Kamayan sa Baguio

Home of Native Lechon Cebu

Belmonte Compound

#27 A Sophia De Veyra St.

Quezon Hill, Baguio City

Last Sunday, my husband and I saw an announcement in Midland Courier (a weekly local newspaper) we knew we couldn't miss. It was a 50% opening discount at the newly opened Kamayan. Promo runs for only five days.

The restaurant is not that accessible but is near Naguillian Road/Cooyeesan (walking distance). It is in the same compound as the Jaime V. Ongpin foundation office. From Naguillian Road, just make a turn towards De Veyra Street. The compound will be on the first corner, if i remember correctly. You won't miss the Belmonte compound and the building that houses the restaurant. It's a cute brown house with a long driveway. I'm guessing that Kamayan's building used to be a house and was just renovated.

My first impression? The tables took too much space so it looked crowded. I do not know if it's just the opening season and they need to provide more chairs for more people. At around 12:15 pm, you had to go through a maze already just to get to the buffet table. They should take out at least 5 tables from the main dining area to give way for the people lining up at the buffet.

We arrived at 11:30 and only 4 tables were occupied. Some servers for main dishes were still empty. They have kare-kare, pork humba, pancit canton, pininyahang manok among others. At 200 pesos, I didn't complain. However, paying the regular price of 400 pesos for at most 30 choices of viands and desserts is not that convincing. For desert, they had halayang ube, a rice cake, ice cream and fruit slices.

Two singers entertained the lunch crowd, hopping from table to table to perform a song or two.

The ambiance is Filipinong Filipino. They also placed tables at the terrace, good for at most two per table. It overlooks Quezon Hill and Coyeesan.

Most are pork dishes. I think there's only one beef viand plus a couple of seafood dishes. The grilled Bangus and Catfish came late. After dessert, they served shrimps, which we feasted on like chips.

If you wanna try it, go early. At 12 noon, the buffet line gets too long and i'm not that patient when it comes to waiting to get food. Their Lechon Cebu is not part of the buffet and you can order it separately.

I'd say: they should continually improve their service to get people to travel far to pay almost 500 pesos for food that they can prepare at home.