "health food" once in a blue moon. I belong to the latter.
"Healthy food" is slowly becoming a food category... By that I mean when I hear "healthy food", images of $50-bottled-juice / $200-superfoods-salad spring to mind. I certainly see the appeal - in the short run: guilt-free goodness that fills you up without post-meal drowsiness, in the long run: healthy body, mind and soul!!! However, the Eat Clean movement is getting too much. I love my boiled broccoli and steamed spinach more than most things, but I'm just sick of seeing EAT CLEAN YOU ARE WHAT YOU EAT Pinterest-y posts on my Instagram feed every day. I can't pinpoint the reason why photos of wraps and shakes from MANA! are popping up everywhere. Is MANA! really such a great lunch place? Is there a extremely high correlation between the love to share and the love to "eat clean"? Or people "eat clean" only to tell the world? OK, digression's over.
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| MANA! Bliss Flat (full $75, half $45) and Babylon Shake ($55) - all flatbread is topped with Zaatar, a mixture of herbs and spices used in Eastern Mediterranean. A taste I quite enjoyed. In Bliss, there is avocado, hummus, cucumber and spinach. Babylon Shake is made by blending banana, figs, tahini, soya milk and cinnamon. |
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| An arm's length of flatbread wrap... When we were placing our order, Chak and me were repeatedly saying "why would people order half a wrap that's definitely not enough!" Little did we know the flatbread wrap is huge (almost double the size of a Pret wrap)... lesson learnt. |
I can see why MANA! is addictive. It's like a Pret addiction - tasty food that makes you think you're down 3 lbs instantly and feel good about yourself. But let's not kid ourselves - you aren't going to feel refreshed and slim down by eating a footlong wrap for lunch. I like the food at MANA!... For the flatbread, they are generous with the fillings and the flatbread itself tasted really great. But after consuming half a flatbread, it got bland and the house hot sauce wasn't spicy enough to give it a kick. As for the shake, it's just shakes from a cafe... I may go back for half a flatbread, but is this place worth the songs of praise from everyone on the Internet? Considering the price, let's just say I'm disappointed.
Rating: 3/5
In a nutshell: It's only a light lunch if you don't go overboard with your order. Clean eating may make you (feel) lean and mean, don't forget it comes with a hefty price tag.
MANA! Fast Slow Food
92 Wellington Street
Central
Hong Kong
Website
Menu
Elephant Grounds
This coffee shop is located in the new hip lifestyle store WOAW*. I love all things elephant. I love the sharp orange paper cups. And most importantly, I wanted to try cookies hand-made by the inspirational Joyce Cheng (see Homie Cookies).
* It had only been opened for half a week when we visited a month ago (I'm a bad blogger). There were two other customers going for coffee in our 30-min stay. Passed by during lunch today - full house! That's the importance of social media / word of mouth / cool Instagram pics in action.
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| Seating is limited to an indoor bar and an outdoor high table with stools. We stayed in the air conditioning (of course!) and watched the barista working the shiny nuova simonelli. |
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| Elephant Grounds Ice Coffee ($36) and Homie Cookies ($20 each) - the coffee came in a tiny glass jar, with a Titanic-sized iceberg in the middle... I may drink a lot of coffee but I'm not good at judging the taste professionally. We shared the White Chocolate Chip Matcha Cookie. $20 may be expensive for a cookie but this is totally worth it. The Dark Chocolate Salted Caramel is more chocolatey than salted caramel-y, but still soft and awesome. I can eat half a dozen of these bad boys for lunch! |
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| Hihi elephant! |
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| Flying coffee cups! |
Rating: 4/5
In a nutshell: Awesome cookies. The patio is great for the cooler autumn months ahead.
Elephant Grounds
11 Gough Street
Central
Hong Kong
Website
Nice post! :D I visited Elephant Grounds today and I too was excited to try homie cookies- not specifically because of its affiliation with Joyce Cheng but because I had seen the cookies all over social media and wanted to try them out- but when I tried to make casual conversation with the baristas and asked them if the cookies were made/founded by Joyce they told me that "they weren't allowed to disclose that"- which is weird seeing as it's all over the internet as well as Joyce's instagram/facebook! It makes me wonder if she had to sign some kind of disclosure agreement with the owners of the coffee shop haha.
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