A Lovely Place for Ladies who Lunch

In my teens, a friend told me about how her mother and her mother’s high school friends would spend marathon sessions in the hotel coffee shop, starting from lunch and going on past merienda until dinnertime. Their marathon talking sessions lasted so long the hotel staff had already changed shifts by the time they stood up to leave.

This was my introduction to women who lunch. My mother was always busy tending to the needs of the family and our family business, I don’t recall mom indulging in this noontime habit. I do recall one tita leisurely lunching with her friends in their perfectly pressed clothes and combed hair, while I wolfed down my vegetable panini in a record time of ten minutes before rushing back to the office.

For women who lunch, a new urban mecca for the delicious luxury of dining out with friends opened along Pioneer Street (corner Sheridan) in Mandaluyong, a violet and orange building that grabs your attention. Its strokes and hues make the structure seem like a canvas painting come to life. If not for the name Morita’s painted on it, one would not guess it is a restaurant.

At the entrance, a sign on the fiery orange wall says, "Good Food, Good Meat, Good Friends, Let’s Eat." In contrast to the gracious welcome is another sign: "In deference to our valued customers, PLEASE DO NOT BRING CHILDREN BELOW 14 YRS. Proper dress code: Smart Casual." Immediately, I knew there would be no kiddie meals or free toys in this restaurant. After all, this was not the Golden Arches or some cliché fast food chain. Hence, one should expect only things beautiful.

A lovely periwinkle colored door opens to an explosion of color and texture. It is like living a whimsical dream of technicolor blooms and fish. There are flowers everywhere: Malaysian mums in baskets hang from the ceiling like chandeliers of spring blooms. Ceramic vases are cemented and built-in to the walls, allowing more mums to emerge. Potted lilies in bright red and pink are lined on the floor.

Tablecloths scream with color and floral patterns, topped with bright blue, aquamarine or yellow accent fabrics. The walls in soothing peach, violet and green marbleized patterns create a great illusion of depth, tempting the first timer to curiously touch the wall. Surveying the room, the eye consistently finds something interesting and beautiful to look at: a lively painting, an unusual fountain with black painted fish seemingly swimming against the white tiles, and the most attractive fire escape I have ever seen.

The fire door adorned with artificial flowers comes out of a country farm in a children’s storybook. Doors here are not just functional devices to separate and seal off rooms; they are stunning works of art. A mixed media artwork of a bejeweled woman with fuchsia, green and violet stones turns out to be the door to the ladies’ room. On the other side of the door is a seductive woman peering out from a border of golden curves and squiggles, dotted with random gems. I fail to locate the men’s room, but it must have been an equally eclectic door. Even the violet door leading to the kitchen and the aboriginal patterned door leading to the garden are a visual treat.

But it is the school of 88 fish chairs that delights me the most. Each chair was laboriously carved with koi and tropical fish designs, meticulously painted in vibrant reds, yellows, oranges, greens and blues. Each chair is a stunning piece of art and a definite conversation piece. It comes as to no surprise that all 88 pieces have been sold.

My aunt, my mother and her friends have been asking each other, "Have you been to Morita’s?" They have all heard of the beauty of this hide-away from the tired images of city life. Realizing it is a place that attracts the forty-something, I decide to bring my "oldest" friend, Patricia, old not because of her chronological age, but rather the age of our friendship: we’ve been friends since fourth grade, and is one friend I feel I can grow old with.

The very efficient and attentive manager Jess welcome us into Morita’s. A gorgeous woman with graying locks and a beautifully structured body walks by, the epitome of femininity with hair neatly tied in a braid, face with the perfect shades of make-up and floral skirt matching an apple green sweater top. It is hard to believe she is the eighty-something lady known as Morita or Elena Roces Guerrero. Her delicate Castilian features burst into a wide smile as she graciously receives us into her home-style restaurant, which she refers to as "your home as much as it is mine." It is "a luxurious mom and pop eatery," not a fancy restaurant, she emphasizes repeatedly.

As I try to capture the meal served to me on film, she verbalizes her reservations. "My food is how I serve my food at home. It is not like the fancy plated dishes created by chefs which magazines feature." So I put my camera aside and enjoy the meal with my dear friend Patricia.

We decide to sample the menu of the day for P765 inclusive of an appetizer, soup, salad, main course, dessert and coffee. It starts with an adorable demitasse cup of clear chicken and beef broth served with toasted garlic bread in a dainty bread basket. The green salad with fruits in season is a sweet combination of strawberries, pears and mangoes with the cutest tint of pink colored berry dressing. The main dish of lengua is a sweetish version of ox tongue with banana, capers and tomato sauce, reminding us of the taste of pochero served at home. Dessert today is their version of halo-halo or ube ice cream topped with beans, kaong and nata de coco.

It is the little touches in Morita’s which make you feel like you are in a friends’ house. Not just any friend, but a fine proper woman who spends time to match her plates, her napkins, tablecloths and other little details to make the meal perfect. Details as minute as dalandan juice served in a glass with a frilly coaster. Bread baskets covered with pretty cloth as housewives used to do many decades ago.

The curtains not only block off the mid-day sun, but its crotched edges add feminine touches women adore. The waiters are overly attentive. When my pen falls, he was already handing it back to me before I could even bend down to get it. The napkin that fell from Patricia’s lap is quickly replaced with a fresh clean one. Growing up in a generation of disposable kleenex, these men must have been trained to pick up hankies as men used to do many years ago. During the meal, Morita repeatedly comes to our table to chat and make sure we are enjoying our meal. She gives us a plate of vegetarian fare to sample, and more lengua.

Although I had seen Patricia just a week ago, we do not lack for stories to share. Be it about men, new friends, old friends, siblings, lost loves, new loves, or work, we never lack topics to talk about. In this setting where the chairs are as gorgeous as the ladies who sit on them, where tables are strategically placed a few meters apart for added privacy, chatting is not only allowed, it is encouraged. There are no annoying ring tones or children crying to disturb juicy details of the story. That’s the way Morita wants it.

While Patricia and I are noticeably the youngest women in the restaurant, we fit right in. Delighting in female bonding and a decadent lunch in the middle of the work week, we are now certified "ladies who lunch." While eight-hour marathon sessions still seems too toxic an activity for me, an occasional lunch enjoyed at a leisurely pace with my old friend in a beautiful setting is definitely a very welcome treat.