Big surprises come in little boxes

You’ll miss it if you don’t look hard enough, I’m sure.

Yes, the Bento Box Japanese-American Bistro which nestles – I should say, inconspicuously – between Goldilocks and Red Ribbon at the corner of Quezon Boulevard and Timog Avenue in Quezon City. But if, like me, you’ve been a "take out" customer of Ihaw-Ihaw Kalde-Kaldero at Kawa-Kawali Restaurant (which offers 101 kinds of Rod’s Favorites, a special recipe cooked up by its owner, Rod Ongpauco), you will marvel at how that litsunan at the right side of Ihaw-Ihaw has been turned into a cute bistro, so cute that you’ll think it’s a dollhouse.

Bento Box is owned and (personally) managed by Wowie Rivera and his wife, Happy Ongpauco, daughter of Rod and former actress Liberty Ilagan. On a dry run these past few weeks, Bento Box is the first "conjugal" business ventures of Wowie and Happy (if she looks familiar, it’s because she’s one of the TV endorsers of Extraderm, along with Tintin Bersola, Cristina Pecson and Bernadette Sembrano). The couple are also co-owners of a similar "little" restaurant, World Topps (where Janice de Belen goes for Salpicao), also along Timog Avenue (near the Timog-Morato Rotonda), with two other friends.

Like World Topps, Bento Box offers big surprises in little boxes at incredibly affordable prices.

"Most of the items on the menu, I would say 95 percent of them, cost no more than P100," said Happy who, together with Wowie, invited us to "sample" Bento Box one Monday afternoon. "For P100, busog na busog ka na, mura pa."

True to form, Happy is keeping in mind her Daddy Rod’s business thrust all these years: Good, quality food at affordable prices.

While World Topps (as in toppings) serves international cuisine (Filipino, Chinese, Japanese, etc.), Bento Box specializes in Japanese and American food prepared, you guessed it, in Bento Boxes in which you can mix and match two or three or even more items that go with yummy fried rice which is a meal in itself.

It was Happy herself who came up with the recipes which are inspired by the thousand and one kinds of cuisine she and Wowie have tasted in their travels around the world. The couple are food-lovers who don’t just enjoy eating but make it a point to find out which ingredients go into this dish and that, and experiment with their own as soon as they come home.

"Wowie and I love Japanese food and American food," added Happy (cousin of upcoming ABS-CBN/Star Cinema actress Heart Evangelista whose father, Rey, is Rod’s brother). "When World Topps clicked, now with an outlet in Makati and another one opening soon in Ortigas Center, I asked Wowie, ‘Why don’t we put up a small restaurant serving exclusively Japanese and American food?’ That’s how Bento Box came about."

If you’re a frequent traveller to Japan, Bento Box should be familiar to you. In the Land of the Rising Sun, you see Bento Boxes in train stations and (especially) on side streets, crowded with hungry Japanese (and foreign) customers all times of the day. You choose items from the menu, mixing this and matching that, and in a jiffy they’ll be served to you in a box distinctly Japanese in design. The boxes come in different sizes – small, medium and large – depending on how big or small your appetite is.

At Bento Box, we tried the following exclusive items: Tempura Cheese Sticks (P60 per) and Potato Wasabi Croquetas (P65 per) for appetizers; California Maki Crunch (P95 per); Sushi/Sashimi/Maki (P75 up); a mix-match of Chicken Teriyaki, Gyosa and fried rice; and Banana Tempura Ice Cream (P55 per) and Mango Gyosa ala Mode (P65 per) for desserts.

Outside, Bento Box looks deceivingly small. It actually sits on a 160-square-meter lot, with the ground floor seating more than 60 people and the mezzanine floor, equipped with sofa tables, around a dozen people. Wowie and Happy are renting the space from Rod Ongpauco who’s resting assured that his daughter and son-in-law won’t give the much, much bigger Ihaw-Ihaw beside it any kind of competition.

"Those on our menu are not found on the Ihaw-Ihaw menu," smiled Happy who, along with the other Ongpauco children and relatives, was brought up on food, glorious food! "I learned a lot from my Dad who always reminds me and my sister (Love) to, 1) work hard, 2) be honest, and 3) be generous."

Wowie’s family, on the other hand, is into real estate but are food-lovers just the same. It was Wowie who conceptualized the Bento Box mascot which is a Japanese-looking American chef (figure it out yourself when you drop by Bento Box). Interior designer Chat Fores made the place as cozy as your home, with the walls bare just yet while the paintings (Japanese and American inspired, for sure!) are still being done.

By next year when Bento Box shall have (hopefully) established its own clientele, like what the three-year-old World Topps did in only a few months after it opened, Wowie and Happy said that they’d buckle down to their next "joint venture" – have their first baby, that is.

(Note: Bento Box is open 11 a.m. to 11 p.m. Monday to Friday and on Sundays; and 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. and then 5 p.m. to 11 p.m. on Saturdays. For inquiries, call 373-37-36, look for Alice.)