Bali 2009: Foooooooood : )

Arriving at Denpasar, we were on a desperate hunt for food. At the hawker square near the hotel, we were ambushed by menus, some even had a crab shoved in their faces. No photo of that though.


Nasi goreng. First Indonesian meal.


Rin's fried rice looked so much better though. Pity her tummy was too small to stomach it all. She had some help from Kenny, our resident sapu-er.


This is Es Fansus. Wa, wtf I know. What the heck is Fansus supposed to mean? It's actually quite simple, really. It's a potion of Fanta and susu. Not like the fresh milk, because it's only carbonated sirap bandung. Fanta and sweetened condensed milk. One can opt for either cola or strawberry Fanta to go with the condensed milk. I must say the one with cola tastes better.


Me in geli mode. I know the facial expression makes it look quite disgusting, but it tasted okay. Just trying to 'embrace' the new taste, you know?


After supper, we went to a club nearby, Vi Ai Pi. I was secretly (but shamelessly) LOL-ing at the name. This here is Blue Lagoon. Or something, I can't remember, although it's mostly my hand that's in the picture. I like my fingers thanks, I sayang them, they make me happy. Insert inappropriate thoughts here.


The next day, right before we headed out to Jimbaran for dinner, we went shroom-hunting. Unfortunately, Oscar's was out, so we had to get some from another shop down the road. So excited looking forward to my first shroomsperience. But when I did, I was so disappointed. Didn't feel a thing! But that was all about to change as I was determined not to go home until I shroomed my most perfect shroom.


Kenny Christ and his four disciples. The view was really quite good, until it got dark! We missed our first Bali sunset! : ( The meal here put quite a fair dent in our spending for as early as Day 1.


Quite a decent spread, I thought. Fish, squid, chicken, all looking quite good, we were salivating.


Until we realized the lobster only had two bites in it. But we still pretty much wiped the food off the table, out of sheer hunger. Some of us were famished because of the late breakfast/early lunch.


I normally like crispy, crunchy squid. But this had a little too much flour. Still good nonetheless.


There were really good corn near the restaurant. I suspect they were marinated in like pork fat or something to that effect.


How did they do it? There was a meaty kind of Maggi perencah taste to it. The fact that one managed to roll off the tissue onto the table (which could have had sand and God knows what other gross stuff on it) and still managed to get eaten by moi proved that. Even Kenny who despised corn ate it and said it was good.


Kenny and Rin playing with their fruits, if you know what I mean. Hehehe...


At night, we checked in to Nefatari, which was a delightful place. We expressed our 2 seconds worth of undying love to Kenny for finding this place. Breakfast was quite good too. I loved the bacon! Pineapple juice was great, no sugar, no ice. Just pineapple. Squished and squashed into pulp and juice.


For lunch, we were in Ubud and had Babi Guling. The meat was alright. We failed to see why other people who have eaten there couldn't stop singing praises about it though.


We also ordered a portion of pork skin. I figured it must be good because how bad can pork skin taste? I like my Chinese style roast pork, it makes me a very happy person. And kind too, I might add. But this one threatens to incur a really expensive dental bill. The skin was too hard to bite into. Didn't like it too much.


Since we were trying the local favorites, we also did the Bebek Betutu. This I thought was really good. And I could eat it again and again for the next two weeks. The duck was quite boney, almost like bat's meat. You know how you need to de-bone the bat before you eat. Er, actually, maybe not. Hehehe...


Here's the Bebek Betutu at another angle. The side dish was really good too. I appreciate side dishes that complement the main dish so I wiped my dish clean.


After checking out from the hotel, we drove up to (actually, Kenny drove us up to) Mount Batur. As we were getting ready to leave the hotel, Kenny tells us that Mount Batur is quite cold, so all of us asked for a more specific reference of cold. And he said Genting Highlands. In case you don't know, Genting Highlands is no longer cold right, and we all thought he just meant it is cooling la. You have your regular breeze, slightly cooler than KL temperature. Nice to sit outside and have drinks kind of cool. But when we got up there, it was freezing. GENTING FREAKING HIGHLANDS IS SO NOT THE CORRECT REFERENCE CAN! Anyway, we had lunch there, in the cold. Our lunch consisted of flies fish and flies. The sauce was quite good. But fish is not really my thing. Unless if it's got no bones.


Our next hotel was in Padangbai. There was a blackout the night we arrived and we had to eat crappy food for dinner. Actually, I'd rather not talk about it. I am suppressing the unhappy (lao sai berturut-turut) memories. Hotel breakfast was quite decent and healthy. Everything is organic, even the butter is unsalted (which none of us liked, but still).


After snorkeling and diving, we once again packed up and hit the roads. Thinking we would find a nice place to eat, we saved our tummies for later (bad idea). As we drove, we didn't see any food places to eat at and we were really hungry and couldn't take it anymore. So we stopped at a roadside stall (really bad idea) to have Bakso Ayam (out of this world bad idea). Jac was clever enough to eat some noodles and proceeded to donate her (they say it's chicken, but we think it could be dog) balls to Kenny. So she conveniently dropped them all in his bowl while he was taking photos (hands down THE worst idea. Ever). Kenny shat water after that and refuses to talk about it later. I on the other hand only shat jelly poopage several hours later after we checked in to the next hotel.


Thankfully for dinner that night, we had a good one. This is the tuna salad something which Rin ordered. It was really good.


The breakfast at the villa was delicious too. This is Dato' Sia and his four atas princesses. "I hope you're not still seeing that guy. Grunt, grunt, ramble ramble".


For lunch we ate at The Beach House, where we ordered from the previous night. The lobster bisque definitely kicks the Jimbaran lobster's ass.


I had prawns in garlic sauce which was terrific.


Olives and cheese as appetizers made lunch even better. Best things ever!


Rin had pork spare ribs which Jac ordered the night before. The mashed potatoes were really good, and it didn't even have to have gravy to go along with it to be great.


Kenny opted for Soto Ayam. This one I'm quite sure it's chicken. According to him, this was okay too.


For dessert, Cindy ordered this caramel ice-cream crepe thing. All of us had a bite and really liked it. But it melted too fast : (

A few tips to keep in mind. Try not to eat at roadside stalls. Rin described the dish-washing steps as (from what I summarize) Dip n Dry. Don't eat seafood at Jimbaran, the pricing is the most unreasonable, obviously because of the view. For speedy food serving, order local cuisine like nasi goreng, soto ayam, lontong. And I suppose, if you really can't help it and have to lao sai, bring a book with you, it's going to be a long night.