Indonesian Restaurants in Cairns Were Disappointing

First, I am unsure whether I should even write this post because the Indonesian restaurants in Cairns were below par.

But then again, I didn’t have one satisfying food experience in Cairns; it varied from expensive-AND-bad and okay-BUT-expensive, so I guess it could be just me. So maybe you can go to Cairns and prove me wrong ━ , God, I hope so!

Meanwhile, I will take this experience as a part of the learning of going to two Indonesian restaurants in Cairns, only to be proven that there can be more than one bad Indonesian restaurant in a foreign city.

in Melbourne, it’s Pondok Rempah. Pondok Rempah used to be my go-to Indonesian restaurant in the city. Then their service level slowly dropped, which was still fine with me until the last time I visited them, waited almost an hour for the food to come, served with watery soup and left without the rest of my order despite reminding them about it a few times.

Anyway, back to my story about multiple bad Indonesian restaurants in Cairns experience.

The first one was called Bagus.

Bagus is a roadside food stall which usually means it would be good (read: cheap and tasty) by the unofficial Indonesian food culture standard. Bagus’s service was good; I will say that. But they didn’t have more than one thing on the menu, deep-fried the chicken to death with oil that had been used too many times. Also, the sambal well left a lot of spicinesses to be desired. And they charged $43.07 for two chickens, two rice and two Teh Botol.

The second (and last one) was called Bayleaf Balinese Restaurant. It was a bit of a walk from the hotel but looked promising as it was almost complete by the time we arrived, less than 30mins after the start of their evening opening hours.

Unfortunately, my hope dwindled after getting lousy service. I had some questions about the menu and asked the waitress; she gave me a blank look, repeated my questions to me (not the answer) and left.

My question was about the menu because the choices didn’t seem familiar.

For example, they have multiple choices of meat/veggies cooked in the “Kalas” style. I have been to Bali many times ━ we even got married there, and never I ever heard of “Kalas”. But it could be because it’s Balinese food, and I might not be well-versed in it as I would with Javanese food.

Then I saw on the menu ━ the choice of doing Balinese Rijsttafel. Hu? Why? First, Rijsttafel is a Dutch term (for the Indonesian eating style of many dishes served in small portions, eaten together with rice, usually shared by a group of people). Second, Indonesian restaurants in Indonesia rarely use the term Rijsttafel, not even in Jakarta, let alone Bali. So why would a Balinese restaurant serving so-called Indonesian Balinese food in Cairns, Australia, use that concept? It was confusing and unnecessary. Why not call it Feed Me – a widely known term in Australian food culture?

Balinese Rijsttafel sounds confusing and unnecessary.

If you think that was bad ━ let me tell you about the food. We ordered Sambal Tapa (also never heard of this before, but it has the word Sambal in it and has tuna as the main ingredient, so we thought it’d be good), Tum Bebek and Sambel Udang. The Tum Bebek was good enough when paired with the chilli paste condiment, and Sambal Tapa was flavourless.

But the utter disappointment was the Sambel Udang

If you are an Indonesian and I ask you to describe Sambel Udang, what comes to mind? Some prawns coated with red chilli paste version? Yes, ding ding ding. And if you are not an Indonesian, let me help you with a screenshot of a google search below.

And here Is the Sambel Udang served by the Bayleaf Balinese Indonesian restaurant in Cairns:

Sambal Udang is one of my favourite Indonesian dishes. So much so that it would be one of the first few dishes Amma cooks, together with Sayur Lodeh, whenever I visit them in Jakarta. And to be served Sambel Udang, which looked and tasted closest to the not authentic version of Thai Prawn Yellow Curry, was just a sore disappointment.

I am not going to tell you how much they charged for the whole meal as it would make my ancestors who migrated from India to Indonesia and their ancestors who emigrated from Bali to Cairns cry together for me and my bank account.

Indonesian Food Around the World series: A Cheat Sheet for Indonesian Food in London / Rijsttafel-ing Indonesian Food in Amsterdam / Indonesia Food in Zurich My Most Expensive Meal in Switzerland / Authentic Indonesian Food in Seoul at Bakso Bejo Korea / It’s Java Authentic Indonesian Street Food in Auckland / Makan A Celebration of Indonesian Cuisine in Melbourne / Rasa Rosa A So So Indonesian Food in Canberra / Indonesian Restaurants in Cairns.

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