Indonesian Food

If you come to Bali expecting the range and exuberance of the cooking else – in Southeast Asia, you’ll be disappointed. Somehow the ingenuity and fiche don’t seem to have reached this, or maybe they have just been allowed the way by pizzas, hamburgers and fries. However, there’s a considerably variety of food available, cooked in a rage of styles. And the number of good or at least interesting restaurants and the choice of different cuisine are increasing every year.

At the inexpensive end of the scale, you can set a-bowl of soup and noodles, ‘baso ayam’ (soup with meatballs), for Rp1.500, from a wayside cart. These carts line the sidewalks and bus stations during the day and congregate at night markets after dark, while others ply their wares around the streets. Slightly upmarket are ‘warung’ or ‘rumah makan’ (eating houses) which range from a few tables and chairs in a kitchen to fully fledged restaurants. There is usually a menu, but in the simplest places you’ll probably just find simple rice dishes on offer.

Most places that call themselves restaurants cater for a broad range of tastes, offering Western, Indonesian and Chinese food, while others specialize in a particular cuisine such as Mexican or Italian. You’ll find the multinational fast food chains – McDonalds, Burger King, KFC, Dunkin’ Donuts – have also made inroads into the tourist and city areas.

Restaurant etiquette is pretty much the same as in the West, with waiter services the norm everywhere. Most places will have wash-basins in a corner so you can wash your hands before eating. If you are eating with friends, don’t count on everyone’s meal arriving together, there may be just one gas burner in the kitchen.

Prices, style, food presentation, decoration and service vary and range from very basic to luxurious and from extremely cheap to quite expensive. Prices vary dramatically depending on the location rather than the quality of the meals. You can spend US$150 and more per person in one of the restaurants in Bali’s 5-star hotels. Most of these do the pricing according to international standards, and you won’t benefit at all from the depreciation of the Indonesian Rupiah. Usually 10% service charge is included in your bill. If not, a tip of 5% or a maximum of 10% is appreciated but not necessarily expected.

Most restaurants in Bali are open until 10.00pm or 11.00pm, and some eateries in tourist areas keep their kitchens open until 12.00, 1.00am, or even around the clock. For a late sushi or sashimi dinner you can go to any of the RYOSHI restaurants (until midnight) or to GOA 2001 in Seminyak (until 1.00am) if they are not sold out. KOKI in Sanur serves Western home cooking until midnight, and MAMA’S in Kuta is open 24 hours. There are a number of PADANG RESTAURANTS in Kuta, Sanur, and Denpasar, which are also open around the clock.

The Cuisine
The most abundant style of cooking available on Bali and Lombok is Indonesian rice and noodle-based meals. Native Balinese food on Bali is something you’ll need to search out if you want to try it. Whether you long for an original Austrian Wiener Schnitzel, Chinese delicacies such as Hong Kong style Dim Sum, Smoked Duck from Szechuan or Scallops in Black Bean Sauce, German Wurst or Rindsrouladen, Greek Souvlaki, Indian Tandoori Chicken or Rogan Josh, Italian Lasagna or Pizza, Japanese Sushi, Yakitori, or Shabu-Shabu, Korean Bulgogi Beef and Kimchi, Mexican Enchiladas or Tacos, Spanish Tapas or Paella, Swiss Cheese or Beef Fondue, or a spicy Thai Tom Yam – you can get it in Bali. See also International Food.

Although based on original recipes, the preparation of the dishes is often adapted to the local taste and the availability of certain ingredients, and the results are not always predictable. However, if you don’t insist on comparing the Balinese version of international delicacies with those prepared in the country they originate from, you can usually expect a rather enjoyable meal.

In addition to restaurants specializing in one type of cuisine you find many (usually not very trustworthy) places which offer a mix of Chinese, Indonesian and Western food, and others which specialize exclusively in fresh sea food which is either grilled, steamed or boiled according to your instructions. And for emergencies, there are also branches of KENTUCKY FRIED CHICKEN, MACDONALD’S, and PIZZA HUT, as well as a HARD ROCK CAFE at the beginning of the Beach Road in Kuta.

Public Restaurants
There are hundreds of first-rate restaurants in Denpasar, Sanur, Kuta, Legian, Candidasa, and Lovina Beach. In both public and hotel restaurants of southern Bali every sort of international cuisine can be found: Japanese, French, Italian, Swiss, Mexican (in the Kuta area), Spanish, and Moroccan. When groups of Japanese enter a restaurant, they play Japanese music; when Americans enter, they play American music.

Some are fantastic people-watching venues and also serve first-class Indonesian cuisine. Although the competition in the tourist areas like Kuta and Sanur make for a higher standard of food, the setting could be drab and noisy, the service slow, their tables set under bright neon lights. The multitudes look, sound, and smell alike and offer identical menus at identical prices. Ask your hotel’s front desk or the Homestay owner where you should eat. Indonesians love to eat and they’ll pinpoint the best places.

When ordering food, many restaurants provide slips of paper on which to write down your order and the price; this is a good idea because it prevents misunderstandings. If you don’t write your order down precisely, half the time they’ll get it wrong. If there is no paper or pen, verify your order with the waiter before it goes to the kitchen. All waiters speak at least some English, and many can get by in Japanese, French, and even Italian. Don’t assume that your waiter knows what goes into a dish; ask the cook instead. If you’re allergic to MSG, tell your waiter “Saya tidak mau aji-no-moto.” If you don’t, half the time you’ll get MSG in your food. The Chinese, in particular, use a lot of MSG.

Also be prepared for the proper sequence to be backwards, i.e., main course, then soup, then salad. Often some members of your party may not receive their food until everyone else has finished. Typically, what finished cooking first is served first. The only way to control the order in which the food arrives is to order one item at a time.

One of the hardest things to take, especially in restaurants with good reputations, is the inconsistency. For example, one time your order of ‘gado-gado’ is what it is supposed to be: a warm fresh vegetable salad with a mild peanut sauce. Another time it’s an overcooked pile of sautéed cabbage topped with greasy, bland peanut-flavored gravy. You never know what ingredients you’ll find in your dish, what color the dish will be, or how big the portion. Also hard to predict is the amount of fat and meat, especially chicken, that goes ‘nasi goreng’ and ‘mie goreng’. One way to avoid the unpredictable fare is to just stick with simple dishes like grilled fish with rice and vegetables or soup without MSG. ‘Nasi campur’ is a safe bet if you personally pick what goes into this “mixed rice” dish.

Indonesian Cooking
Indonesia has one of the world’s great cuisine, its influences originating from all corners of the globe. Located at the crossroads of the ancient world, astride the great trade routes between the Middle East and Asia, wave after wave of traders, adventurers, pirates, and immigrants have, since the Middle Ages, been drawn by the riches of these Spice Islands. Thus, nature and history have conspired to give Indonesia a cuisine as varied and highly seasoned as its thousands of islands and its hundreds of ethnic groups.

From India came curries, cucumber, eggplant, Indian mustard, cowpeas. The Chinese brought the wok and stir-frying, Chinese mustard, and vegetables such as brassica and Chinese cabbage. From Arabia came typical Middle Eastern gastronomic techniques and dishes such as kebab and flavorful goat stews. Europeans introduced Peanuts, avocado, pineapple, guava, papaya, tomato, squash, pumpkin, cacao, soybean and cauliflower. During their occupation of Indonesia in WW II, the Japanese introduced rice paddy fish and improved methods of planting rice. Yogurt and milk were introduced by Westerners in the 1970s due to the Balinese repugnance for dairy products. More recent additions have surfaced due to tourist demand: cheeses, ham, good meat, pickles, and locally grown citrus fruits.

Indonesian home cooking can be excellent, but finding a restaurant serving good local dishes in pleasant and comfortable surroundings is very difficult. Some tiny food stalls and “Warungs” offer one or two excellently prepared local specialties but the primitive surroundings easily spoil the experience for many visitors. On the other hand, Indonesian dishes served in well-decorated and comfortable Western-style restaurants are often specially prepared for foreigners and have not much similarity with the delicious authentic version.

The centerpiece of any Indonesian meal is steamed or boiled rice. Accompanying dishes include various preparations of chicken, duck, beef, (in Bali also pork), goat, all kinds of seafood and vegetables, either steamed, boiled, braised, stir or deep fried, roasted or grilled over coconut husks. Other ingredients used to give Indonesian food its unique flavors are chilies, coconut, peanuts, garlic, ginger, saffron, basil, cardamom, lemon grass, lime, nutmeg, pepper, shallots, soy sauce, tamarind, turmeric and several kinds of shrimp paste. (They weren’t called the Spice Islands for nothing, you know.) The result is usually very tasty but not unbearably hot — as long as you avoid the small green chilies and different kinds of ‘Sambal’ which are often served together with your meal.

Two dishes available in even the simplest ‘warung’ are ‘nasi campur’, boiled rice with small amounts of vegetables, meat and fish, often served with a fried egg and ‘krupuk’ (huge prawn crackers), and ‘nasi goreng’, fried rice containing vegetables, meat, fish or shrimp, also often with egg and ‘krupuk’. The noodle equivalent is also commonly available. Mie goreng means noodles fried in coconut oil with eggs, meat, or seafood, plus tomato, cucumber, shrimp paste, spices and chilies. The other mainstays of the Indonesian menu is ‘gado-gado, a healthy Javanese salad combining potatoes and other vegetables. Peanut butter-loving Americans are particularly fond of this dish because it’s served with a good quantity of rich, spicy peanut sauce on top.

‘Krupuk’ is a big, crispy, tangy, oversized cracker made from fish flakes, crab meat, shrimp paste, or fruit mixed with rice, dough, or sago flour. After being dried to look like thin, hard, colored plastic, when fried in oil the ‘krupuk’ unfolds and blossoms. Since bread is seldom eaten, being too expensive and not to their taste, Balinese eat ‘krupuk’ instead. ‘Emping’ is another type of cracker made from ‘melinjo’ which you crush krupuk-like over your food. When hungry, grab one of these delicious and nutritious crackers. It’ll tide you over until you can get a proper meal.

Javanese-style ‘satay’ is widely available on Bali. On Java, sate are marinated mini-kebabs of chicken, beef, or mutton impaled on skewers of coconut palm, grilled over an open charcoal fire, then dipped into a spicy peanut sauce. The Balinese make their ‘satay’ by mixing minced meat laden with freshly grated coconut, prawn paste, garlic, chilies, lemon leaves, and salt to make a sticky dough-like mixture. Wrapped around a thick vein of bamboo or sugarcane, it is then charcoal-grilled and served with either a mild or peppery sauce. Pork, shrimp, bowel (usus, jerohan), egg, dog meat, and turtle meat sate, absent on Java, are popular on Bali.

Just a few years ago the only chicken one could find was the skinny, sinewy ‘kampung’ variety, but today there are juicy drumsticks, Javanese-style fried chicken, ‘ayam suharti’, ‘ayam chichi’, ‘ayam timbungan’ with curry, as well as such exotics as California fried chicken. In Denpasar, new eateries on the Kuta-end of Jl. Imam Bonjol serve ‘ayam taliwang’, a superb chicken recipe from Lombok.

Another widespread, nourishing dish is the Chinese ‘Cap Cay’, a kind of Indonesian meat and/or vegetable chop suey. Soto means that thick ‘santan’ (coconut cream) is added to a soup; this is also a breakfast dish. Sop is similar to a meat and vegetable stew, except only that water is added.

For Indonesian “High Cuisine” – not to be confused with local home cooking – visit the restaurant KETUPAT in Kuta. For a down-to-earth experience of Indonesian food you should visit the night markets or the food halls in or adjacent to some shopping centers (e.g. Tiara Dewata) in Denpasar.

A frequently encountered Indonesian dish acquired from the Dutch and found mostly in Bali’s hotel restaurants is rijstaffel (“rice table”), a sort of Indonesian smorgasbord. In colonial days, a ceremonial rijstaffel could embrace as many as 35 courses. Today, five to 10 courses is more the norm. The total meal offers a variety of dishes, some sweet, others spicy, all to be eaten with boiled rice and condiments. The Balinese-style rijstaffel is made up of well-spiced regional fish, vegetable, and meat dishes and black rice pudding for dessert. The dishes are served in handmade pots, often accompanied by a haunting tingklik orchestra.

The rijstaffel presented at the Tanjung Sari Hotel in Sanur for Saturday and Sunday lunch is nothing short of spectacular. Many other big hotels serve their own versions of this popular dish, for example the Kartika Plaza (tel. 62361-751.067) in Kuta and the Pesona Bali (tel. 62361-753.914) in Seminyak for Rp30,000. The Beluga Restaurant (tel. 62361-71.146) on Jl. Segara Windu, Tanjung Benoa, serves rijstaffel in the original style on antique plates by young Indonesian girls.

Nasi Padang from Sumatra
Inexpensive and authentic Sumatran or Padang fare is sold in ‘Rumah Makan Padang’ which you’ll find pretty much in every sizeable town. Usually a meal with many different dishes is one or perhaps two US dollars. Padang food is always cold and displayed on 10 or 15 different platters piled up in a pyramid shape inside a glass-fronted cabinet next to entrance. There are no menus; when you enter you either select your composite meal by pointing to the dishes on display, or just sit down. The waiter brings a plate of rice and one plate of every single dish to your table.

The range of options is variable, vegetarians are sometimes well catered for and sometimes not at all, and the food is traditionally fiery. Dishes you may encounter include boiled ‘kangkung’ (water spinach), ‘tempeh’, fried eggplant with chili, boiled eggs in curry sauce, fried whole fish or fish steaks, squid or fish curry, meat curry, chicken, beef, liver, beef brain curry, fried cow’s and lung potato cakes. They are all prepared in the style of Padang, a major city in Sumatra. You eat whatever you like, and you will be charged when you leave only for the food you’ve eaten. Usually a meal with many different dishes is one or perhaps two US dollars.

Balinese Delicacies
The everyday Balinese diet is a couple of meals based on rice, essentially ‘nasi campur’, eaten whenever people feel hungry. Supplemented with snacks such as ‘krupuk’, the full magnificence of Balinese cooking is reserved for festivals and ceremonies when all the stops are pulled out.

There are some Balinese specialties you should not miss. It’s a must to try the ‘Babi Guling’, the crispy skin and pieces of grilled suckling pig served with ‘lawar’, a spicy raw meat mash which is a specialty of the town of Gianyar. To try “Babi Guling” watch out for signboards at small restaurants which specialize in this dish.

‘Bebek Betutu’ is a delicious duck specialty, which is slowly baked in banana leaves together with many different herbs and spices. The other one is ‘Nasi Bebek Panggang’ (smoked duck) cooked very slowly in an earth oven – it has to be ordered in advance from restaurants. The “Bebek” you should try in MURNI’S WARUNG next to the bridge in Campuhan, Ubud.

The best place to experience a whole range of authentic Balinese dishes including Sate Lilit made from minced prawns and fish, a delicious grilled marinated fish, and Nasi Kuning, yellow rice often served at celebrations, is the BUMBU BALI Restaurant in Tanjung Benoa adjacent to Nusa Dua (Jalan Pratama, Gang Nusa No. 5B). This unique and very comfortable restaurant was opened in December 1997 by Heinz von Holzen, the author (and photographer) of “The Food of Bali” – a book which is a must for everybody interested in exotic cuisine. Heinz is the former food guru of the Grand Hyatt Bali and the Ritz Carlton hotel, and his new restaurant is a temple devoted to traditional Balinese cuisine – and a Cooking School for visitors at the same time. Don’t miss it!

Although the Balinese tend not to desserts, they have created bubble infix black rice pudding, named after the color of the rice husk. The rice itself is pink and served with sweet coconut milk sauce, fruit and grated coconut. Rice cakes (jajan) play a major part in ceremonial offerings but are also a daily food. Rice flour dough is baked, steamed or fried and the eaten sugared with coconut syrup or with fruit.

Indonesian Drink

Drinking water will keep the price of your meals down. Thirsty foreigners are provided, in most cases, with boiled water or tea from their hotel or Homestay, so you don’t have to be paranoid about drinking unclean water. At a restaurant or shop, order air putih (boiled drinking water), or cold plastic-bottled drinking water. Aqua is the best known brand.

The Balinese themselves often prefer to take warm or cold tea with meals, just as refreshing without milk or sugar. Tea helps stimulate the appetite and digestion and will keep you awake after a heavy lunch. If you don’t want your tea (or coffee) filled with 50% sugar, say ‘teh pahit’ or ‘teh tawar’ (unsugared tea) which you shouldn’t be charged for. Another way to avoid over-sugared drinks is to opt for soda water (botol soda) or beer (bir).

Powerful Balinese coffee, a crop grown in the highlands as far back as 1880, is served pitch-black (fresh milk not usually available), sweet, thick, and rich, with the grounds still floating on top. This black, unfiltered coffee, made by pouring hot water on top of coffee powder, can be hard on the stomach. Don’t drink more than two cups a day as it’s like chewing coffee beans. Stir well to get the grinds to sink. Condensed milk is often the only kind of milk available and is so sweet you don’t have to add sugar. If you need to wake up, try spiking your morning coffee with ‘arak’ or drinking hot ginger tea.

In Kuta, Legian, and Seminyak’s cosmopolitan cafes you can sample not only Bali coffee but also gourmet Colombian, Brazilian, and other imported coffees as well, including frothy, piping hot cappucino. Some cafes cater to certain cliques like the rather self-conscious Cafe Luna in Seminyak, a hangout for European and North American jewelry and clothes makers and designers.

Since there are so many natural fruit juice drinks around, both hot and cold, many derived from fruits found nowhere else in the world, it’s insane to drink Fanta or Coca-Cola. Instead, quench your thirst with ice juice (es jus). Half a dozen juice bars are available in 50 exotic iced-fruit juice blends (papaya-lemon, avocado-pineapple, etc.).

On the carts lining Bali’s streets and at festivals are tubs of a poisonous hue bobbing with ice. These contain delicious (though overly sweetened) drinks like citrus juices (air jeruk), ‘es zirzak’, or bright pink drinks of sugar water and fruit flavoring. ‘Sari Temulawak’, is a safe, refreshing, not-too-sweet ginger drink popular with Balinese, and is available at ‘warung’ and restaurants. The usual Western soft drinks like Fanta, Sprite, 7-UP, or Coca-Cola are available everywhere.

Because fresh milk is unsafe to drink in the tropics, stores all over the island sell sealed cartons of milk (with straw attached), treated to last up to 24 hours after opening. Canned, sweet condensed milk is also available. Coconut milk is a form of sterile water containing potassium and is a superb source of glucose, which can help you rehydrate. On a hot day it’s not too difficult to persuade someone to clip down a young coconut or two with a bamboo pole knife. Fresh ones are green, old ones are yellow. Its water (yeh nyuh), mixed with ice and sugar water, makes a delicious, thirst-quenching drink.

Beer, Wine, and Hard Stuff
Heineken of Holland taught Indonesians how to brew Bali’s ubiquitous Bintang lager beer (620-milliliter or 22-ounce bottles); the best accompaniment to the island’s hot, spicy food. Some visitors feel that Anker beer is better, derived from the south-Netherlands and Bavarian breweries. Indonesia also produces the lesser-known San Miquel beer. Other locally produced beers are CARLSBERG and the less popular BALI HAI beer. Irish whiskey and Guinness Stout are served in the bars and restaurants of Kuta, Sanur, and Denpasar. The one beverage some Western visitors really crave is a decent bottle of wine for a decent price. In hotels and supermarkets you can also find well-known brands imported from Australia, Germany, Japan, and even China (Tsing Tao).

“HATTEN Rosé” is quite drinkable if properly chilled. The same company started to produce a slightly rosé sparkling wine named “Jepun” with a refreshing fruity taste. “Jepun” is usually about 50% more expensive than HATTEN Rosé. The local “Indigo” red wine has not become very popular.

High quality mixed drinks and cocktails can be ordered at any hotel or public bar. The skill of the bartender depends on the place, but as a rule Balinese bartenders use fresh ingredients and follow the recipes exactly without resorting to those obnoxious bottled or artificial mixers found in the West. In other words, a margarita is truly a margarita-built from the bottom up by bartenders trained at bartending-school in Ubud (only Mexican restaurants carry good tequila).

In the past a wide range of imported liqueur and a (somewhat limited selection of) wines was freely available in supermarkets and restaurants, although at relatively high prices. However, recently it has become sometimes difficult to get hold of a bottle of white wine, red wine, cognac, whisky, a real Vodka, etc – no matter what price you are prepared to pay.

Some religious (Moslem) groups are trying to make the consumption of alcoholic beverages illegal in Indonesia, and there is a possibility that in future alcoholic drinks will either not be available at all or can only be served in international hotels and only to foreigners.

Native Alcoholic Drinks
The fancy cocktails and other recreational drinks concocted in the tourist restaurants and hotel bars are totally alien to village Bali, where mellow, homemade, mildly alcoholic native brews are preferred. These are produced in home breweries all over the island: ‘arak’ (insidiously strong distilled rice spirit or “palm whiskey”), ‘tuak’ (sweet palm beer or “palm toddy”), and ‘brem’ (rice wine) – all cheap, plentiful, refreshing, potent. Most villages have special drinking clubs of men (never women) who meet after sundown and sit around on coconut-leaf mats exchanging news and getting stoned. Thousands of Bali’s ‘warung’ and certain stalls in the night markets sell palm or rice toddy.

‘Tuak’ is fermented palm tree juice, the same tipple that is enjoyed everywhere in tropical Africa, Central America, and Asia. Imparting a slow-motion high, tuak is made by cutting the flower of an immature coconut tree (punyan nyuh), then allowing the sugar water to ferment for about a month. ‘Tuak’ is sold by the large beer bottle (botol bir) and can be bought at many ‘warung’. Depending upon how long the brew has been allowed to “spoil,” there are two kinds of ‘tuak’, sweet (nguda) and old (wayah). ‘Tuak Manis’ is newer, musty-smelling, and may cause flatulence; more popular ‘tuak wayah’ is older, more sour, earthier, and has a higher alcoholic content (the same as beer, around five percent).

‘Brem’ is a wine to be gently sipped like sherry; its subtle, gentle flavor gives little warning of the warm-hearted kick that follows. Made from black glutinous rice (injin), yeast, and water, old ‘brem’ (more than three days old) is sour and has more alcohol content (nine percent), while new ‘brem’ (under three days old) has an extreme sweet taste and seven percent alcohol content. Want to visit a brem brewery? Ask for Perusahaan Brem Bali Cap Dewi Sri in Sanur.

Colorless, sugarless ‘arak’ is simply distilled ‘tuak’ or ‘brem’, a cheap and powerful drink (20-50% alcohol, depending on the quality). The best is sold at Talibeng market, between Klungkung and Sideman. Balinese and some tourists drink ‘arak’ over ice and fruit juice or brem to take the edge off the ‘arak’. ‘Arak’ is an important ingredient in temple offerings.

Fruits
Discovering the local fruits, delicately crisp and bursting with juices, is one of the delights of Bali. Many of Indonesia’s fruits are found nowhere else on Earth. There are pineapples (nanas), melons, guavas, passion fruits (from Kintamani), tangerines, grapefruits, lemons, limes, lychees, grapes, vitamin-rich breadfruit (cempedak), papayas, sweet jeruk bali (like a grapefruit, pink ones are best). Also try Bali’s large, cheap, delicious oranges (juwuk). A serving of fruit is the customary dessert for most Balinese; fruit vendors and stands are found at almost every step along the busy streets of Bali’s towns and villages. The local markets offer an even greater variety. All fresh fruit and vegetables should be peeled and washed before eating.

Stands selling fruits and/or juice stay open after most other ‘warung’ close down, so you can find fruit to snack on until late at night. Along Jl. Legian in Kuta you see fresh fruit stands selling fruit for sky-high prices, and ladies on the beach sell beautifully cut-up pineapples. Prices vary widely depending on supply and demand and how far you are from the growing area.

The largest of all fruit (up to 90 cm long) is the jackfruit (nangka). Sayur nangka muda (young jackfruit) is used in cooking and taste like artichoke hearts. The very best mangoes come from the Singaraja area, the sweetest within the sound of the sea. A cousin, the mangosteen (manggis) is hailed by some as the most perfect of fruits. Its outside is round and purple, its inside is like an orange, but creamy, cool, and melts on the tongue. The mangosteen was enjoyed and lauded by Queen Victoria. Named for its prickles or duri, the smelly, infamous durian (family Sterculiuceae), spiked like a gladiator’s weapon, tastes simultaneously like onions and caramel fluff. It’s a fruit much enjoyed by those who are not put off by its evil aroma. Believed to be an aphrodisiac, an old Malay expression goes, “When the durians are down, the sarongs are up.” The fruit is named for its prickles or duri. Grown from Bangli to Kintamani, when they’re in season you’ll see them piled in stands along the road. Durian on Bali can cost as much as Rp8000 for select large ones, but it’s often difficult to find a good one (sellers seem almost eager to sell you unripe ones!).

The lychee-like rambutan has a prickly rind of a pale rose color. Within, it holds a dark green transparent jelly, somewhat like a grape in taste, but far more luscious. Don’t be alarmed by the rambutan’s hairy exterior-this is an easy fruit to love. Gently squeeze and open the fruit and enjoy the sweet, translucent flesh inside. Salak (best from Rendang) is called the snake-fruit because of the remarkable pattern of its skin; carefully peel and enjoy. It’s similar in taste to an apple. The amazing array continues: the succulent zirzak, the tiny, delicious belimbing (starfruit), and the bell-shaped jambu air (“water apple,” genus Eugenia) which, though tasteless, is an effective thirst-quencher. There are sweet, gooey, sumptuous fruits like the ceroring. The sabo is shaped like a potato but tastes like a ripe, honey-flavored peach or pear. The unbelievably juicy sweet-sour zirzak, meaning “sour sack” in Dutch (sarikaya in Balinese) is unforgettable.

Bananas
The pride of place among Balinese fruits goes to the cheap and ubiquitous banana (biyu). Steamed, deep-fried, or boiled, they are sold everywhere. Bali has, in fact, over 20 varieties in all shapes, flavors, textures, sizes, from the tiny finger-like biyu susu to the biyu raja (“king banana”) which comes closest to the size and shape of bananas as we know them in the West. Some bananas are big and fat and red-skinned; others have edible skins. There are seedless ones and ones with big black seeds (biyu batu), wild species, and some varieties that are only edible when cooked. One of the sweetest is the small “milk banana” (biyu susu), with its thin skin, incomparable taste, and perfect size. Biyu gadang are green yet ripe and ready to eat.

Bananas are used frequently as pig food and also to season meats and stews for humans. Plantains are sometimes cut into very small cubes to resemble nasi goreng and prepared in the same way as fried rice. Banana stems boiled with spices (ares) is a widespread side dish. Banana leaves also make handy food wrappers, plates, and umbrellas, functions being usurped by ugly, non-biodegradable plastic. In the past 10 years rubbish piles have accumulated on Bali for the first time-banana leaves rot away; plastic doesn’t.

Desserts
The Balinese love their sweetmeats and you’ll see them everywhere: lentil pastes, coconut cakes, gaily colored rice pastries, crunchy peanut cookies, sticky banana cakes, mung-bean soups, and other bizarre munchies. ‘Warung’ offer a great variety of sweets and snacks kept in big glass jars. Help yourself and let the owner know afterwards how many you ate of each item.

‘Lak-lak’, ‘bendu’, ‘giling-giling’, ‘culek’ and ‘batun cluki’ are traditional Balinese sweets served with grated coconut and grated sugar. Another local favorite is tape (tapioca) with ‘jaje uli’, enjoyed with durian and coffee. Try Balinese ‘dodo’l, a mixture of flour and pure cane sugar. Considered a delicacy, it’s prepared by stirring the concoction constantly for two hours over medium heat.

Scores of desserts are derived from rice. ‘Lontong’, used in ‘gado-gado’, is rice cooked in banana leaves and tastes somewhat like cold Cream of Wheat. After cooking rice, what sticks to the bottom of the pot turns brown, crunchy, and sticky. This rice-also considered a dessert-is coveted by the children of an Indonesian family as much as cake icing is in an American family. Ketan is rice pudding cooked in coconut milk and sugar syrup. Among the most popular, most filling, and heartiest native desserts is black rice pudding with coconut milk and melted brown palm sugar on top. Sumping is banana wrapped in rice dough, then steamed in a rice cooker. Irresistible godoh biyu (pisang goreng elsewhere in Indonesia) are peeled bananas dipped in manioc batter, then fried to a golden brown.

Special holiday desserts are also made of rice flour or glutinous rice; over 70 different types of rice cakes (jajan), cookies, and sweets of every color and shape imaginable (including plant, animal, and human forms). Specially made rice cakes, colored with gaudy artificial dyes, are a required component of the magnificent “high offerings,” skewered on a central banana plant stem up to two meters high. Meant for divine consumption, these are carried to temples in processions by identically dressed women. See masses of commercial rice cakes in certain sections of the market, like molten rivers of bright colors cascading over the stalls.

Another variety of jajan, made from more natural ingredients such as squash, beans, or manioc flour, is meant for human consumption. Served still warm, these sweets are a common Balinese breakfast available early in the morning from foodstalls and street vendors. At breakfast time, women walk down the lanes of Bali’s villages carrying a huge selection of jajan on trays on their heads.

Two kinds of sugar are used for desserts, the white, super-refined gula pasir (same as white sugar available in the West) and the more natural dark brown sugar, gula barak, made from the sugar palm (gula merah, in Indonesian). A syrup derived from gula barak is a favorite topping for rice cakes, fruit, and such ice dishes as es cendol, which is palm sugar, coconut milk, jackfruit and other fruits on a bed of cendol (a sweet green pudding made from rice flour and mung beans).

‘Es campur’ is the Indonesian equivalent of the banana split, and many travelers become real aficionados of this dessert. Es campur are made differently all over Indonesia but a typical one consists of sweetened water, milk, fruit syrup, gelatin, cubes of sweet bread, tape (cassava root or tapioca), ‘gage uli’, and other nameless brightly colored coagulated pulpy substances. They run anywhere from Rp500-900. The ‘es kacang’ that you find on Java is not found here; on Bali it’s a strange mixture of other fruits and little doodads.

In the “tourist dessert” category, ice cream comes in all the usual flavors plus durian, sweet corn, coconut cream, and lychee fruit. Or you can stick with such Indonesian brands as Peters. Kuta’s restaurants are known for apple pie with vanilla ice cream.

International Food

Except in Denpasar, the restaurant business is largely based on tourism, unlike Jakarta where restaurants are also patronized by locals. A non-tourist restaurant in Bali’s capital city will naturally have plenty of Indonesians sitting in it. Since Indonesians are fastidious eaters, you can bet it’s good. If you want really authentic Indonesian food, stick to the streets or eat in ‘warung’ or night markets, both of which are found even in tourist areas. Just go around to the back or to the sides of any hotel where all the service people eat.

The only restaurants where you can make reservations and use your plastic are expensive four- and five-star hotels. No matter what the class, many restaurants offer free transport though they may not advertise the fact. Always call ahead to ask.

Don’t take it for granted that the bill is correct. If it is incorrect, it will never be in your favor. Double-check the prices and add the bill up again. The higher-priced the restaurant is, the more likely a service charge and tax, varying from 10% to 21%, will be added to your bill. Hotel restaurants and restaurants at tourist sites invariably add these charges. If it’s not added, please don’t tip! It’s not expected and it should not be introduced on Bali.

Tourist Restaurants
A tourist restaurant is characterized by menus in English featuring Western-style dishes. As is the case anywhere, the number of people who patronize the establishment is an indication of its quality. Restaurants and painting galleries, particularly those along the tourist corridors, pay tour bus companies and travel agencies to stop at their establishments on their tours around the island. Your guide and driver, or the owners of the tour company, receive a commission for each person they deliver to their doorstep.

One should be wary of the species of tourist restaurant that serve Balinese/Indonesia/Chinese buffet luncheons. Popular tourist sites and heavily trafficked tourist routes seem to breed these restaurants. Since they have you and the rest of the people on your bus captive, you have no recourse but to eat the awful, tasteless, high-priced food. The restaurant is only saved by the view.

Though many of these roadside restaurants have truly inspiring and romantic garden settings or are situated in breezy open-sided pavilions, they tone down or eliminate many of the “funny-tasting” Indonesian spices in order to make the food more palatable to Westerners. On the other hand, buffets targeted to the traveler and put on by certain tourist restaurants of Kuta, Legian, and particularly Lovina, can be extraordinary good values. Read the advertised menu items carefully-soy sauce and napkins are not worthy of being included!

The biannual magazine Menu’s: The Restaurant Guide of Bali (Box 2179, Kuta) is a collection of menus from some of the best restaurants of Bali. Available for Rp2000 at most bookstores, kiosks, and hotel reception desks, it comes with a convenient restaurant locator map, index, and food list vocabulary in Indonesian. Each of the restaurants included have been personally researched and recommended by at least five people based on quality, atmosphere, cleanliness, service, and originality.

Another honest source of information for the gourmand is Eating Bali: The Complete Restaurant Guide by Mark Beshara (Times Books International), which humorously evaluates over 200 restaurants in the island’s six tourist areas. Restaurants are graded on their food, service, atmosphere, sanitation, and price. Includes maps, photos, plus a list of 59 restaurants to avoid. The information in this book, published in 1990, is only about 70% accurate.

Hotel Restaurants
The hotel restaurants of Bali are capable of truly gourmet fare. In the big resort hotels the price of all-you-can-eat breakfasts and dinner buffets, from Rp15,000 to Rp30,000, is kept reasonable so the restaurant can compete with outside dining establishments. They run on a very thin margin and thus are quite a good value.

At elegant hotel restaurants you start the day off at extravagant breakfast buffets with assorted local and imported fresh fruit, followed by ham, steak, eggs, croissants, toast, yogurt, coffee or tea. Almost all the star-hotels put on gigantic dinner buffets in which a different cuisine is featured every night of the week. Known as “food entertainment,” hotels present a variety in order to hold the interest and loyalty of hotel guests.

When hotel restaurants are good, they are very good, serving such international cuisine as marinated dolphin-fish, barbecued prawns, lobster-stuffed red chili peppers, avocados overflowing with shrimp, mango zabaglione, pineapple flambéed with Grand Marnier sauce, and huge river crabs with claws the size of lobsters crammed with extraordinarily delicious sweet fluffy white meat. All are accompanied by fine imported European and Australian wines. Some hotels offer hot and cold breakfast and dinner buffets of 50-odd dishes.

In all but the very cheapest and most expensive hotels, breakfast is included in the price of the room. The lady who runs your Homestay will probably give you fresh fruit, a bottomless pot of good tea, a thermos of hot water for coffee, and a dish of homemade ‘jajan’ (cookies to the Americans, biscuits to the Brits). Unless you say otherwise you’ll be served coffee and tea in glasses filled one-third with sugar and sweet condensed milk. In the higher cost hotels (US$20-30 and up), you can save the cost of breakfast (usually charged extra) if you travel with a heating element and make your coffee or tea and eat baked goods and fruit (bought the day before) in your hotel room each morning. You can cut down on your food costs if you buy snacks, drinks, and groceries at a nearby supermarket, then prepare some of your food in your hotel room or front veranda. Higher-priced hotels frequently have refrigerators in the rooms.

Ethnic Restaurants
For those who crave a dish cooked in the style of their home country, you will not be disappointed on Bali. The choice of international cuisine is unlimited-Bali offers everything from Moroccan couscous and Mexican enchiladas to Polish borchst and Swiss fondue.

Not all ethnic-restaurants are good-some fall down on the job of re-creating their cuisine on Bali. Really authentic versions of Italian and French food, for example, are difficult to achieve when using local ingredients. If it’s a pizza or home-style steak you’re looking for, don’t be too critical. Fried bread is many restaurants’ version of toast. Salads, as a rule, are not their forte. Balinese banana pancakes don’t contain any leavening, only flour and egg, and taste like extra thick crepes. Despite its Hindu origins, neither is Bali the place to eat great homemade curries. “Maharaja Curry” bears about as much resemblance to curry as Westminster Abbey does to the Taj Mahal. Dozens of restaurants serve Mexican dishes, but be forewarned that tacos are sometimes nothing more than Chinese stir-fried vegetables on a big cracker-no relation to a real taco. Nachos and guacamole are served with ‘krupuk’ instead of corn chips. When in doubt, always order food from the restaurant’s Indonesian menu-that they know how to cook well. And you’ll have ample opportunity to try Javanese cooking on Bali, which is perhaps more to the liking of the Western palate.

Chinese restaurants are generally more expensive than tourist eating places but offer more variety and culinary sophistication. Visit Chinese restaurants in a group so that a wide variety of tasty dishes can be sampled. The Chinese are a little fussy about their meat intake, taking only small, gourmet-cooked portions, so if you feel that Indonesian or Balinese food is short on vegetables head for a Chinese restaurant, which usually serves an abundance of fresh vegetables with their dishes. A typical Chinese-style restaurant now charges about Rp10,000-15,000 per person minimum for a large meal, including beer.

Vegetarian
Bali is not Yogyakarta – the vegetarian capital of Indonesia-but in the countryside you come across amazingly nutritious and tasty vegetarian dishes. All over Bali you can enjoy ‘bubur sayur bayam’ (rice porridge with coconut shavings, coconut cream, chili sauce, and peanut plant leaves) for as little as Rp200. The little old ladies who sell it come out from 0600 to 0700, then again from 1400 to 1700. There is health food in restaurants in Kuta, Legian, Sanur, and Ubud.

It’s common for restaurants to include many vegetarian items on their menus. Look for Chinese-style dishes in particular. You can, in fact, pick almost anything from a menu and get the vegetarian version by saying (though writing it out is always better) tanpa daging or kurang daging (without meat) after the name of the item. Example: Nasi goreng tanpa daging is “nasi goreng without meat.” Also teh tanpa gula means “tea without sugar.”

The majority of restaurants have tofu (tahu) and ‘tempe’ in the kitchen, so just say “Saya mau cap cay tanpa daging. Sayur-sayuran saja. Boleh pakai tahu atau tempe” (“I want chop suey without meat. Vegetables only. Please add tofu or tempe”). When ordering ‘nasi campur’, go up and point to what you want to make sure you don’t get meat. Don’t leave it up to them. Don’t hesitate to ask for more vegetables (tambah lagi means “add more”).

Sea Foods
Though surrounded by sea, the Balinese themselves are not big on seafood; the catch goes either to the island’s canneries or to the local tourist restaurants. Kuta and Sanur’s Chinese restaurants serve the best seafood on the island.

You should try exotic fish and shellfish dishes, which are probably more affordable on Bali than in your own country. Fish and shellfish dinners average Rp10,000-15,000, about half the Singapore price and about one-third the American or European price. The flipping wet fish is usually brought to you on a platter for your inspection, and then it is charbroiled and presented to you cooked, tantalizingly tender, spiked with scallions and slices of lime. You can often get a better price if you bargain before you even enter the restaurant. Select the fish you want, then offer 30% less than the price they quote you. You’ll probably get it at around 15% less. Remember: The more fish you buy, the better price you should get.

Lobster is supposedly the delicacy of the island; it costs about US$5 per 100 gram. This means a full lobster dinner with bottle of beer will set you back US$15-20. The Nusa Dua hotels are the most expensive at about US$6 or US$7 per 100 gram. A better deal is fresh grilled red snapper, which is firm, fleshy, and tasty.

Fast Food
A relatively new phenomenon is Bali’s fast-food restaurants. In spite of a wonderful native cuisine, you see popping up such outlets as Burger King (two locales in Kuta), Kentucky Fried Chicken (outlets in Kuta, Legian, Sanur, and Denpasar), McDonald’s, Pizza Hut, and Church’s Texas Fried Chicken. There are also two Swenson’s and one Pioneer Chicken. For the most part, these Western franchises cater to Jakartans and other Indonesian “outsiders” who like to eat “modern.”

Night Markets
Open-air ‘pasar malam’ in Bali’s large towns offer a collection of smoky, ramshackle ‘warung’ where some of the best food for the money can be had. A trip into town to eat at the night market – whether in Kuta, Ubud, Bangli, Gianyar, Singaraja, or Amlapura – makes for a great night out. The visitor will discover an array of European, Arabian, Chinese, Indian, and local Indonesian cuisine.

These collections of makeshift foodstalls-poor-men’s restaurants-are aglow with hissing gas lamps, covered by plastic canopies, and provided with wooden benches or stools. Pure Indonesian and occasionally Balinese cuisine, including such delicious snacks as ‘krupuk’, ‘pisang goreng’, and fried ‘tempe’, are eaten with a cheap aluminum spoon amid much banter from your fellow diners. You’re assured of a genuine and lively atmosphere. If you’re sitting in one foodstall, it doesn’t mean you can’t also order from ones nearby. Choose one with the friendliest atmosphere, then walk around to neighboring ‘warung’ and order different food treats. If you gesture to where you’re sitting, each vendor will deliver your dish to you. If you don’t speak Bahasa Indonesia, simply point to anything that looks good.

Excellent ‘pasar malam’ is often in the perimeters of markets and bus stations. One of the largest is in Denpasar, behind the parking lot of the multistoried Kumbasari Shopping Complex; other night markets are at the Suci Bus Station and the Sports Stadium (corner of Jl. Supratman and Jl. Melati). At night along Jl. Teuku Umar, tent restaurants open up. Very popular with the locals are such dishes as ayam chi-chi, grilled fried chicken with lalab (Sundanese salad).

Day Markets
If you prefer to do your own cooking, buy household and kitchen utensils in the markets along Jl. Gajah Mada in Denpasar, then visit the native markets for your grocery staples.

While the cattle market (pasar ternak) is the domain of the men, the everyday village market is the world of women-haggling, gossiping, cooking, working. Markets in most villages, even the size of Ubud, take place every three days where you’ll see a cornucopia of grains, beans, seeds, greens, fruit, and pastes of all colors and textures, as well as typical pasar, and snacks such as ‘klepon’, ‘pisang rai’, ‘bubur sumsum’.

Stands in the markets serve up soups, vegetables, curries, betel nut wrapped in palm leaf. Great care is taken to make the food attractive so as to catch the shopper’s eye: flowers are strewn over fruit, dishes are brightly garnished, and green leaves are spread under vegetables. Get there by 0600 with the housewives and ‘pembantu’ (house-servants) because the best and freshest produce and the best price go to the quick and audacious. There are at least three price levels: the lowest to those in the same ‘kampung’, a higher price to fellow Balinese, and highest of all to the Javanese and other foreigners who pay a “newcomer’s tax” on local goods and services (don’t feel ripped off, it’s a negligible amount). Treat bargaining as entertainment, an enjoyable means of communication.

Supermarkets
At a number of Western-style, air-conditioned supermarkets around the island you can score such imported and expensive items as peanut butter, jams, cereal, liquor, Australian T-bone steaks, New Zealand lamb legs, U.S. sirloins (local meat is too lean and tough), frozen meat, and fresh seafood from lobster to snapper. Most are laid out like mini-shopping malls. Some even offer discounted goods, giveaways, and special promotions.

Kuta’s Gelael Dewata (with a branch on Jl. Bypass in Sanur) has the best deli and wine selections. There’s even a market in Seminyak near the road down to the Oberoi that’s open 24-hours called K-Mart. It carries deli items like fresh and processed cheeses, fresh baked breads, dairy products, cereals, biscuits, and beverages. If you’re buying biscuits, nuts, and snacks, get the Indonesian product, which is fresh, delicious, and cheap. Especially good are the locally produced butter cookies and shortbread. All imported fruit is expensive, but if you want oranges or stone fruit, you have no choice in the matter.