We got to visit 10 restaurants during our Cebu Food Crawl with Food Crew PH and while I find all of it impressive, if pressed to decide on which of them is my ultimate favorite, I would say it's the Isla Sugbu Seafood City located at The Grand Convention Cebu. It is a Paluto-All-You-Can restaurant with main focus on fresh and bountiful servings of seafood and then some.
I might be a bit biased here because if you have been reading my blog, you would know that I love love love seafood. I even co-authored a book about my love for seafood, remember. So yes, Seafood City just rocked my world while we were in Cebu.
Now the great thing about Isla Sugbu is the fact that it is a a combination of a paluto and an eat-all-you-can restaurant. Choose all the fresh seafood and some meat you could muster to eat, then have the friendly chefs cook everything for you, and you're all good.
Related Posts:
* Cebu Food Crawl with the Food Crew PH
* Cebu Food Trip: Choobi Choobi Restaurant
* Cebu Food Trip: House of Lechon
* Cebu Food Trip: Tsay Cheng Chinese Restaurant
What sets apart Isla Sugbu from all the other paluto restaurants I have ever been to is the fact that it is so impressively clean. The ambiance can be liken to high end restaurants here in Manila. And while there is still a faint of fresh seafood smell in the air, it is so subtle you need not to worry about smelling like a fish market right after eating inside the restaurant.
Seafood choices are of course aplenty. There are different types of lobsters - all of which were big and plump. There are also humongous crabs which can send crab-loving person into a total bliss.
Variety of seafood were neatly spread, buffet-style. I remember spotting some crabs, lobsters, tuna, flat fish, tanigue, and some other fishes which names escape me.
There were crablets, seaweeds, squid, octopus, milkfish, tilapia among many others.
While majority of the food options were of course creatures from the sea, there are also a handful of meat to choose from. There were some chicken gizzards, pork barbecue, and pork belly to name a few.
There were also some vegetables and fruits to choose from that can compliment whatever dishes diners could think of feasting on while at Isla Sugbu. If feeling fancy, there are also variety of wine available but it is not included on the paluto-all-you-can rate.
Now on to our feast. We enjoyed several dishes such as Fresh Oyster, Suahe in Garlic Butter, Tinola Tanigue Soup, Fried Fish Grouper with Sweet and Sour Sauce, Squid Adobo, Stir Fried Assorted Veggies with Oyster Sauce, Grilled Pork belly, Fried Rock Lobster with Salt and Pepper, Fruit Platter, and Rice.
All of which were a delight to the bite but there are two dishes that to this day I could not stop thinkig about. First is the Fried Fish Grouper with Sweet and Sour Sauce which is by far the best fish dish I have ever had since I started blogging! The crispness was so excellent that despite the fish being laden with sauce for a time, it was still utterly crisp. It feels like eating ultra crisp pork rinds but way way better than that. I will go back to Cebu because of this dish, I promise.
The other one was the Fried Rock Lobster simply because I am always crazy about lobster.
We ended our feast with servings of fresh fruits. We were told that fruits are not included on the rate. Regardless, little addition to the price tag wouldn't matter because there could be no better way to end the festive dinner than having these slices of healthy fruits.
I know I have said it before and I am saying it again, Isla Sugbo Seafood City is my favorite restaurants of all the restaurants we have visited. The Paluto-All-You-Can rate is only Php850 per head which I find well worth it considering all variety of seafood and meat choices one can choose from.
These days, whenever I am asked on restaurant recommendation in Cebu, Isla Sugbu is definitely on top of my list. While I wish that they open a branch here in Manila, I wouldn't mind going back to Cebu again if only to experience dining again at Isla Sugbu Seafood City.
Isla Sugbu Seafood City is at The Grand Convention Cebu located at Archbishop Reyes Avenue, Cebu City, Philippines. Contact Numbers are 233-1114 and 0998-963-1223. You may visit their website ar thegrandcon.com and follow them thru Facebook (@GrandCon), Twitter (@TheGrandCon), and Instagram (@TheGrandCon). Use the official hashtags #PalutoAllYouCan and #SeafoodCity to join the conversation.
