Hotline handy

We all like the idea of being spoiled. If we can have someone at our beck and call 24/7 doing everything we asked for, we’d all be happy little critters. Everyone seems to need an assistant especially these days, to help with shopping choices, dining reservations and gift deliveries. Fortunately, someone has got our back.

Citibank’s Premium Concierge Service is a 24-hour, seven-day-a-week concierge service that is available to Citibank Gold and Platinum cardholders. Simply call 687-9000 and you can get any assistance you need.

Most premium cardholders call the concierge number for referral and reservation services. Calling the number to ask for the best place to get a good dinner (you can even specify which cuisine you’re craving for), to get the best haircut, or to reserve a room in a certain hotel saves you so much time, effort and stress. The concierge service can even provide you with a list of establishments that offer additional discounts or freebies when you pay using your Citibank credit card.

Citibank’s concierge also allows you to enjoy the convenience of delivery and messengerial services, such as flower and gift delivery, courier services, and messengerial service assistance. If you need gift wrapping services this holiday season, the premium concierge service can canvass for the best or the most location-friendly wrapping establishments for you. They can even refer you to the most affordable delivery service.

Tapping in Citibank’s seven digits also extends the perks of personal business service assistance, personal shopping, travel and personal event planning assistance.

Aneth Lim, Citibank vice president for PR and Communication, tells of how one Citibank Gold card holder was trying to plan her wedding and didn’t know where to start. She called up the Citibank Premium Concierge Service and was given numbers and recommendations to the best florists, venues, churches and caterers in town. Aneth describes, “It’s like having your own girl Friday, only more efficient.”

Another premium cardholder, a pregnant woman, slipped in the mall and landed on her back side. In her distress, she called up the service number she was most familiar with: 6-8-7-9-0-0-0. Citibank’s concierge service, upon learning of her predicament, called an emergency ambulance service and sent it to her aid. The concierge number can also provide you with emergency numbers to the police and fire departments, towing services and government offices. Says Aneth, “Here in the Philippines, we’re not so used to the idea of a ‘concierge service,’ but once you’ve tried it out, you won’t be able to stop calling it, and you even begin to depend on it.”

I was neither trying to plan a huge event nor was I in a grave situation but I decided to make the most of my Citibank Gold card and called the Premium Concierge Service to consult on the best place to have lunch and dessert in the Makati area. I was having lunch with a friend and wanted somewhere quiet, cozy and preferably offered dishes that can be shared between two girls dead set on not following the tradition that made the holidays synonymous to girth expansion. I also asked for a restaurant that had great vegetarian options. The hotline came up with not one, but two restaurant options: Mezzé in Greenbelt 2 for our hot meal, and Bizu just around the corner to indulge in our sweet cravings. Both restaurants are currently taking part in the Tasting Room program, a tieup between Appetite magazine and Citibank that allows diners to sample and share smaller portions of dishes offered by certain Greenbelt restaurants.

Citibank’s concierge recommended Mezzé because its Tasting Room menu included ample soup and salad options among its main course dishes. For P1,000, the menu gives you five courses inclusive of dessert. Mezze’s Tasting Room menu starts off “amusing your palate” with a trio of soups: potato leek, tomato soup, and French onion. Quirkily served in little shooter glasses, each broth is a different savory experience, and it’ll be hard to ascertain your favorite. The potato leek, despite being rich and creamy, still goes down easily; the rich tomato broth, served with grilled cheese crouton, has to be sipped slowly to be able to fully appreciate how the garden tomatoes were roasted; the French onion soup was a hearty broth made perfect by melted Gruyere.

Though my friend and I split the soup shooters between us, she had full access to the next dish, a smoked salmon and black caviar appetizer topped with onion dill crème fraiche, grated hard-boiled eggs and chopped red onions and chives. She ate it all up with no questions asked. While she was gobbling up her seafood fare, I asked to start with the salad, a refreshing medley that mixed in sliced peaches, candied walnuts and light wine vinaigrette with the freshest greens. I prefer my salads this way: uncomplicated yet flavorful.

The main course combined two of Mezzé’s best-selling dishes: Chilean sea bass (served with asparagus, tomato confit and orange supreme) and lamb tagine (a tasty Moroccan stew topped over couscous). Small servings of each dish are served in one long plate and can be easily shared between two light eaters. My friend took to the sea bass like kids to a Christmas stocking, oohing and aahing over each sensorial surprise the dish afforded.

Dessert came next. If we had thought three soups at one go was too much, we definitely weren’t prepared for the dessert sampling, which put together five of Mezzé’s choicest sweet creations. The array included small portions of panna cotta, apple b’steeya (baked apples in walnut phyllo filled with caramel syrup), Falling Cake (rich dark warm chocolate cake hiding a soft velvety chocolate center), crème brulee, and torta limone (a French meringue with lemon curd, walnuts and whipped curd). Mindful that we were still trekking over to Bizu for more dessert, we thought we were just going light on this sweet tray. By the time we dropped our spoons, however, no one would’ve thought we had any prior reservations.

Since I used my Citibank Gold card, I got a complimentary Italian Roast brewed coffee to cap off the meal. We could’ve also chosen from Mezzé’s tea selection as an alternative.

After five courses at Mezzé, we didn’t know if we still had stomach space for more sweets at Bizu. The pattiserie’s Tasting Room Menu, however, is too interesting to pass off. For this program, Bizu specially created five new desserts that each promotes the five elements of taste: salty, sweet, spicy, sour, and bittersweet. These five dessert creations are meant to take the diners on a journey of sweetness and flavor, a new dessert experience meant to excite and entrance one’s taste buds. Each dessert is set in front of you in the order mentioned above, and with a purpose.

The first dessert incorporates the salty element of taste: crème brulée napoleone with caramel sauce and fleur de sel (a subtler French version of rock salt). “Not all desserts have to be sweet,” explains Bizu marketing manager Audrey Tanco. As the crème brulée melts in your mouth, the hint of saltiness from the fleur de sel tickles your taste buds and surprisingly whets your appetite, makes you crave for more, and prepares you perfectly for the next element of taste.

There’s sweet, and then there’s sweet. One is provided by an overwhelming amount of sugar and another is the light sweetness gained from fruits. Bizu’s Tasting Room menu features a light pavlova in a light meringue base topped with strawberry, mango and blueberry chunks. Mixing sweet ingredients together only works with light desserts and the fluffy pavlova goes down smoothly, aided by the natural tanginess of the fruits.

Chili in chocolate is a very South American tradition but French-inspired Bizu pulls it off extremely well with its spiced hot chocolate in demitasse, the third of five in Bizu’s Tasting Room menu. The dessert seems to be just like any rich hot chocolate. The boldness of the dark chocolate brew greets your tongue but then the chili surprisingly kicks in when you swallow. “Spiciness can be tasted in your throat, not on your tongue,” explains Audrey. If you’re spice intolerant, you can opt to just experience the chocolate by using it as a dip for the toasted sponge cake the dessert comes with.

Up next was Bizu’s creation to represent the sour element of taste: lemon mousse with raspberry coulis surprise. The light lemony mousse is served in a carved-out lemon shell and topped with whipped cream and raspberry coulis. I particularly loved this dessert because it wasn’t as filling as I expected — especially since I also devoured the whipping that came with it. Audrey enlightened that the basic sour taste actually makes you want to eat more. (Now you know why vinegar-based adobo is such an appetizing dish.)

The bittersweet molten chocolate soufflé cake with crème anglaise capped off the dessert menu. Bitterness brings taste on the palate to a full stop. This dessert was a great conclusion to the whole tasting menu. The warmth of the melted chocolate soufflé cake — not so sweet — gave a sense of contentment. Finally, my friend and I were able to say “Enough! We’re full.” (Although I couldn’t resist taking home some of Bizu’s signature mini-cakes.) By that time, we had spent nearly two hours at Bizu and had caught up on years’ worth of bonding moments.

We sipped the last of our genmaichai tea (paying with your Citibank card gives you a free choice from Bizu’s tea or coffee selection), happily paid our bill, and waddled out of the restaurant, promising to catch up again over lunch or dinner sooner than later. There were seven more Greenbelt restaurants on the Tasting Room menu that we can try. Or I could just easily call Citibank’s Premium Concierge Service for any more dining recommendations. The number is now saved on my speed dial.

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Citibank Gold and Platinum cardholders can avail of the Premium Concierge Service by calling 687-9000.

The Tasting Room program is available until the end of December. Log on to www.appetitemag.com for details.

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E-mail comments to ana_kalaw@pldtdsl.net.