I want to take Indonesia with me as a whole – to the last coffee bean. And you also want to eat it completely – to the last grain of rice. The only way to somehow resist this is to clearly define what exactly you need. An overview of the best dishes and incomparable fruits of the island (with prices) will help you.
Recall that in previous articles we talked about the best beaches and places for surfing in Bali, and in another article – about what you should definitely see and visit in Bali, except for the beaches.
WHAT DISHES TO TRY IN BALI
I propose to start with the gastronomic side of Bali. The national dishes of Indonesia, of course, are known much less than the popular dishes of their Asian neighbors – for example, Thai tom yam or Vietnamese pho-bo soup.
which are well-known in Russia. But this does not make Bali’s culinary diversity less striking. As in other Asian countries, Indonesians love rice, vegetables, meat, spicy and fried, but there are real “calling cards” of local cuisine that you must definitely learn, taste and remember.
The name speaks for itself – fried rice with fillers. Nasi goreng can be vegetarian, meat or seafood and with the obligatory addition of a large amount of oil. Fried rice is often garnished with scrambled eggs on top, and always served with rice chips. In Indonesia, they often use chips instead of bread – there are rice, corn and (we advise) very tasty shrimp (krupuk).
You can find such a dish both in a good restaurant, for example, Menega Cafe Jimbaran (in the Jimbaran district), and in a simple warung (street cafe).
Miya goreng is also considered very popular, the cooking technology and ingredients are generally the same as for goreng, only in this case it is not rice, but different types of noodles.
Sata is ideal for both fried rice and noodles – small skewers of pork, chicken or lamb, less often beef on skewers.
The meat in sate is amazing: soft, juicy with a rich taste. When making sate, the meat is soaked in grated coconut, coconut milk, and other spices, and served with walnut and other sauces.
Traditionally, most Indonesian dishes are served with special dressings.
Another exemplary Indonesian dish is gado-gado. This is a salad of boiled vegetables (beans, zucchini, spinach, etc.) with tofu and tempeh (pressed soybeans fried in oil), served with peanut sauce. Gado-gado does not at all correspond to its associations in Russian, it is not nasty, but very tasty, light, absolutely not spicy, rather, even sweetish because of the peanut sauce.
This soup contains boiled chicken or beef meat, meatballs made from soy flour and minced meat, cereals or noodles and fresh thinly chopped cabbage.
But the way pork is cooked on a spit (babi guling) in Indonesia is not cooked anywhere else. Historically ceremonial, this dish has become truly outstanding, thanks in large part to special roasting techniques and traditional spices. Juicy meat chopped into strips.
as well as baked lard and, finally, meat with streaks of lard, are placed in each portion of babi guling. As a rule, this meat is served with vegetables of varying degrees of spiciness. They cook such pork perfectly at the famous Spice Restaurant in Ubud.
And the Char char bar & grill restaurant in Seminyak serves European cuisine (we advise you to try pasta there) and incomparable drinks. In Indonesia, freshly squeezed juices from pink guava, mango, all kinds of mixes – from mango and dragon fruit to beets.
pineapple and papaya, cocktails with coffee (I advise you to try green coffee with fruit) are very fond of. A ginger drink, temulawak, is also very refreshing, be sure to ask for ice cubes. Jamu drinks made from herbs and spices, roots, flowers, and fruits are also popular in Indonesia. But they are most often sold in the markets, or in warungs.
As for alcohol. Here he is not held in high esteem, the locals drink very rarely, except perhaps a little vodka of their own production arak (from the fruits of the palm tree).
Arak, which has been a ritual drink for Balinese ceremonies for centuries, is now more of a popular souvenir. Of course, all types of alcohol are available to tourists in bars: beer, wine, tequila, etc., but get ready for the fact that all these drinks are imported (mainly from Australia) and are not at all cheap.
So, beer costs about 250 rubles per 0.3 ml, for a glass of Australian wine you will have to pay about 600 rubles. Food prices in restaurants are moderate: a portion of baby gulling costs about 650 rubles, gado-gado about 300 rubles, nasi goreng about 300 rubles, a green tea cocktail with pieces of fruit – from 250 rubles.
For those who are not ready to spend that kind of money on food, but still want to try the delights of local cuisine, we advise you to eat in warungs, which seem to have occupied all the sidewalks of the island. In general, in Bali, at every step, something is fried, boiled, boiled.
This fruit looks like a green apple, but inside it is pink with a lot of seeds, the pulp is fragrant, remotely reminiscent of mango, strawberries and pineapple. Choose fruit according to its softness, the softer the riper. The price per kilogram is about 100-120 rubles.
