Geprek or Pass
Baby in the sun like the Teletubbies
International YIMBY Zeitgeist Indonesian products: the Bali cinematic universe, a flash-in-the-pan rapper, batik (drip for the listening bar, not a wedding), kopi luwak maybe some stylish food and drink, or asking their university mates to bring back some kreket. More broadly - the extent of posh DINKYs engagement with the country, at least in my experience, seems to be either stunted comments related to S-named dictators, something about Gojek and the youngness of the population making it investable, or knowing which satay stall to go to at Lau Pa Sat (the Glasgow-cast iron hawker centre that was assembled in the CBD about ~130 years ago); not sure which stall it is but the beverage move is an iced teh halia at the kopitiam facing the steps leading inside (AA insight). I didn’t get the chance to try a ‘sandwich rendang’ which some places in Amsterdam seemed to have had (wasted time at a ‘cyberpunk sando’ spot instead).
Couldn’t be me..
I’ve been to Indonesia about a dozen times I think, from Denpasar-Seminyak-Nusa Dua to Balikpapan, Banjarmasin-Samarinda, Medan(?), and mostly Jakarta. I can’t say I remember the minutiae of these trips, other than sitting alone at Three Buns on a hot day and going to an ‘extremely good Shisha cafe’ with someone I wasn’t really friends with, which was so extremely good it had its own theme song. I think I went to an ASS-club-era t-shirt popup, a handout I have since lost. A funny haunted-cartel-themed speakeasy seems to have since closed. I don’t own any Indonesian cookbooks or particularly follow any content from the country either - not looking particularly hard or intentionally avoiding.
Having lived in Singapore before the UK, my family had a couple of restaurants we’d frequent - driven to by my Indophile father, an identity assumed as a result of a blue-blooded Islander roommate at a WASPy Boston school. I remember Bumbu, the well-loved post-masjid Abrar Pagi Sore, and various sup buntut and sup kambing stalls (from the mamak run Haji M. Abdul Rajak and bib-gourmanded (…) Bahrakath). At Edinburgh the particularly active Malay and Indonesian students association would have events throughout the year with aunties serving up styrofoammed tapau boxes of nasi padang and takeaway cups of bandung or iced milo, and maybe someone would have brought back a kueh laips legit to microwave and eat dunked in milkmaid. There was a WhatsApp group for homestyle deliveries once a week as well. All this goes to say I know what my eyes-closed orders are - nasi goreng ikan bilis, ayam penyet, all rendangs, gado-gado, tempe goreg, pisang goreng, the soups, whole fried crispy fish.
At Orient Xpress Kitchen - a permanent fixture inside of Fish Bone, an ordinary-seeming, perhaps Arab or Greek-owned chippy underneath the BT-Tower (of Coldplay fame, obviously), angry seeming employee in an increasingly loud voice kept telling me I broke the door. “Is this yours?” “Yes” “You broke the door” “Excuse me?” “You broking the door mate…” proceeds to pick up my bike and pivot it out of the door way “it was blocking the door…so I moved it for you:)” not so angry after all really. I look at the daily specials which are both on a blackboard outside and a whiteboard inside, and the laminated permanents.
After learning that geprek and penyet might be synonyms, I decide to get one of those, a nasi goreng with some fried anchovies added (off-menu request), and half a portion of rendang to take home. Their compliance with my (perfectly reasonable for a canteen but unsure for a central London restaurant) requests made me up. The geprek, which arrived with a strawberry granita glisten, seemed to be more akin to a zinger-schnitzel cutlet covered in sambal, while I’ve nary seen a penyet topped with anything except a floss/chicken crumb of sort. As seen at Ayam Penyet Ria. The Maggi redolent soup was a comforting side - a spoonful in between bites of uniformly textured tempeh and XXL quavers-shaped kropek.
I brought home the nasi-goreng ikan bilis, beef rendang, unexpected grilled chicken, and additional kropek - and had a bite of just the fried rice. The instant salted-fish+belacan hit sent me to MacKenzie Rex. Oriental Xpress Kitchen, which seems to have just opened, would definitely feature in a not-Pret Oxford Circus list redux. Up and across the road is Noddle & Snack, a Mainland-Chinese student at UOL canteen, a highly visible format of which there are 2-3 dozen now; OXK is a bit different. A nice pause.
Other bits
Devotion now definitely has the best selection of retail beans: SEY, Onyx, La Cabra, Kawa, Tim Wendelboe, Fulgen, Koppi, Manhattan, Coffee Collective, KAWA, DAK, every version of Ozone (instant, Nespresso, whole), something from Upper Cloosh I got.
The Italian bean-selector from above is also friends with the people at Da Giovanna Deli which has an Eataly-rivalling selection of specialist Italian products. I got some saffron pecorino, E5 Bakehouse sdough, The Pasta Michele Portoghese long fusilli, anchovy paste, and a double-strength pesto.
Currently really enjoying reading the flavour thesaurus: more flavours, and the food bible, and revisiting Preserve Issue no. 4 - which i referenced in the preceding post.
