Maranatha

For future reference:

Maranatha
Jl. Gatot Subroto No. 100 Ka(?) 3
Denpasar, Bali

Tel: 0361-236337

Excellent pao/bao place. I ate the mung bean one and Bonnie was eyeing the pao the whole time. Silly doggie, buns aren't for dogs.

Mmmmmmm Mangoes

One of the advantages of living on a tropical island--mangoes, lots of them

I still think it's crazy how well the guys working at our house can climb.

Fire Update

I mentioned a while back about a fire that burned down one of the biggest markets in Denpasar. Our favorite Chinese-Indonesian restaurant was located in that complex, and we thought we'll never taste the goodness of Ma Fong Sen (aka Honey's Restaurant). Then, we found out from one of Mami's relatives that the restaurant survived the fire and in fact it's still open! We ordered take out last night, and the food was as delicious as before. All the dishes are still there and they tasted just the same as pre-fire. Yay, so happy!

Not more fires!

We have guests visiting us right now and we wanted to take them to Mafongsun aka Honey's, which is our favorite Indonesian-Chinese food place. This place was more like a large food stall rather than a real restaurant. The formerly green colored walls were covered with soot and grease. The place looked like a dive but the food was great and no one we've known ever gotten sick from the food here. Our friend from Hong Kong who is quite picky when it comes to Chinese food highly approved of this place when we took him and his wife to the place. We decided to take our friends are Cantonese to this place. Unfortunately, that morning of our planned trip, the market which housed this restaurant burned down. Just our luck! It took about twelve hours for the firemen to put out the fire. I wonder what's going to happen to the people who ran the restaurant as well as all the occupants of the market. This market was huge and I feel sorry for all the people who had their shops there.

I don't think the authority knows the cause of the fire. Maybe it's an accident or maybe it's arson. Wid said that there were disputes about the land which the market was located. Something about wanting to turn the place into the parking lot. I guess we'll know when people decide what to do with the land.

It's really ironic considering the last time we planned to take some people to a new place, the exact same thing happened. I hope we're not cursed or anything.

De Ka De Resto

A couple of days ago we tried out a new Indonesian restaurant called De Ka De Resto (Jl. Noja Saraswati No. 2D, Denpasar). The setting was surprisingly nice for a place that serves Indonesian food. The dining area consisted of two parts--one on the patio above the fish pond (huuuuuge kois swimming around) and the other enclosed in an air conditioned room. The food was quite nice though but I'm really not a judge of Indonesian food since I'm not a huge fan myself. The family got mostly grilled fish or various set menu. I wasn't in the mood for Indo food so Wid ordered me gado-gado, stir fried kung kong, stir fried noodle (mie Jakarta?), and rice.

The gado-gado tasted fresh, but it was drenched in sauce. I later found out that typical restaurants are very stingy with sauces so if some place serves the dish with lots of sauce, it shows the place tries to be more "luxurious." Maybe that's why Wid's mom liked my lasagna because it has lots of sauce and therefore more luxurious.

Kung kong was not bad either and they put little red beans (not azuki beans nor the red kidney beans) and chopped shrimp bits, which I thought was a bit different than the other stir fried kung kong I had before. I didn't eat much of the stir fried noodles because I'm pretty bored with mie goreng and egg noodles in general, but the others seemed to enjoyed that dish.

Portion was filling for everyone and the price was not too bad. I wouldn't mind going back to the restaurant if I'm actually in the mood for Indo food. I was definitely pleasantly surprised and impressed by the ambiance because most places that serve Indo foods are warung, shacks, or street carts with zero emphasis on the atmosphere.

Kekeluargaan (Jimbaran)

A couple of days ago Wid's parents took some guests to Jimbaran for grilled seafood. Jimbaran is known for the row of shacks selling fresh seafood on the beach. This place is quite successful because of its winning combination of beachy setting and good food. Unfortunately, Jimbaran was one of the places that was bombed in 2002 by those terrorist assholes because it is a prime tourist attraction. When we were there a few days ago, we saw a decent number of people there, which is good.

The one we frequent is the Pantai Sari Cafe, also known as Kekeluargaan ("family style"?). I'm actually not a big fan of seafood, but this is one of the few place I actually would eat a decent amount of seafood because it's so fresh and well prepared. According to Wid's parents, Taiwanese tourists like the seafood from Jimbaran, and indeed my family did like this place when we brought them there back in 2005. We ordered a nice selection of seafood: crabs (boiled and grilled), grilled white fish, fried squid in a calamari style, clams, and baby lobsters. There were shrimps available also, but I don't remember we ordering that this time. The fried squid isn't what we normally get, and Wid thinks the squid satay is better. Rice, kung kong (空心菜), and fried potato were ordered as well. The weird thing was the potato took the longest time to show up. We ended up having the mild chilli because of the guests who can't tolerate spicy food.

Wid's bro's father-in-law brought to the dinner sake and XO. It was the first time I tried XO and it was sooooo delicious and very, very smooth. It has a sweet, plum after taste, which I thought was pretty interesting.

That dinner was really nice because everyone seemed to have fun. A little band played assorted music at our request. The weather was cool and breezy.

Another Nasi Campur

I decided that the nasi campur (mixed rice) from the local, no name place is superior to the "famous" nasi campur from Singaraja. I tried the Singaraja version last night and I didn't like it too much. Like the no name place, it's made with beef instead of the usual chicken, except this one was ALL meat (lung, shredded meat, chunks of meat, dried meat) with no vegetables, noodles, or whatever. The chunks of meat was really tough and it took me a while to finish the whole dish. Bonnie the Naughty constantly begging to play with her throughout the meal didn't help either.

Babi Guling

新年快樂，吉祥如意!! Happy Lunar New Year to those who celebrate it! Since it's the year of the pig, I thought it was appropriate to make the first post of the year about a pork dish.

I finally appreciate the tastiness of babi guling. I tried this dish several times already at various warung, but for some reason I didn't like it very much. A couple weeks ago, Wid's parents brought some back. While according to Wid, it wasn't the best babi guling; I actually enjoyed it. Then, a few days ago on our way to Kintamani to pray at the ancestor's altar, we stopped by at Gianyar because Wid has been craving babi guling. Apparently, we were lucky that day because business was a bit slow that day (due to the heavy rain) so plenty food was left even though we were there late (around 2 pm).

Maybe I was starving or maybe it is possibly the best babi guling rice on the island or maybe my taste buds finally opened to that dish, that babi guling was one of the best I've tasted. I enjoyed it so much that I finished off the entire plate. I didn't realize how full I was until I stood up. The pork meat was so tender and juicy and the skin was crunchy. Best part is skin that still has bits of fat attached to it. This dish is definitely best when fresh. Their egg sausage was quite good too, and it supposed to be one of their signature dishes. We also got some fresh fried peanuts discs too, but the one place that sold chicken rice in Ubud still makes a better version. To wash everything down, Wid and I had the orange flavored fruit tea. We later decided that the ones in the bottle seem to taste better than ones in a box.

You are what you eat

Now if you are what you eat, then right now I'm a pig. Yesterday for lunch we went to our favorite Chinese-food done Japanese style restaurant Ippin Nyukon after we found out that they are NOT closed permanently. Let's hope the rumor that the owner/chef wants to go back to Jakarta is false because this is the only place with good ramen. Apparently, when Wid's mom called last time, it was a Wednesday and the restaurant is closed on Wednesdays. Besides the usual (favorite) ramen, we tried a few other dishes. One was stir fried noodle with vegetables and wood ear mushrooms. The dish tastes fairly normal, but when mix in a bit of the wasabi mustard, it becomes something totally different but very tasty. We also tried the fried shrimp coated with seasame and Japanese mayo, but my favorite was the babi kecap (pork with soy sauce). It tasted almost exactly like the one dish we had at this restaurant by the river front (Ming Guan or something) in Singapore, except no steamed buns. The pork tasted even better with the previously mentioned wasabi mustard.

Last night we went to a Balinese wedding in Ubud. One of the employees in the company got married, and apparently he's a Balinese noblity so we got to see a very fancy reception (with real ceremonial dancing by real professional Balinese dancers). The reception was nice and I enjoyed the little cakes, but we skipped the dinner so we could get BBQ ribs at Nuri's. All the white people were staring at us, apparently they think staring it's not rude to stare in Indo or they've never seen people dressed up in fancy traditional clothes before. :P Anyway, because we were all still pretty full from the lunch, we only had two racks of pork ribs, two plates of kentang goreng (fried potato wedges), one plate of salad, one bacon cheese burger, and drinks. Good stuff, and bones left overs for the doggies at home. No bones for Bonnie though. She gets dog food and fruits/vegetables (she LOVES mango).

We tried out a new restaurant on Saturday, but maybe I'll make a review of that place later.

Chocolate-Covered Chocolate Croissant

We're on strike to protest Wid's mom's policy regarding dogs so no cooking for at least a week. Times like this makes me glad that I didn't teach anyone in the house the recipes I brought with me.

Wid and I have been obsessing about chocolate-covered chocolate croissant from BreadTalk. Previous, we were crazy about their custard filled bread with dipped chocolate on each ends (double impact), but we got kind of tired of that after eating way too many of them. At first I ate a whole croissant on my own, but then we decided to share because it's so sweet and filling. It's the perfect midnight snack along with a glass of cold milk. It's a croissant filled with dark chocolate that has a different flavor than the chocolate coating, which is a bit sweeter. What I like about the chocolate used by BreadTalk is that it doesn't have that greasy aftertaste that I experience with chocolates from other bakery. I suspect the other bakery puts margarine in their chocolate mixture. Ick.



As much as I like the price and taste of breads from BreadTalk (a chain from either Singapore or Malaysia?), I feel bad about its impact on the rest of the bakery businesses in Bali. The others cannot compete because of BreadTalk's cost cutting measurements and business structure. At least for some local bakeries, like Bali Bakery, they learned to adopt by focusing more on the cafe aspect of the business. My Japanese-style cheesecake still kicks ass compared to BreadTalk version. Haw.

What is That?

This morning I noticed these really huge fruits with light green skin. Each fruit was about a palm and a half long. It turned out that these are white mango, a Balinese speicality. I've had white mangoes here before, but I've never seen it whole before. Beside the white flesh, the fruit is slightly alcoholic which gives it a distinct taste. Wid's mom mentioned that there are white mangoes in Java too, but those are usually sour or bitter. Another reason why I'm happy to be in Bali instead of Java. Haha.

Nasi Campur

Yesterday Wid's mom got all of us some Balinese-style nasi campur. The "mixed rice" has no real name and it came from a place with no real name either. Wid thinks it's a food stall/shack in a banjar. I'm normally not a huge fan of nasi campur, but this one was so good. The toppings are separated from the rice itself so that way you won't get what Wid called surprise--the unexpected blob of hot chili paste. The topping consisted of small pieces of egg omlet and chicken, fried coconut shavings (orange color thing in the pic), a bit of noodle mixed with veggies, some meat that tasted a lot like the Chinese-style beef jerky (the dark brown chunks), and braised beef (the light-brown, shreded meat). Everything is all wrapped up nicely in a banana leaf.

Widhy likes this dish so much that he always gets double portion. I can only eat one portion, but it is very enjoyable. I also love the fact that this dish came from a place with no name.

Full Moon and Pura's Birthday

On Saturday (10/7), according to the Balinese lunar calendar, was full moon. For some reason this meant that it's an extra auspicious day. It was also the pura's birthday so we had a big ceremony for it. From what I gathered, the ceremony was a lot like our wedding ceremony, but the chants and the offerings were different. I couldn't participate this time, so I ended up taking pictures of Wid's newphew and niece.

After the ceremony, we had suckling pig (babi guling) for lunch. Too bad this time they didn't bring the whole pig so I didn't get a nice picture of it. According to Anthony Bourdain (on the Indonesia episode of No Reservations), the Balinese makes THE best roasted pig in he world. If I remember correctly, the meat inside of the pig is taken out and cooked separately and flavored with lots of spices. Then, the meat is shoved back into the pig, and the pig is roasted slowly over a fire for hours. The pig is bathed with coconut water regularly. The end result is super crispy skin and the meat is soft and flavorful.

Ox Tail Soup

Last night while Wid's mom had her arisan (gathering of her housewive friends) at the house, we ran off to the local restaurant near our house for some yummy ox tail soup. When we asked Wid's dad if he wanted any of the soup, he thought for a second and replied yes even though he already had his dinner. The first time I had Indonesian ox tail soup or sop buntu was here a couple years ago during my first visit to Bali. To this day the soup from this small restaurant is still my favorite. The soup has been slow cooked with chopped up ox tail, various spices coloring the soup orange, shallots, and some sort of green leaves (mint or celantro?). It's been cooked for so long that the soup is actually thickened and the meat falls off the bones so easily. To eat the dish, you squeeze a bit of lime juice and add a bit of chili sambal, and then spoon some of the soup over a bowl of rice. Normally we also get the Indonesian salad called gado-gado, but since I'm not very hungry, Wid just ordered a side of fried tofu. Each of us also ordered a nice glass of hot red tea to warm the throat and wash down the food. It's not as awesome as the Kintamani wood stove tea, but it was still nice.

In the end we saved the bones for the doggies (and take a new order of the soup home for Wid's dad). :3

Eat and Sleep

We went to Kintamani to do ceremonies because Tuesday was Hungry Ghost Day, which is a Chinese holiday during which families made offerings of food and prayer for their ancestors and also for ghosts who do not have family to pray for them. There's really not much to do in Kintamani except eat and sleep and look at all the cute dogs running all over the place so we did a good amount of all three.

Since I haven't really talked much of Balinese/Indonesian foods in this blog so far , I'll just mention some note-worthy stuff. For dinner Wid and fam got some nasi ayam (chicken rice) from Nasi Ayam Kedewalan from Ubud, which is on the way to Kintamani. I normally would eat this dish (very authentic and delicious) but my stomach wasn't feeling well that day. Instead of the rice dish, I found these snacks consisted of peanuts and flour, all fried together forming these little round, salty crackers. I was actually expecting sweet, but if it was sweet, then it wouldn't have been Balinese anymore. Hehe.

The rest of Monday night dinner was the usual Balinese dishes (fried eggs, sambal, rice, fried fish, etc.), but what turned out to be my favorite dish was the stir-fried vegetable. This was the first time me trying this vegetable, called paku in Balinese, and it was very delicious. For some reason it reminded me of spinach and kung-kong (空心菜), but people eat mostly the stalks. Wid told me that this is peasant food because it is grown everywhere and people often just pick it from the side of the road and cook it. They could only eat this vegetable in the village because it's not popular to be sold in the area we live. Another food that can't be found anywhere else is the pork sausage with it's large chunks of fat and stuff. It's crunchy on the outside and soft and fatty in the inside. Sausages can be made easily at home, but what make this sausage special is that it's been smoked over the wooden stove to give it its distinctive taste. This particular batch was extra delicious because it was smoked for five days instead of the usual four days. The smoke from the wooden stove also gives other things a nice flavor, one of them being tea. The red tea prepared the usual way, but the smoke gives the tea a richer flavor and aroma. It's always nice to have a glass of tea to warm the body up.

The ceremony is like the usual with the typical Chinese/Indo-Chinese food offerings. Lots of pork, tofu, vegetables, fruits, tea, and alcohol. It's not very exciting to me because I've seen it so many times, but may be I'll talk about ceremonies some other time.