Bali High - Two Days, Two Lunches

Bali can be many things to many people. For some, Bali is about being at a luxury hotel on the beach and fine dining. For others, it can be a spiritual haven while staying a basic homestay. I definitely experienced this kind of contrast on different days during two different lunch experiences : "local" Bali and a little more "touristy" Bali.

Eating at local and authentic restaurants in Bali occurs primarily in local warungs, or open air restaurants where locals eat a variety of Balinese dishes ranging from crispy fried duck to roasted suckling pig. I didn't want to leave Bali without at least having the opportunity to eat totally in the same manner as the people who live there.

What I'm going to call our Warung Lunch #1 happened when we went to view Gunung (Mount) Batur and Lake Batur.

Gunung Batur is an actual active volcano. There have been multiple eruptions in the 20th century including one in 1917 that killed a thousand people; one that started in September 1963 and ended in March 1964; and the most recent in 1994 which apparently still happens from time to time (glad I missed it this time around). It's not always a full lava flow though, so don't worry if you're planning on making a trip there.

Right next Gunung Batur is Lake Batur.

Purty, ain't it?

On our way up to the Mount/Lake Batur area, I asked our guide for the day NOT to take us to any buffet or anything like that, which is readily available to tourists who make the trip to that part of the island. Instead, I asked for a local, cheap and presumably good warung. So did I get the authentic warung experience? Let's see...

It's got a great view of Lake Batur.

Well let's get a checklist going:

-open air - Check!

-a plastic covered menu - Check!

-no pictures, descriptions or translations of the food - Check!

-plastic tablecloth - Check!

-waitress that didn't really speak much English - Check!

-a few flies buzzing around - Check!

A Balinese warung experience...priceless.

A happy me

Husband J's choice for lunch was Cap Cay, a vegetable casserole with a chop suey-like consistency that often includes chicken, seafood, beef, tofu or pretty much any protein you want. It is influenced by Chinese cooking although it's a pretty common Indonesian dish. Husband J's version was spicy and as you'll soon see not his first Cap Cay of the trip.

For me, I had the Ikan goreng bumbu bali. So how did I pick that? Well I know the "goreng" means fried, and I took a quick look at our guidebook and realized that "ikan" means fish. I wasn't sure about the rest, so I figured that I'd just be surprised.

I knew I was getting fish, but I was pretty shocked to see a whole one. I guess when your warung overlooks a lake, fish is pretty easy to come by? I loved the fish. Underneath all of that sauce, was a nice crispy fried fish (what kind I couldn't tell). The sauce was of a thick spicy peanut variety, and a welcome level of fiery flavor from what we'd be getting from more tourist oriented places. Yay! Real Balinese folks' food. Woo hoo!

I didn't take me long to get through it.

Sadly, I don't even know the name of this place; but if you're in Kintamini on the road overlooking Mount Batur and Lake Batur, definitely stop in. For a basic meal for two including drinks for 88,000 rupiah (about $9 USD), it was pretty darn good.

From super cheap where the locals hang to a more well-known tourist friendly restaurant in the heart of Ubud, Husband J and I stopped in for lunch at Cafe Wayan. Cafe Wayan is very much an institution in Ubud having pioneered the art of making authentic yet tourist friendly Indonesian dishes. This place even had a write up in Food & Wine magazine (I guess I should now divulge the fact that I have been a Food & Wine subscriber for over 7 years just in case I mention it too much.) I don't blame tourists for wanting to come here. Wouldn't you want to eat somewhere that looked like this?

Yes, folks, this is a restaurant.

Each individual hut/"bale" has one to three tables.

Husband J never really got used to sitting on the floor.

Oh yeah, we actually ate too. :)

Husband J's Cap Cay, similar taste as the warung's version just much less spice. To me, it was more like a stew/soup, and I made sure that I sneaked a few bites for myself.

I had Cafe Wayan's version of Nasi Goreng (fried rice). Just like mie goreng, you can find nasi goreng all over Indonesia. Again, as with most dishes, everyone has their own way of preparing and serving a dish. Cafe Wayan's version includes shrimp crackers, chicken satay and some very interesting fritters (I think they were vegetable), and what seemed to be a potato salad. The fried rice was very light and nothing was too spicy. I was a happy tourist, but I definitely added some sambal (chili sauce) to the rice for extra kick.

Chicken satay

What sets Cafe Wayan apart from many other restaurants in central Ubud is their wonderful selection of pastries. They are known for their Death by Chocolate cake. I'm not a big chocolate person, but this worked for me totally. No cloyingly super sweet chocolate here. Just moist, rich cake with a pretty decent frosting made even better some chocolate sauce on the side. I highly recommend it.

So there you have, two very different ways to have a great lunch Balinese style!

Bali HIgh - I See You, Cheeky Monkey

Having been on a safari and seen animals outside of a zoo, I thought I'd be okay with getting up close and personal with the monkeys of the Monkey Forest, part nature preserve and part sacred shrine to monkeys, in the heart of Ubud. I can handle this, right?

Husband J in the Monkey Forest

One of our monkey friends. I think he's posing.

Well, I'll definitely say that it was an experience. For parts of my trip to Bali, I couldn't shake the distinct feeling that I was slowly but surely being eaten alive by bugs. Even when there was nothing on my skin I STILL felt like I was some lovely Balinese bugger's lunch. (I had a special relationship with some bug repellent with 35% DEET.) Actually that was the case during our very short jaunt in the Monkey Forest except in addition to bugs I had to also think about these cheeky little monkeys. But they're so cute, right? Hmm...

At least the babies are. :)

Families are cute too!

While they are cute, knowing that these very quick and known to be occasionally unfriendly animals were essentially right next to me didn't always sit well. We'd heard stories of the monkeys grabbing food (hey, they get hungry too!), sunglasses, and other objects not stapled to your body. Umm...fun.

I mean there are just so many of them. You feel kinda surrounded.

Some of them were up to a little monkey business..okay, I had to. :) But seriously I noticed several monkey couples searching each other's fur. I think that maybe they were searching each other's fur for ticks or maybe cleaning each other? What do you think?

There were other things in the Monkey Forest besides...monkeys.

Cool statue..with a monkey

A closed off temple area

So Husband J and I are close to the exit, and we're thinking that it wasn't so bad. We've made it through the Monkey Forest. The next thing I know I feel something on me. It's a monkey! I'm thrashing about, and the little cheeky monkey finally jumps off of me. The whole episode took about 5 seconds, but it felt like a whole lot more. They're super quick. Don't believe me? See below.

This wasn't the monkey who jumped on me, but it was probably his cousin.

Thanks to the Monkey Forest, I've definitely had my fill of monkeys for awhile. :)

Bali High - Battle of the Hotel Breakfasts in Bali

I figure that I would start with breakfast. Breakfast, really? Well, it is the most important meal of the day! :) You'll see why breakfast was one of our favorite parts of our trip.

Both of our wonderful hotels, Komaneka Bisma in Ubud and The Samaya in Seminyak offered breakfast as part of the cost of our accommodations. Just 'cause it's included doesn't mean that it wasn't good! So who will win the battle of the all-included, tropical fruit laden breakfast?

First up, our first hotel, Komaneka Bisma in Ubud. Each of the breakfasts here was almost its own multi-course set meal. The first thing you get to choose are these wide array of freshly made tropical juices.

Watermelon juice, light refreshing and actually full of nutrients. Oh yeah, that's Husband J in the background.

First out was a tropical fruit salad with everything from watermelon, papaya, pineapple, lychees, etc. (it changed each day) along with the Komaneka's own version of muesli, a pre-mixed concoction of yogurt and granola.

I have not admit I wasn't always a huge fan of the muesli because it created this whole soupy, milky mess. I guess sometimes I have texture issues?

Warm banana bread, not too sweet with even more fruit (and dollop of yogurt)!

One day Husband J chose the Egg Ricotta, which is sort of an odd way of describing what is essentially quiche. There's also some grilled tomato, their version of some sort of hashbrown and small amount of spinach and sauteed mushrooms. Also don't forget the bacon!

I actually had this a day later and while I think the Balinese do well with roasting pig (more on that another time), I don't think their strenghts lie in bacon. I like my bacon somewhat crispy, but this was a bit overcooked and had lost the bacony good stuff in the cooking process. The mushrooms were down right awesome,and I wished there were more on the plate. The quiche itself was light, and the eggs didn't overpower many of the other ingredients in the quiche (although I did want to taste some more cheese!)

Another dish both Husband J and I had at the Komaneka was the poached eggs with smoked salmon. Props to the restaurant staff for even asking if I wanted mine poached soft, medium or hard. Yes, I know that there are diehards out there who think poaching an egg too hard is killing the dish but sometimes too runny eggs give me the heebeegeebees. More latent texture issues?

Finally an omelette with similar accompaniments as the Egg Ricotta (quiche or whatever you want to call it!)

Overall, the Komaneka's breakfast were tasty and filling, and I loved having a little feast each morning to look forward to. This is from a person whose breakfast is usually yogurt and fruit or maybe a whole grain waffle so I am not starving at noon. I could get used to this hotel breakfast spread thing, and, boy, did it get better!

Enter the Samaya. I really liked the food here, really. Honestly, it was some of the best food that we had in Bali. In addition to daily breakfasts there (also included), we had a dinner there that I will let you know about later. Anyway, here were some of the highlights from our breakfasts.

I am currently missing the fruit juice. Sigh...papaya juice (which tasted like some lime might be in there somewhere!). Husband J declared that he really likes papaya, so I made a mental note.

Also check the bread, y'all! Wooo..those croissants were bangin'. Warm and crusty on the outside but moist and chewy on the inside as they should be.

Okay, banana juice. Really? Can you really get JUICE from a banana? I'm going to call this a banana "drink" 'cause this was waay too good, and I could swear I tasted a hint of coconut in it, but I could be wrong. I want one of these today. Like right now.

The frittata with baby potatoes, mushrooms, feta cheese, with roasted cherry tomatoes and crisp basil for garnish. Nice! I love when you can taste each ingredient in a frittata, and it's not just one baked egg taste, know what I mean?

Loving the fruit plate, which like the Komaneka's, was a little different each day. No milky soup from the muesli! How did they get the pineapple to look like that? (See it on the left?) Don't try that home! Although I would be impressed if someone e-mailed me your attempt at that. :)

Wait! This doesn't look like breakfast, but it is! The Komaneka did offer their own version of an Indonesian breakfast, but I have to admit that I was a little intimidated by it. Too many choices maybe? The Samaya's was a simple choice between nasi goreng (Indonesian friend rice) and mie goreng (fried noodles). Yes, those are two pieces of beef satay, by the way. I loved this so much that I had it twice. The Samaya version included tender pieces of shrimp, baby squid, cabbage, and a big 'ol egg on top with shrimp crackers. Plus pickled veggies and sambal (Indonesian hot sauce which I think was modified for the tourist palate)

I loved the light spice, and since I am very much a salt person, this satisfied my savory early morning cravings. Besides, I'm not getting this at IHOP or any other brunch menu here in the US, so why not?

Finally, smoked Tasmanian salmon (their words, not mine) and scrambled eggs on ciabatta with creme fraiche and chives and a little salmon roe on the side. Doesn't it just look pretty? It tasted pretty darn good too! Again, I love my salt in the morning, and the scrambled eggs weren't too runny but cooked to a nice consistency (more bordering on hard than soft). The smoke salmon wasn't a wimpy sliver but a nice thick, fresh cut. Salmon roe in the morning? A'ight with me.

The winner? I'm going to have to go with the Samaya, although their restaurant is highly regarded so that probably isn't a fair fight, right? I am ready to go back to Bali just so I can have breakfasts like these.

I would love to hear about any great hotel or B &B breakfasts you've had.

I'm Back! A Preview of Bali

Hey, all!!

Sorry for the extended break, but preparations for Bali as well as the trip itself made it pretty hard to blog. Well, I could have blogged while away, but I'm sure Husband J gets to see me do a lot of that at home. :) Since this trip was the honeymoon we never took, I wanted to make sure that we got some q-time (quality time for those of you who are not dorks like me), and we did!

Let me first say that Bali is a unique, beautiful and fascinating place. I feel like in the 9 days we were there, we only scratched the surface of what we could have seen and done. From sightseeing, to cooking, dancing and art classes, there was a lot we could have done and didn't. Insert sad face. :( It made me sad knowing that I don't know when I am going to be able to make this 24+ hour journey from New York City again, but I tried not to think about that part too much. Less than 36 hours after being back, I already miss it. Okay, well, I don't miss having to put on bug cream with DEET or brushing my teeth with bottled water, but I still had a great time!

Here's a sample of some of the things we saw and ate while there:

This is just the tip of the iceberg. More to come soon!