a mano: Skip The Pizza, Stay for the Soft Serve Gelato

My first time dining in a mano would be several years ago – as I recall it just newly opened at the time. Unfortunately, nothing was a standout in the dishes we sampled previously; thus, I never really found myself going out the way to make that second visit to the restaurant (this, despite the fact that Cibo - its kindred concept is a personal favorite). On the flip side, I do recall that the service of the team members was excellent and I was just in awe watching them prepare handmade pasta before our very eyes.

PROSCIUTTO E RUCOLA (P870)

I’ve been planning a visit to a mano ever since my sister started raving about its soft serve gelato – roughly around the same time, a mano got recognized as one of the 2022 Top Pizzerias in Asia-Pacific so that further built up my anticipation to try it out again.

Beware though, a mano has a slightly inconvenient seating schedule – when we were booking our table – it was 11am to 1pm or 1:15 to 3pm (we opted for the 11am seating) - which means, no lounging around for after-lunch coffee or drinks!

FETTUCCINE ALFREDO (P620)

I was pleasantly surprised that their menu is stacked with more options compared to its relatively limited selection back then that I was quite struggle to lock in our choices. We decided to order a Prosciutto e Rucula and Fettucine Alfredo for our pizza and pasta. I was pretty impressed at the speed of its service – but the pizza – as gorgeous as it looked – didn't come served warm. I would have preferred it served straight from the oven. Toppings wise – the quality of the arugula and prosciutto were unquestionably good – but it felt a little sparse. Other pizzerias offer the same quality with more toppings at more reasonable prices.

BISTECCA A MANO (P2250)

The Fettuccine Alfredo heavily relied on its aged Parmigiano-Reggiano for flavor; however, I do believe it’s best paired with the Bistecca A Mano. The Bistecca a Mano comes in two sizes – we opted for the smaller version which was more than enough to be shared among four of us. I enjoyed this – but it’s not such a big departure from the steak you’d get from Cibo (since they are related concepts – perhaps they use the same supplier?).

PARMIGIANA DI MELANZANE (P750)

We decided that we needed another dish to pair with the Fettuccine Alfredo (as I really couldn’t appreciate it on its own) so we decided to order the Parmigiana di Melanzane or its version of the Eggplant Parmigiana. Taste-wise, this was excellent – I loved the play on textures (from the gooey cheese to the crunchy toppings of the eggplant and how tangy its tomato sauce was. Unfortunately, the serving size was way too small for what we paid it for.

GELATO SOFT WITH HONEYCOMB (P240)

However, the reason which piqued my interest in revisiting a mano, the soft serve gelato, made my visit worthwhile. Each spoonful was gloriously creamy and wonderfully complemented by the honeycomb bits. It was unanimously and unquestionably the favorite dish of our entire meal. Too bad this flavor is not available anymore in their Powerplant branch as they made it exclusively available in their BGC branch (hope they reconsider this though as I’d find myself going to a mano solely for this).

a mano

Powerplant Mall, Lopez Drive, Makati City

Date of Visit: August 20, 2022 with Danica Dayonayos, AJ Esplanada and Myca Rolloque