When it comes to food, members of the same family have different tastes. What one finds good, another will not necessarily think so.

This was evident between me and my late brother, Bong. Although we both loved steaks, he preferred a char-grilled medium rare from Peter Luger in Brooklyn, New York, while I liked a medium Henry the VIII cut prime rib roast with au jus, baked potato with all the fixings and creamed spinach at the House of Prime Rib in San Francisco. We would try to convince each other to try our respective favorites.

Don’t get me wrong, I also love char-grilled steak, although, given a choice, I’ll pick the baked one. In Manila, I love Mamou’s char-grilled steak with red rice.

But I have not found a baked prime rib as good as that at The House of Prime Rib in San Francisco, or close to it. Still looking!

Recently I’ve been experimenting with the sous vide method of cooking. My friend Bong demonstrated how it’s done. He put a huge chunk of prime grade rib-eye in a plastic bag, dropped it in controlled temperature of 140°F and let it sit for hours. When everything hit the internal temperature of medium rare, he fished out the meat, dried it, seasoned it, then seared the outsides.

We had a perfectly cooked, most delicious, sous vide steak dinner.

Wolfgang’s Steakhouse

Then I got an invite to the newly opened Wolfgang’s Steakhouse at The Podium. The first time I tried Wolfgang’s at Resorts World Manila, the experience was good but not great.

At The Podium branch, I started with a crab meat appetizer, chunks of fresh crab meat with a simple crab cocktail sauce. Very good. Then came Caesar salad and Beverly Hills chopped salad, both very good as well.

The Beef Barley soup was tasty and rich, with tiny morsels of beef. I wondered if they were cutoff parts of aged beef.

Then came two cuts of steak, rib-eye and porterhouse, both cooked medium rare. The rib-eye was very good.

The waiter placed the hot plate on a small plate to make it tilt a bit and have the oil from the porterhouse on one side. The perfectly cooked porterhouse had a crispy dark browncrust and was reddish pink on the inside. We were given a one-kilo cut, shared by four persons.

It was the most flavorful, tender grilled steak I have had. I could taste the perfectly aged beef with hints of seasoning. I would get a slice and season the meat with some salt and smoked pepper. It went perfectly well with the creamed spinach and the German potatoes. Easily the best steak in Manila today.

I love Japanese steaks, as well as a good old American steak. Between the two, I prefer a more beefy American steak. Japanese beef, to me, has too much marbling and can get too rich.

There are many great steakhouses in America. But even by US standards, Wolfgang’s Steakhouse will give them a run for their money. Congratulations to Raymund Magdaluyo and Marvin Agustin!

Happy eating!

Wolfgang’s Steakhouse is at The Podium, 18 Ortigas Center, Mandaluyong. Call 5056272

My next Japan food tour is on Feb 18-23. I have a few slots left. E-mail [email protected]