Getting Ready for Christmas and Some Freebies

It is a few days before Christmas!

Christmas spirit is everywhere with all the dancing christmas lights, decors, parties here and there and the bustling towns with people getting ready by shopping for the Christmas celebration.

Like most of the people, I also plan to celebrate the christmas with the family. Food is an essential part of the celebration. I already planned of what dishes I will prepare though I would leave the cooking to the hubby, lol! I trust in his skills more.

Sweets and desserts are never out of the picture. I had a couple of desserts in mind that I want to prepare myself. So bear with me as I fulfill my shopping list of different ingredients for a christmas dessert.

My #MarketFriday started with an interesting encounter with a vendor that took the same I bus I was in, carrying with him a basket of some sort of traditional medicinal concoctions.

According to him, these are concoctions of certain tree barks, oils and other kind of plants that can help with some external problems such as skin rashes, insect bites, etc. With his sales talk he was able to sell one small bottle that costs 120php. I wonder if those are really effective.

I arrived at the Metro Supermarket where I did my shopping. Suddenly I felt my stomach rumbled and I realized I didn't have lunch. Twith the situation, I remembered someone commentes before that when shopping, you must be full so as not to add unplanned expenses. Who could say no to a rumbling stomach. Now, I really understand what he said.

I ordered beef nachos at Shawarma Shack which I regretted in the end. My stomach was not satisfied and was still craving for a decent meal with rice. I should have chosen the beef shawarma rice instead. Rice is life, you know! 😅 With this small box of beef nachos, I spent 85php.

Though it didn't satisfy me but at least I was fueled as I needed the energy for the shopping.

After I consumed my snack, I proceeded to go shopping.

Fruit salad is a favorite dessert for the christmas celebration. It is sweet, delicious and colorful! Like how colorful christmas is. It is my husband and kid's favorite too. I bought a can of fruit cocktail first. In a can is a mix of different tropical fruits such as pineapple, mango and papaya. You can also choose to buy fresh fruits but that would be more expensive, I guess.

Another ingredient for the fruit salad that makes it more colorful and enticing is the kaong and nata de coco. Kaong are preserved sugar palm fruits. Most commonly, it is preserved in red, green and white colored liquid mixture, the reason it is perfect ingredient of fruit salad for christmas. While Nata de coco, is a chewy, translucent, jelly-like food produced by the fermentation of coconut water.
Fruit salad couldn't be complete without the nata de coco. It's my kids favorite ingredient.

Adding a little twist to the taste of fruit salad is cheese. A little salty and cheesy texture to its sweetness with create a more unique experience.

And to complete the list of ingredients are condensed milk and all purpose cream.

I was also contemplating on making gulaman desserts but I haven't made up my mind yet so I just bought a few pieces of gulaman powder.

After I completed the ingredients for my fruit salad, I remembered I need to buy some canned products. For beef loaf, I only buy this particular brand called fiesta. It is the best tasting beef loaf in the country. I remembered my aunts when they come home in our province, they would bring a few cans of this particular brand back to Manila since, this brand is not available there. It is only sold here in the Visayas and Mindanao region. As you can see, it's a best seller with few pieces left on the rack.

I also bought a loaf of bread. I chose the one with the Pinoy brand name coz of course I am Pinoy and the piyaya freebie is a plus. They said nothing is free now. I think they were wrong. It still exist in the market,Lol!

When I paid for my purchases, the cashier asked if I have reward card already. Here we are again, I thought. Though it's an advantage to have a reward card but I don't like to be bothered. She continued to explained that it's the best time since they offered a discount for the card. Well, I think, ok I'd just through it. It is also a bother to be asked tgat I should get my reward card everytime. She guided me to the service booth where I filled in some important information.

After a few minutes of waiting, I finally had a reward card. I didn't expect it to be quick and convenient so I was happy and I also got my first reward points.