Good Eats

Right off we got a hold of our first fresh, passionfruit and mangosteens (I didn’t get a photo). They were whole, unopened on our hotel breakfast buffet the first morning, so we went a little nuts. How to eat: press thumb into the crunchy shell until it yields, then pull it apart. Consume the entire interior with a giant smile on your face. I spent the entire rest of the trip asking for mangosteens and not finding them until I ran through a local market on one of our last days and found some just as they were closing. “End of day special,” she said to me as I gave her my last rupiah. A half kilo of mangosteens (5 of them) for $2. As an added bonus, they boil the dark purple rinds of the mangosteen to make a dye for their batik process. 

Our hotel buffet breakfast cakes… and BMW, which was weird – they are too wide for the roads – so this was an anomaly that I just happened to capture. I could have eaten those little sugar cakes all day though.

Lunchtime fruit in a fresh coconut. This was my 12-year old’s favorite: chunks of fresh fruit swimming in a half coconut full of milk they had colored green. In the foreground, spice rubbed chicken with salsas.

 

There’s chicken under that pile of spiced peanut sauce. And field greens, no rice.

Small child, large pile of veggies. This dish is sayur urap – bean sprouts, green beans, spinach and toasted coconut covered in a flavorful sauce of tumeric, shallots, galangal (a spicy root like ginger), red chilies and keffir lime.

 

Coconut curry chicken with green beans and red peppers. The flowers were all over the ground and I thought I’d garnish the table with them. 

Traditional Balinese roasted spiced chicken – Ayam betutu – which uses flavors from tumeric, caraway, coriander, cardamom, lemongrass and garlic. The spices are crushed into a paste and spread over the top side of the chicken before slow roasting. Roasted peanuts in a ginger-coconut salad and 2 amazing sauces to add.

 

Cashew chicken and a cone of garlic rice. Sweet tea to drink. And while you can’t drink the water without treating it, the ice cubes are government regulated and made with only purified water. Joe, sitting next to me had ginger coffee – fresh ginger and grounds brewed together right in the cup. Yum!

 

Now, my favorite restaurant of the whole trip: Cafe Wayan. You could think of it as a restaurant with a garden, but it was really the other way around.  

 

Each table was secluded under its own thatched roof, open air, of course.

Traditionally dressed waiters brought food with a smile…

as if we were the only people they had to serve. It was luxurious in its space and place. The food was spectacular, too. This is where I had my first nasi campur which translates as “little taste of everything.” I expecially liked that they made a salsa boat out of a slice of banana leaf. The drink was broccoli pineapple something. I just remember it sounded weird but tasted wonderful and cooling. Bintang is one of the 2 local beers of Bali. 

 

Video of the place below