Ribenkoff

Central Park has been developed. A lot. 

Listed as one of new hangout place in Jakarta, many new restaurants opened their outlet here. This one is Ribenkoff. I ate this few months ago. The last time I saw, it changed its name. I forgot the name though. ;p

The place was pretty vacant when I came in. They had outdoor seats too. For me, nothing special with the decoration. I mean, it was good, but  a lot of restaurants have good decoration. So nothing became unique anymore. 

Chicken Steak. Seriously, this dish was horrible. It came in not-big portion, and  the meat was tasteless. Fortunately, the sauce was tasteful, even it taste like a bunch of MSG. Anyway, the french fries was kinda a lot. 

Chicken Cordon Blue. The chicken was juicy. Unfortunately, it was also tasteless. Oh, and it served with spaghetti which was also tasteless. ;(
I think they have to put some more flavor into their dishes. 

Strawberry juice. I forgot how much it costed me, approximately 18-20K IDR. And again, I was disappointed. First it came, they even didn't strain it, so I asked the waitress to strain. Then, it tasted literally like strawberry and water. They didn't put any milk into it. Seriously, 20K for a juice with no milk? That's crazy. I mean, Ribenkoff wasn't a high end restaurant. Plus, they put a lot of ice cubes into the glass. I wonder how much their capital budget for a glass of strawberry juice was. So bad. 

Another thing that turn me off was their menu book was like in food court. It's only a clear holder. It looked cheap. 


Anyway, since they had change their name, I hope they also change their quality. Amen. 






Ribenkoff
3rd Floor Central Park Mall
 Jl. Let. Jend S. Parman Kav 28. 
Jakarta 11470.
 Phone: +6221-5698-5599

Starbucks Holiday Gathering

Holaaa! Sorry for late update, my owner been so busy lately. :(

Anyway, last 9 November 2011, I was invited to Starbucks Holiday Gathering. Yeiy me!

So bad, because of the traffic, i came late and missed some activities. 

Look! The backdrops.
I saw the brand manager of Starbucks, I forgot her name, but I knew she's a Filipino.
Starbucks held this gathering in order to introduce their holiday menu. This holiday menu only available during holiday season (year end). As well as there were also some new holiday menu.
As you read from my former Starbucks experience (click here to read again), Starbucks Indonesia had launched Starbucks VIA. And now they had Starbucks VIA Christmas Blend, so you may brew the christmas blend by yourself at home.
Christmas blend itselves (it has 2 variants; Starbucks christmas blend and Starbucks Christmas Blend Espresso Roast) only available during holiday season since 1985.

Say hello to Blueberry & Strawberry Cream Cheese Cake. These are their holiday menu. Cheerful colors reflect holiday spirit. There's cream cheese in the middle and blueberry/strawberry jam on the top. NYUM!
With a hint of blueberry/strawberry pieces, balancing the rich cream cheese. Nice! :)

Raspberry temptation. Don't worry. This was just the bite size. The true size was way bigger than this. It consisted of 3 layers: vanilla sponge cake, cheeese cream, and raspberry jam. I loved it! Yeah, it's so tempting.

Cranberry Scone. Well, this wasn't my fave, but this was okay. Better be eaten while warm. ;)
A mixture of cranberry and walnut, with white chocolate decoration upside. Tasted a bit crunchy outside.

Calling out all salty lovers! This Holiday Beef and Egg Bagel was the only salty holiday menu here. ;)
Anyway, out of expectation, it tasted very nice. Consisted of bagel, cheese, union, scrambled egg,and mayo. The bagel wasn't too hard, very suitable for my 'morning snack'. The scrambled egg also nice. They put some seasoning in it. I heard they put a kind of veggie into the season. Nice. Means, increasing the nutrition contained by the dish. ;p

And this time, I found this Cranberry Oatmeal Cookies in the goodie bag! Whoaaaa. FYI, it tasted very very very nice. Me super loved it. I ate all of these in half hour! lol
The cookies wasn't too dry, crunchy, not too sweet, and healthy. ;p

Go! Curry

Curry. Curry. Curry. Many things could come up in curry. Chicken, beef, pork, seafood, or anything. 

Go! Curry is one of tenants that has curry as their main menu. They serve many kind of curry; Japanese, Indian, Thai, etc. I'm not sure what kind of other curry, but they have many mascotts representing where the curries come from. 

After opened their first outlet at Cilandak Town Square, now they had opened at Pacific Place too. Go! Curry bring the new concept, that eating curry not always be troublesome. So they offer a simple and modern ambience to their customer. 

To order here, there are 3 steps you have to do. 

First, choose the curry. They have (approximately) 5 kinds of curry. 

Second, choose your meat. Chicken, seafood, beef, pork, lamb. Your call. :)

Third, choose your rice. Long grain, cilantro rice, butter rice. 

Voila!And finally, Happy eating! :D

Chicken Katsu with Rogan Josh Curry and Cilantro Rice (56K).
Rogan Josh is the curry with high tense of spiciness. Even the waitress warned me when I ordered one. This is their specialities. 
Well, it's hot. Just as I expected. :)
The chicken katsu was nice, crunchy outside, and juicy inside. The chicken cutlet wasn't too thick, and not too thin either. The curry was not thick. Good for me, so I didn't feel full easily. ;p
The rice has good fragrant, I loved it. 

Zesty Cheese Chicken with Brown Curry and Long Grain Rice (56K).
Zesty chicken was cube cuts of chicken. Same as the katsu, the chicken was juicy and nice. First they grilled it first than put it into the curry. So we could smell the smoked chicken. Oh, I loved it. 
Brown curry is Japanese curry. This curry wasn't spicy. Smell like Japanese curry (of course it was). To be honest I prefer Rogan Josh. It had something special that I rarely could find anywhere else. 
The long grain rice was just okay. It's just plain rice. :)

Butter Naan (19K).
They only had few choices for naan. Actually I wanted a sweet one, but apparently thay didn't have any. So I tried this. Naan is kind of bread. Click here to find out more about naan. this naan remind me of prata. But naan is thicker and drier. 
Anyway, the taste was just so so. It even tasted plain. I thought it would go well with the curry. So bad this dish didn't come with curry. :(




Cilandak Town Square, 1st Floor Unit C127
Pacific Place Jakarta, 4th floor Unit 4-01
http://go-curry.com/

Pesto Autentico

The other Italian restaurant in Jakarta! Pesto Autentico located in the heart of big city, its name easily spread  and known among people. The next question is how good are they? Could they win from another Italian restaurant? 

Complimentary bread welcoming me when I came in. :)

So bad it wasn't warm so even I was in hunger, I just ate 2 slices of them. The bread was a bit rough but after I bit, it became soften. 

Spaghetti Firmati - To be honest, I thoughht this kind of restaurant would give such standard portion. But it came to my table, surprise surprise! The plate was huge. Oval shaped, about 30x15cm big. Not only the plate, the dish itself also came in huge portion. Enough for 2-3 persons I guess. Whoah! Lets try how it tasted like. Spaghetti Firmati was spaghetti with prawn, clams, squid, organic cherry tomatoes, and white wine sauce. The spaghetti was al dente, nice texture, and the sauce was very very nice. The prawn was crunchy which means it was fresh. Everything just fine, except the squid which was overcooked. Yeah, squid is one kind of meat that easily done. But overall, I guess this dish was over my expectation. :)

Going to Italian restaurant without ordering pizza is like walking without shoes. So I determined to order one; Rustica. The waiter said this was one of their recommendation. The pizza's diameter was about 30cm. Not too thick yet not too thin. Crunchy on the side, but bready in the middle. Me lovey. The toppings were tomato sauce, mozzarella, cooked ham and mushrooms. Well, I was hoping for more toppings, but no probs, this was okay. 

Panna Cotta. Funny, they don't write dessert in the menu. So I asked, and there were only 3 kinds of desserts available, and I tried this. Apparently I have nothing to regret. I love this panna cotta! 
The texture was thicker that pudding, but light enough to be called as dessert. Smell like lychee and milky. Actully I'm thinking to try to make this at home. :p

Hot chocolate. Came in a tall glass. Pretty thick chocolate and not sweet. Nice.

I heard they still have a lot of good pasta. I hope I could make another visit. Anybody? ;)

Pesto Autentico 

UOB Plaza - Thamrin Nine, UG Floor, Jl. MH. Thamrin No.10,

Tel: 29937230 

Tan n Tan

If you happen to Miniapolis, Plaza Indonesia, you might find a red and white chinese restaurant just right beside the baby-gym. Yeah, its name is Tan n Tan. As I walked through in, the place was still vacant at 11.00 am. But as the lunch time coming, the place was, slow but sure, pretty crowder.

I read, this restaurant was founded by 2 different Mrs. Tan, who were bestfriends and they fancy to have a modern chinese restaurant. So that's how Tan n Tan created.  

Pork Mee (36,5K). First thing I noticed was this restaurant served pork. Hardly find pork in Chinese restaurant that located in malls. Basically, pork mee was noodle that covered with tomato & chilli sauce, served in a big white bowl with two meatballs, beansprouts, fish ball, and fried pork fat (we usually call it cuyucha). First, I was annoyed by the smell of tomato sauce. I hated it. But then I tried, and it turned out to be better and better then. The bad news is the fried pork fat  was smell bad. I mean it's like had been kept for a long time, so it became musty. 

Bakso Goreng - Fried Chicken Meatball (19,5K).  Actually, this one didn't disappoint me. Pretty nice. Crunchy outside, soft inside. Tasted salty and savory. They put minced chicken and prawn together, mixed it with spicies, than repeatedly threw it forcefully. Yeah, that's how you make fried meatball. :)

Bakuteh (59,8K). As a chinese restaurant that served pork, of course Bakuteh is one of their speciality, and I wouldn't miss an opportunity to try one. :D

Served in a big hot bowl with a small bowl of cakwe, the smoke and smell was going through wherever. 

Filled with some kinds of fungi, yeah, chinese herbal recipes is the main idea of this dish. The pork was nice, not too hard to chew, yet not too soft. The broth tasted a bit tasteless, but the smell was so strong.

Compared to other chinese restaurant in malls, this one seemed pretty edible and nice. 

Compared to my owner's mother and grandma cooking, this one seemed horrible. :)

Ice Cocktail (27,5K). After tasting a lot of oily thingy, I thought I should eat some fruits to make myself balance. :p
So I tried this cocktail. First glance, it looked so colorful and fresh. It was shaved ice at the bottom, with fruits on its top, showered by liquid sugar. The fruits were strawberry, orange, watermelon, pineapple, and melon. I tried, then felt something wrong. Ah, I realised there was canned fruit, that made the taste became weird. Please, for 27K cocktail in this little bowl, you shouldn't use canned fruit. I really really really against it.Moreover if you put the water of canned fruit into it. Geez! It wasn't edible anymore. I even spit it out my mouth. Big disappoinment to me. 

Overall, my visit was just so so. The waiter/ess were friendly and helpful. :)




Plaza Indonesia, M.H. Thamrin Kav. 28 – 30, Tanah Abang, L3 # E45, Jakarta Pusat